Luxury cruise line Regent Seven Seas Cruises has announced a new collaboration with the Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team. It’s a luxuriously high-speed partnership, and one that Regent is eager for travel advisors to embrace and highlight for their clients.
“We are so excited to be partnering with the Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team,” said Shawn Tubman, senior vice president of sales and trade marketing for Regent. “This pairing of two iconic luxury brands means our travel partners will have the opportunity to tap into a new affluent audience and enjoy more selling opportunities through our unique Spotlight Voyages. We’re also very happy to be offering advisors a chance to win a once-in-a-lifetime Aston Martin Aramco VIP race experience day in Miami to celebrate this partnership."
The multi-year collaboration will extend to guest driving experiences and excursions to the premier automotive brand’s AMR Technology Campus in Silverstone, Northamptonshire, England. And the Regent logo will be applied to the AMR24 race car, drivers’ race suits and all official apparel donned by the team at races.
We checked in with Andrea DeMarco, president of Regent Seven Seas Cruises, as well as Steve Odell, the line’s new chief sales officer, to learn more about the latest happenings with the brand.
Luxury travel often includes access to exclusive sights or experiences. Is that the aim with this partnership?
DeMarco: We want to make sure that we’re [aligned] with other like-minded luxury brands, and that we can tap into and curate experiences together. One [such experience] is this game-changing partnership with the Aston Martin Aramco Formula One Team. We're going to create exclusive experiences for our luxury travelers. Think: curated programs on shore; Spotlight Voyages where you can meet some of the Formula One team from Aston Martin; and real immersion in this combined world of luxury and high-performance motor racing.
How does Regent’s new “Immersive Overnights” program fit into that?
DeMarco: We're always looking to find new and creative ways for our guests to really immerse themselves in destinations. And so, we're testing out new immersive overnight itineraries, and they’re beautiful. They are for guests who want something different — maybe guests who've never cruised before, who have been more land-based vacationers. They can go to four marquee ports of call and stay overnight and really get to experience these destinations, not just during the day in so many hours, but with a more culturally diverse experience. So far, they've been a pretty big hit for us.
We're always looking to find new and creative ways for our guests to really immerse themselves in destinations.
Odell: It's a big opportunity to look outside the bubble of cruising and into the broader luxury market. Traditionally, we've always tried to put in as many ports as we can to [help] people experience the different countries.
We're getting a lot of great feedback [on Immersive Overnights] from regular guests already. If we can make these a success, which I absolutely am confident of, then we'll obviously expand this program. It's sort of turning the way we do things on its head, trying something completely different; that's sort of where we're trying to go with the brand. We're trying to get out of the box, think differently, think laterally — and I think this is a very good example of that.
In the world of luxury cruising, Regent has historically been considered the most all-inclusive. What is the brand doing now to sustain or even elevate that market position?
DeMarco: The unrivaled experience that we deliver is the most inclusive luxury experience. Everything from before you even get to the cruise to what’s included onboard: all of the dining, all of the amenities, all of the shore excursions. We have more than 4,000 free unlimited shore excursions across the 550 destinations we visit. And then you combine that with the space that we have onboard our ships — we offer unrivaled space at sea.
But we're always looking for new [things to try]. How do we raise the bar? How do we become more innovative? And I think you'll hear us talk more about this as we look into the future.
How do we raise the bar? How do we become more innovative? I think you'll hear us talk more about this as we look into the future.
Odell: I think it has become rather a clouded issue, because everyone's claiming to be inclusive. But we are always encouraging our travel partners and customers to look beneath the surface and see what the inclusions really are, because they are different between the brands. It isn't always about price. It's about value, and luxury customers are very savvy about that.
DeMarco: One of the things we've really focused on is showing the value comparisons, and how it could compare it to a land-based vacation. So, [advisors can] sell that value. And, of course, being that we are the higher-priced cruise fare, that gives our travel partners “commissions with a comma,” as we like to say it.
How is the 2024 wave season going?
DeMarco: Wave season has been great. We've got our best promotions in the market now; it's definitely the time for advisors to capitalize on some of the richest offers and extra bonuses, such as bonus commissions and gift cards and other types of value-adds that we're giving to our travel partners. You'll see us continue to innovate in this space too, because I want to make sure that we're empowering and elevating our travel partners to have the best business and grow with us.
