Well, it's time to talk about everybody's favorite topic, which is the price of going on a cruise. Cost is the, well, number one reason why you will or will not go on a cruise, I feel like. And when you evaluate the vacation cost out there, it's one of the first things you're to look at. And it's really no surprise to anybody listening to this podcast that, in fact, prices for a cruise this year are higher than they were last year. In fact, Real Carbine talked about this during its earnings call. We're going to do the good cop bad cop. Today is the bad cop. We're going to give you the bad news. Next week on the podcast, we'll have the good news. But in the meantime, I want to talk about the higher prices because this is a topic that everybody is always asking about and real caregiving gave some context for it. I mean, real

Caribbean during their earning call, and again, they're talking to Wall Street analysts. So remember,

Wall Street is interested in profitability and outlook and all the reasons why stockholders should

invest in the company. And during the course their earnings call, they talked about, obviously, their rates and where they are. And there was a question that was asked about some of the rates, especially for next year and all that. And Wilhelmine Group CEO, Jason Liberty, talked a little bit about it saying, quote, we actually think we're in an optimal book position. We are at rates that are, I think, higher than we probably thought they would be at, what you think is a really good thing. As we see really strong demand, and people are dreaming more and more about their aviation experiences, and we're also seeing that translate to onboard spend. And so we're thoughtfully meeting our guests with the experiences, and they're willing to pay for them, end quote. This is a very important quote, because in my opinion, it shows a couple things. Number one, yeah, it's not your imagination. The cost of a cruise costs more today than it did a year ago. But people are also willing to pay it, which is the most important thing about this, because a company can charge really any price for their cruise. There's, there's no limit on that. But at the end of the day,

you need to have enough, you know, business demand to meet that. Otherwise, you're not going to get that, right? And Roy's always playing that game with how do they make it up there. How do they kind of meet that, that sweet spot of demand, price, and whatnot? Now, I'm not here to defend real for his pricing strategy after all just like any of you i prefer to pay less for my vacations i prefer to pay less for

really anything price and whatnot. Now, I'm not here to defend real agreement's pricing strategy. After all,

just like any of you, I'd prefer to pay less for my vacations. I prefer to pay less for really anything if I can, so I keep more money in my pocket. The reality is, I mean, everything's gone up in price over the last couple of years. But I think Royal Caribbean, especially, their fairs have gone up, but also the quality of the product has gone up. I mean, Real Caribbean is investing heavily right now in some of the new innovations that we're seeing, not only in

cruise shifts, That's traditionally where you've seen that innovation, you know, of course, the icon class. I don't take anything away from that. But we're also seeing, of course, the development of a number of private destinations. And that is going to fundamentally change what it's like to go on a Royal Caribbean cruise versus other lines.

I've talked about this in articles and other videos here, but the ecosystem that Real

Crimin calls it, that they're building where you're going to have ships, you're going to have

perfect days and you're going to have beach clubs and then, you know, Labideon and Llepa,

they're not beach clubs, they're not perfect days, they're just this other thing. then, you know, Labideon, Llepe, they're not beach clubs or not,

beach clubs, they're not perfect days, they're just this other thing. Anyway, you have all

that together. You really do have like a completely different approach to a vacation than other

lines simply just have a cruise ship or just have a cruise ship that visits one private island

they may have in the Caribbean.

There's just a lot more to it.

And I think that's where they're really going with it.

There was actually an interesting comment by Mr. Liberty at another part of the call where he talked about,

I think because of our differentiated assets with our ships and our destinations and our ability to keep our guests inside of our ecosystem, and we are seeing a draw from

other ecosystems coming into our ecosystem that we're able to not only manage the demand,

but we're also able to see our guests pay up to experience our delivery.

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