Building and delivering the world’s second largest cruise liner has added €1 billion to the French economy, official data shows.
The Royal Caribbean ship, named the Utopia of the Seas, has 2,834 cabins, 18 decks, five swimming pools, eight hot tubs, 3 waterslides, and 21 dining venues. She weighs in at 236,473 gross tonnage. The only bigger liner in the world, the Icon of the Seas, also belongs to Royal Caribbean.
Costing $1.3 billion and taking two years to build, the Utopia was the sixth so-called “Oasis-class” vessel commissioned by Liberian-incorporated and Miami-based Royal Caribbean. She is the first vessel in the class to be powered by liquefied natural gas and is the 28th ship in their fleet.
Revised growth forecasts
Constructed at French government-owned Saint-Nazaire’s Chantiers de l’Atlantique shipyard in Brittany, she alone added 0.3% to French economic output from April to June 2024, and gave French exports a 0.6% shot in the arm, according to figures released by the French national statistics office INSEE (Institut National de la Statistique et des Etudes Economiques).
Those numbers, alongside an assumption of increased consumer spending associated with the Paris-hosted Olympic Games have been enough to prompt the French finance minister, Bruno Le Maire, to revise the government growth forecast made in February.
“We will probably have growth after all that is better than the 1% forecast in February,” Le Maire said, adding that the last two years in France had seen better than anticipated economic results. “For two years, France has outperformed; our economic policies work and are giving tangible results.”
The “ultimate weekend gamechanger”
The Utopia of the Seas set sail on her maiden commercial voyage on 19 July 2024, from Florida’s Port Canaveral, destined in the short term to be a “party boat”, targeting the youth segment with marketing materials boasting of “the ultimate weekend gamechanger” and official posts on X reaching out to the demographic using youth-speak such as “Hope your timeline’s ready for the FOMO” (Fear of Missing Out) and “Matching PTO is the ultimate friendship flex” (Paid Time Off)
Online information focuses on short three or four night cruises with prices for the Bahamas starting from just $421 (€385) per person. The Royal Caribbean website promises “the world’s biggest weekend”, and highlights the Utopia’s sailings to CocoCay, a destination voted “Best Private Island” by Travel Weekly readers for four years running.
Meanwhile, the work continues at the Chantiers de l’Atlantique, one of the world’s largest shipywards, with another unnamed Oasis-class, 231,000 tonne Royal Caribbean ship on order for delivery in 2028.
