Passenger complaints have led some cruise ships to eliminate smoking sections on board, including Crystal Cruises, who announced Monday that they will ban all indoor area smoking, excluding the Connoisseur Club smoking lounge.
Some designated smoking areas on deck will still be allowed, but all smoking in cabins, Crystal Cove lobby lounges and Pulse and Luxe nightclubs are now verboten, according to a recent USA Today article.
This new police will take hold with the first voyages in 2014, says Gregg Michel, Crystal president.
These days, he said, smoking indoors is not as popular as it previously was, and Crystal had to accommodate that societal shift.
"We have received considerable feedback [on smoking] and we listened," he wrote in a statement that came alongside the announcement. "Our policies have evolved as lifestyles have changed. The majority of our guests worldwide are non-smoking, and travelers are used to more non-smoking environments today."
Michel also noted that more than a few areas of Crystal ships have been designated as non-smoking for a few years now. Most of their restaurants and entertainment lounges, and even cabin balconies in fact, are smoke-free.
Cabin interiors were still safe places to light up, until this revision came about.
Crystal's new rules follow a trend Carnival, Princess and Holland America cruise ships started in 2011, when Tim Gallagher, vice president of public relations at Carnival, echoed the sentiments that Michel expressed on Monday.
He also acknowledged that the times had changed, and the large portion of his passengers were non-smokers, according to a Frommers article two years ago.
"Considering that nearly 90% of our guests are non-smokers, we wanted to make sure our shipboard experience aligns with today's guest preferences," he said.
Crystal will establish this new rule exactly one year after rival luxury cruise line Silversea forbade smoking in cabins.
This article is copyrighted by Travelers Today, the travel news leader
