Scenic Tours company's plans in 2020 to take on full management of its entire European riverboat fleet of ships navigating on the rivers Danube, Rhine, Main, also in France (Seine, Saone, Rhone) and Portugal (Douro). The company had been managing 6 of the ships in the fleet internally since 2017. G&P Cruise Hotel Management had been handling 5 boats.
In a written statement Scenic Group's COO Rob Voss said that the decision to take back the management function of the 5 ships was not related to performance, but necessary for "absolute product consistency and delivery" fleetwide. The move would also help it benefit from increased purchasing power. And more importantly, having the entire hospitality crew employed and managed by Scenic would standardize career and training paths.
Scenic has grown over the course of the company's 33-year history to include ocean and river cruises and escorted land tours. Scenic offers river cruises in Southeast Asia, Russia, Egypt and Europe on 15 newbuild boats, while the sisterbrand Emerald Waterways has 7 ships (aal deployed in Europe) with an 8th launched in 2019 on Mekong River. Also in 2019, Scenic launched its first megayacht - the 228-passenger Scenic Eclipse.