Mezeron & Steam Packet Master Thread

[Tempus Fugit]

I'm just waiting for some bright spark to spout up saying that BMC didn't sail tonight and inventing conspiracy theories and "chap in the pub" reasons for why it didn't

[thesultanofsheight]

The "Outside Tescos" Flyer

 

 

This is childishness in the extreme and the SPC should be ashamed of themselves. I don't like Tesco's at all but actually this could make me shop there as a protest. They refused to pay the high fares the SPC took them for, boo hoo ... apparently its not the Manx way. No, we're supposed to accept that we are being ripped off particularly when the government write an agreement conferring the right of someone else to rip us off.

Edited November 6, 2010 by thesultanofsheight

[Tempus Fugit]

 

 

This is childishness in the extreme and the SPC should be ashamed of themselves. I don't like Tesco's at all but actually this could make me shop there as a protest. They refused to pay the high fares the SPC took them for, boo hoo ... apparently its not the Manx way. No, we're supposed to accept that we are being ripped off particularly when the government write an agreement conferring the right of someone else to rip us off.

 

where does it say that was produced by SPCo ?

read the footer

[Andy730]

I'm just waiting for some bright spark to spout up saying that BMC didn't sail tonight and inventing conspiracy theories and "chap in the pub" reasons for why it didn't

 

Don't they sometimes have the odd Saturday evening off? I can recall seeing the Ben tied up here on the odd Saturday for a long time.

 

Not sure if it's due to lack of Freight required on a Sunday, or, some other reason, perhaps suitable time for maintenance?

 

I duno... But nothing to do with the on going discussion, that's for sure

 

perhaps someone 'in the know' can tell us the real reason why?

[Sean South]

Actually The Steam Packet should be laughing all the way to the Bank now but Woodward obviously isn't shrewd enough to realise it: They can easily bang up the Non freight prices now and use the Mezeron issue as the excuse.

Doesn't the user agreement prevent that as it limits fare increases to Manx inflation or Manx Inflation less 1/2%

Yeah. So they should tear up the user agreement. Allow Mezeron to use the Linkspan. Then the Steampacket can have the highground again in that they can increase their passenger fares and blame it on Mezeron. They can then use, said increase to lower the freight fares to see off Mezeron. You see? That's business as it should be... Comeptitive...

 

Unless Mezeron acquire a ro-pax vessel and then the real fun begins.... And, having done some homework on this the past few days, there's quite a few vessels Ro-Pax available nearby, just now, for both sale or charter...

 

So you can say for certain what the SP will do with regard to frequency of sailing etc. Seems to be that if and the word is If the SP cut back sailing to only that required by the User agreement it could have a negative impact on Tourism etc. If the SP sell the Snaefell that is potentially three round trips a day not operating during TT which is a few visitors not coming.

No. Of course I can't say for certain. If it was me I would be aggressively competing with Mezeron in the Sea... Not throwing my toys out of the pram and blaming my customers, the Government and anyone else that they can think of. If I was running the company and the impact was a severe as they claim it is I would: 1. Reduce the unneccessary sailings immediately. 2. I would do what Ryanair do when there is a crisis in the Airline industry such as 9/11 etc Discount the main fares and get bums on seats. Once you have people on board you have a captive audience and motivate the onboard staff to sell sell sell. I'd go and see Graylaw and whoever they lost and see what it will take to get them back on board. I'd kiss their asses instead of slagging them off in the media. And as for the TT? I'd make arrangements now to have Stena or whoever to run some sailings for me and I'd sell them like mad now! They ( Woodward and Co.) need to stop whinging and get on with running their business. And try and remember the customer from now on!!

 

 

And as for the comparisons of sailing numbers between 1995 and 2010, well, another huge red herring. 1995 was the infamous year that they messed up by chartering tha Lady of Man out to some foreign company (Spanish or Portugese iirc) and the deal to charter the seacat fell through so they were left with only the King Orry.

What you say may well be true about the Lady of Man and Sea Cat but that would not alter the Winter sailing figures when basically they are not used.

The winter sailings were up on the Summer sailings because the Lady came back from charter early October and they launched the Liverpool thursday to Sunday sailings prior to Orry's annual face lift.

Rubbish, As I've stated before they are pulling in at least £25 million on non freight business and that's with not much marketing effort. A viable business. If no other operator was interested (which is lost unlikely) I'd charter a vessel myself and run it.

They may well be pulling in the level of business you say and the amount of business may make for a viable company. But that dies not alter the fact that if a company losses asubstantial amount of income it is going to cut its costs. Basically that means less sailings both freight as it has less freight to transport and passenger as they are less profitable and out of "season" many sail with low loadings.

 

You from these postings and others seem to have real issues with the SP. I have no idea why but fine. Personally I could not care whether the SP stays in business or not. I do care about the level of service we receive in the Island which you in your Ivory Tower in Ireland do not give a monkey about. It seems as long as you see the end of the SP you will be happy.

 

As a resident of the IoM as I say I do not care about who provides our ferry links but I do care that they provide a reasonable passenger service, such a service may be incompatable with maximising profits. So rather than moan about the SP, hope they will go to the wall and being convinced somebody will step in to follow the please make a postive suggestions on ways of ensureing that whoever follows them operate in a way they will provide a reasonable level of service when such provision does not maximise profits. That is all I care about, not who provides the service but the level of service provided. Or as you live in Ireland I presume you simply may not care.

