An update from Josh Weinstein

As I’m sure you’ve heard many times already, these are truly unprecedented times for all of us both personally and professionally. The current global health emergency is having a huge impact on the lives and lifestyles of people around the world and, of course, on the travel sector globally – for the UK we haven’t even reached the peak of this crisis yet.

As you know, with ports and whole countries closing their borders we took the decision to suspend our cruise operations for a bit, along with the rest of the cruise industry.  Now, with our ships coming home, our teams are all doing their best to overcome the travel restrictions now imposed by many nations to ensure all our Guests, and those crew members who are due to return home, can do so.

In the meantime, with this pause we can focus on protecting the bright future of our brands—weathering this storm and coming out the other side. To do this, we’ve had to, and will need to continue to, be determined and courageous in making decisions and setting our priorities for the coming months, which I wanted to share with you all…
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1. Your safety and wellbeing
First and foremost the safety and wellbeing of all our people is mission critical to us. For both our colleagues on board and the teams in in Southampton, we continue to follow the guidance of the UK Government and Public Health England to ensure we continue to do the right thing by you all. It’s tough for you folks on board for whom we’ve had to suspend shore leave – this wasn’t a decision we took likely, recognising the significant impact it will have on your personal and social needs, but ultimately we’ve done this to give you the best chance of staying safe and well. For office-based colleagues ashore, many of whom are now forced to work remotely and balance two jobs – Carnival UK job and caring for dependents, we’re asking you to think creatively about what flexible working in this unique context could mean. It will challenge us to think differently and go to greater lengths to stay connected and collaborative – these are both good things.

2. Keeping our brands active
We need to remain focused on keeping the core functions of the company and our brands active and engaged, and ensure the effectiveness of our coronavirus working group. Aside from the fact that we’re still carrying Guests and crew home, we’re also still selling future cruises and we’re still running the business from top to bottom. In other words, pausing new voyages doesn’t mean we stop operating the business or stop preparing for our re-entry into the market. We can and will return to the market, stronger and better as business.

3. Ensuring we’re operating sustainably
It’s also crucial that we recognise the macro-economic environment in which we’re operating. As shore colleagues heard me say on the floor walks a couple of weeks ago, throw the 2020 plan we had developed in November 2019 out the window. We need to reprioritise, and create a new understanding of what’s important to the business and what’s not.  The fact is, Covid-19 has ground the travel industry to a halt, and is pretty much doing the same thing to society as a whole.  That means we need to ensure that we operate as efficiently as possible.  It means the business needs to retain as much cash and capital as possible during this downturn, and reducing cost wherever possible, so that we can come out stronger and wiser, ready to take advantage of the opportunities the future has for our brands.  This isn’t just a Carnival UK initiative, it’s corporate-wide across the world.

Touching on that point, I suppose now’s a good time to explain why I’ve been absent from Carnival House over the last 10 days.  No, I haven’t taken a holiday.  I’ve actually been back in Miami working at Carnival HQ.  As many of you already know, I’ve been asked to help lead a corporate-wide effort to preserve capital which will support the company’s ability to weather the Covid-19 crisis.  I planned to be back in the UK next week, and then bounce back and forth over the next couple of months splitting my time between the US and the UK.  Well, Covid-19 has scuttled those travel plans too so it looks like I’ll be here through at least mid-April.

Having said that, I only said yes to Arnold’s request because I had 100% confidence in the abilities of our Executive Leadership Team, our Senior Leaders and every single team member at Carnival UK, ship and shore.  I’m on video calls with my team daily, and in contact with many others as well.  And based on what I’ve seen over the last couple of weeks, my decision and assessment of the Carnival UK team was absolutely spot on.  I could not be prouder of the way everyone has come together, supported each other, and led Carnival UK through the most volatile time I’ve ever seen in my life (I’m not talking 18 years at Carnival Corporation, I’m talking 45 years walking the planet).  Which leads me to the last point…

4. Continue to live by our Values
We need to continue to live by our values, be there for one another and continue to work better together. At a time where many of us won’t be face-to-face with each other, it’s that much more important to remain in contact, continue to meet virtually, have your 1:1’s, stay tuned to what’s happening in the business through our communication channels and most importantly, take care of yourselves, your loved ones and each other.

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Our teams both ship and shore have performed heroically during this crisis, not only safeguarding our Guests and colleagues, but all the while trying to uphold our purpose and doing so in complete alignment to our core values.

In particular I’d like to call out our coronavirus working group who’ve been working 24/7 for nearly two months and our Contact Centre, including volunteers from across the business, who’ve all stepped up to help support our Guests. It’s truly humbling to see such dedication.

I don’t have a crystal ball and while I know we will get through this, I don’t know exactly when that will be.  But I do know that we have the pride, character and determination to get through it together, and be all the stronger for it.  Thank you all for your hard work in these difficult times.

Take care,

Josh

P.S. In answer to many concerned team members reaching out (which is truly appreciated) I did manage to get my American refugee family over on a flight two days ago, before the travel bans get even more severe.  They were planning to be in Miami for half term anyway, so we just pulled that forward a couple of weeks.  If you’re anything like me, you’ll feel that the most important thing in the world is your family and loved ones.  Keep yourself—and them—safe.