The most surprising thing about the news this month that Richard Branson is getting into cruise travel is that it took him this long. The Virgin franchise is already epitomized by “perky” – at least the airline elements of it are, as Virgin Trains, cleaving through Britain along the West Coast Main Line, is a more foreboding experience – and, of course, there is no more perky way to travel that cruise liners. “Cruise ship entertainment” – long the insult of choice for such purveyors of sophistication as Simon Cowell – is perfectly suited to Branson’s existing style, and “Virgin Cruises” the perfect marriage of that style with a mode of delivery. You can see the reality show, already, right?
The clichéd idea of life onboard – all struggling entertainers and group-home type activities – is not, apparently, what Branson is aiming for. In the publicity material for the enterprise, which is still five years from launch, the emphasis is on a classy experience, with the Virgin fleet apparently drawing on “downtown Manhattan and SoHo” for inspiration.
His inspiration raises certain questions. Which bit of downtown Manhattan? Broadway on a Saturday afternoon a week before Christmas? The Lower East Side on garbage day? Murray Hill during Santacon? At sea for two weeks with a bunch of vomiting hipsters and suddenly the back end of Virgin economy on a full flight from Bangkok starts to look like an ideal way to travel.
What Branson means, obviously, is the SoHo of our Hollywood-based dreams, some 1990s version of a loft experience in which people mill about drinking cocktails and exchanging bon mots. It’s an empty and increasingly outdated marketing ploy, like those terrible bars in London named after New York neighbourhoods – or worse, the yuppie apartment complex currently going up in Tottenham, north London, in which the units are called things like Tribeca and Bushwick. (Seven Sisters is many things, none of them to do with artists’ lofts in New York).
On the other hand, cruise ships are about a fantasy anyway, so if you’re willing to buy into it, fair enough. What makes going on a cruise heinous to the rest of us is that which actively appeals to its fans: the fact that while you’re at sea, you exist in a state of suspended animation, outside the usual parameters of space and time. Things happen on cruise ships. They are the perfect locations for a novel, or a murder.
And Branson’s ability to ride certain cultural waves suggests that cruise travel might be due for a resurgence. In spite of the recent drop in oil prices, airline fares haven’t fallen at all and the holiday season is about to remind us how hideous the airport experience can be.
For instance, for about two minutes earlier this year, I actually thought about taking the Queen Mary back to London next summer as an alternative to wrestling two babies through airport security. Then I shuddered and came to my senses because, 10 years ago, I took the QE2 from Southampton to a docking area off the coast of Scotland (for work, not for fun). It was like a floating old age home, fraying at the edges, and totally skewed towards the American market. I remember being put out that they served pancakes and syrup rather than baked beans at breakfast.
Oh, and like a holiday camp you can’t escape from – or a social experiment designed specifically to mess with English people – if you entered the dining room alone, they made you sit at a table with somebody else and have a conversation. My dining companion was a convivial, elderly lady, who thought the ship would be nicer, she said.
But now, enter, Branson! If the entrepreneur is good at anything, it’s overcoming public relations disasters – and he will have his work cut out for him with the cruise industry. It has suffered one catastrophe after another in the last few years, from the capsizing of the Costa Concordia, to repeat outbreaks of the Norovirus, to the news this week that cruise ships are breeding grounds for sexually transmitted diseases. (Patrons are now advised to bring their own prophylactics.)
On the upside, Virgin cabin crews, frustrated entertainers all, will finally have an official venue for their talents, over on-stage at Virgin Cruises.
And whatever else you say about cruise liners, they do permit guests to get away from it all - even if it is via an interior journey brought on by vomiting and delirium.