00:00The city has got a lot to offer, great history and we'd love to see your passengers stay and spend their money here in Portsmouth.
00:19Exactly, I totally agree.
00:30I'm not sure if you pull on me, I'm not sure if you pull on me.
00:58Oh, it's great and I'm really pleased that Swan Hellenic are here.
01:19I did my honeymoon on a Swan Hellenic cruise leaving from Portsmouth so it is personally really lovely to see them back here.
01:28So it's yet another cruise company coming to Portsmouth, yet another new ship coming to Portsmouth.
01:33We've got almost 100 cruise ships visiting this year which is great.
01:38And what have you thought about the ship while walking around? It's definitely beautiful isn't it?
01:42It is lovely, a very, very new, as opposed to the old Swan Hellenic ship which was very, very old.
01:48So it's great to have such a lovely new modern ship coming here and I know that they would like to come back more often.
01:55They'd like to stay overnight so that their visitors are able to go and experience more of the city and that's great because then they all spend more money here.
02:03So for people who haven't seen the ship in the interior, how would you describe it?
02:07Oh, modern, top-rate, we specialise in doing boutique top-end cruise ships and this is one of them.
02:14So overall the port makes a profit of £8 million and that goes to the shareholders.
02:19The shareholders are the people who live in Portsmouth.
02:22We have to pay back debt from that but overall that brings millions of pounds that support services in Portsmouth that other councils can't do.
02:30That's why Portsmouth is not going bust as a council.
02:33While Sir Hampton has gone bust and the Hampshire County Council looks as if it's going to go bust in the next few months.
02:39So we're in a very, very different financial position, not just because of the port but because of long-term financial decisions the council has taken under all parties.
02:49But we've done it on a much more entrepreneurial way but working in ways with all parties in areas where we're experts, like the port.
03:02We know how to run a port so we do it and we run it profitably.
03:05And it's not just the money coming in directly from the ships coming in, it's also the tourists who come off and spend their money in Portsmouth.
03:10How much of an economic boost is that to the city on a day to their basis?
03:14Every ship that comes in puts about £1.5 million into the city economy.
03:20That's an awful lot for one day's ship coming in.
03:23And different people will do different things.
03:25The crew will queue to go to Primark and HMM in Commercial Road and come back with full bags.
03:32The tourists often want to go to the historic dockyard and things like that.
03:36People here are staying in local hotels before joining the ship today.
03:41So it's lots of different parts of the economy of the city that are benefiting.
03:45And finally, are you hoping that the port can potentially expand on the 9-4 cruise calls that they have this year?
03:52Yes, absolutely. And we're putting in the shore power now so that from the summer onwards when cruise ships come in they just plug into the mains.
04:00They don't have to run their engines just like the Brittany Ferries ones will do and that's going to be a real boon.
04:06We're a high-end boutique.
04:29It's a very good idea.
04:32This is not a good idea.
04:34It's not a good idea.
04:37I don't know.
04:39I'm really excited.
04:41I'm so excited.
04:42I'm so excited.
04:44I'm so excited.
04:46I'm so excited.
04:47I'm so excited.
04:48I'm so excited.
04:49Oh, OK.
04:53Oh, I can't just use something.
05:13But this adjoining, adjoining, and then what John always liked,
05:21and so is there a proper bar?
05:25Is this the type that you stayed in?
05:27No, no, no, no, no.
05:29The old one, Swamp Alec, used to be a rapid spice.
05:33You do look at that in the 1990s.
05:35That stopped being built in 1991.
05:37That is the Swamp Alec table.
05:39That is Swamp Alec table.
05:41It can be affordable for the kids.
05:45Sometimes they have grandkids.
05:47The grandparent and the parent, they cannot stay in.
05:50The mic has 14 children.
05:52Hold on.
05:58Thank you very much indeed.
06:00That's very kind.
06:02On your table on your own.
06:04Yeah, but that's your children.
06:06He's already assigning it for you.
06:10Sorry.
06:12How old did we go?
06:16Eight.
06:17There we are.
06:18They'll be well behind.
06:20Yeah, I mean, it's a beautiful ship.
06:34Very modern.
06:35It's only a couple of years old.
06:36And capable of taking shore power.
06:38I learned from speaking to the captain, which again is important for us because we're in the process of putting in shore power so that ships can plug in and run on our electric rather than run their engines when they're alongside at the port.
06:52In terms of the type of ship that we've got here.
07:08This is the kind of ships, the kind of business that, you know, our business plan was around attracting to Portsmouth.
07:15The whole boutique, the expedition cruising, you know, the high end passengers, which then will spend money in the city.
07:24And that is important to us.
07:26It's important to Portsmouth as a city.
07:28Speaking to the captain today, he would like to in future when he calls to stay overnight so that they can explore the city more, which is great.
07:37It's fantastic.
07:38I was going to say, how does that make you feel that essentially all these businesses want to expand their calls from just the original ones?
07:45So I think we have now built a really good reputation.
07:48We've got a USP now in terms of what we can offer.
07:51And, you know, the cruise liners that have been calling as multiple brands now that call, you know, you can see on the plaques on the wall behind me,
07:59the number of inaugural calls that we've had over the recent years and the different brands that keep coming into Portsmouth.
08:05You know, that we've got a good reputation.
08:08You know, we are growing, you know, when very close to that target of 100 calls, our initial target.
08:14And, you know, all of that is great for us.
08:18It's great for the city.
08:20And, you know, I feel very proud of the team and what the team are delivering here.
08:23The customer service that going that extra mile for the customers.
08:27So of the new businesses that haven't called in Portsmouth before, have they held like preliminary discussions with the port at all?
08:32Are you imagining that other new brands will be able to come in in the future?
08:35Yes.
08:36Yep.
08:37There are other brands out there.
08:38There are other targets.
08:39You know, we go along to cruise conferences.
08:43We speak to the brands.
08:45We tell them what we've got on to offer.
08:47You know, if you go back five years ago, the initial discussions pre pandemic, pre, you know, all the issues that happened over that period of time.
08:56Nobody really had a Portsmouth, not as a cruise port.
09:00But now when we go to those events, the cruise liners want to come to us.
09:05They come to us.
09:06They speak to us.
09:07They see what's on offer.
09:08They then look at the potential of booking itineraries, which we get two years in advance because it's a holiday.
09:14So they need to book it with us.
09:16And, you know, we've got new brands all the time every year, year on year.
09:22And we'll see that in the next few years.
09:24And finally, do you think that record of over 100 cruise calls can be met?
09:28And what would it mean for the city of Portsmouth if that was to happen?
09:31So that record will be met.
09:33You know, we wanted to meet that this year, but I think we'll see that next year.
09:37You know, then we'll start edging towards 150 calls.
09:40We're getting that exponential growth each year.
09:42And what it means for the city, you know, every time there's a cruise liner in here depends on the size of it.
09:48But we see up to a million and a half of spend in the city as a result of just one cruise call.
09:55So it's a huge economic opportunity for the city.