My only issues with the Steam Packet is that all you ever hear from it's CEO is whinging about unfair competition etc and his disgracefully insulting rant here earlier this year to a customer when he (CEO) was clearly incorrect in his assertions.

 

Also regarding your sly little dig at me not living on the Island, Yes. And I use the SP several times a year to travel home. I, like a lot of potential Irish based customers, would use them more if their sailings were user friendly ie weekend sailings to/from Dublin or Dun Laoire on a Friday and a Sunday/Monday instead of Thursday to Tuesday as it is too long. The Irish sailings have been too unreliable this year too. I guess the point of that was to justify killing off the route. Again, I have no problem with them cutting it altogether but if they do they should allow another operator a crack at it and allow them to use the linkspan at Douglas... Stena have a Seacat and a HSS hanging around much of the day in both Dublin and Holyhead since they cut the frequency of their fastcraft sailings this year and increased their ferry sailings...

 

Also this thing of them sailing from Dublin and Belfast is just daft. It's maximum an hour and a halfs drive from one to the other now so sailing fro one or other port would be quite sufficent. They need to cop on and get fit again and take on the competition. It looks like they have been dozing for the past decade thinking they were immune from competition and they got fat and lazy. This whole Mezeron thing could actually be very good for the island as it will force the Steam Packet to shape up.

Edited November 6, 2010 by Sean South

[Tempus Fugit]

I'm just waiting for some bright spark to spout up saying that BMC didn't sail tonight and inventing conspiracy theories and "chap in the pub" reasons for why it didn't

 

Don't they sometimes have the odd Saturday evening off? I can recall seeing the Ben tied up here on the odd Saturday for a long time.

 

Not sure if it's due to lack of Freight required on a Sunday, or, some other reason, perhaps suitable time for maintenance?

 

I duno... But nothing to do with the on going discussion, that's for sure

 

perhaps someone 'in the know' can tell us the real reason why?

 

you hit the nailon the head, I know the reason from lookimg at the schedule, and you know, but I was just waiting for someone to shoot their mouth off

[Andy730]

 

you hit the nailon the head, I know the reason from lookimg at the schedule, and you know, but I was just waiting for someone to shoot their mouth off

 

 

No doubt it will happen... but i'd still like to know the real reason

[thesultanofsheight]

 

 

This is childishness in the extreme and the SPC should be ashamed of themselves. I don't like Tesco's at all but actually this could make me shop there as a protest. They refused to pay the high fares the SPC took them for, boo hoo ... apparently its not the Manx way. No, we're supposed to accept that we are being ripped off particularly when the government write an agreement conferring the right of someone else to rip us off.

 

where does it say that was produced by SPCo ?

read the footer

 

Oh come on. It may have the union's name on it looks like its pure political jerrymandering by Woodward and Co. Nobody else would be daft enough to try this approach. It smacks of arrogance to blame one of your customers for not using you. Perhaps Shoprite staff should stand outside Tesco's next week handing out leaflets that accuse Tesco's of putting Shoprite workers out of work by simply existing?

Edited November 6, 2010 by thesultanofsheight

[Sean South]

I see this statement on their website:

STATEMENT ISSUED BY MARK WOODWARD, CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER, ISLE OF MAN STEAM PACKET COMPANY

 

Following recent press reports on comments I allegedly made about Shoprite’s use of alternative freight carriers to and from the Isle of Man I wish to apologise on behalf of the Steam Packet Company for any misleading impression given.

 

We can confirm that Shoprite, via its trading partnerships with 7 Manx hauliers, is still a valuable and committed customer of the Isle of Man Steam Packet Company. The Steam Packet Company is happy to withdraw any suggestion to the contrary.

 

Furthermore I have been made aware of, and am happy to recognise, the significant contribution that Shoprite makes to the Island’s economy by employing over 600 Manx workers and investing in, and supporting numerous other Manx domiciled businesses.

I note he says "comments I allegedly made". That implies that he doesn't believe he made the comments... Did he or didn't he? If he did then the said comments aren't "alleged". If he didn't make the comments, why is he apologising?

[lowell thurber]

 

you hit the nailon the head, I know the reason from lookimg at the schedule, and you know, but I was just waiting for someone to shoot their mouth off

 

 

No doubt it will happen... but i'd still like to know the real reason

got to be maintenance hasn't it some things surely can't be done on three hour turnarounds and sat nights must be quietest so makes sense

[pongo]

Oh come on. It may have the union's name on it looks like its pure political jerrymandering

 

Gerrymandering is when an electoral boundary or national border is drawn so as to secure and maintain a political and electoral majority for one particular faction or interest group - normally based on ethnicity, social class, religion etc ..

[thesultanofsheight]

Oh come on. It may have the union's name on it looks like its pure political jerrymandering

 

Gerrymandering is when an electoral boundary or national border is drawn so as to secure and maintain a political and electoral majority for one particular faction or interest group - normally based on ethnicity, social class, religion etc ..

 

I do have google ...

[pongo]

Oh come on. It may have the union's name on it looks like its pure political jerrymandering

 

Gerrymandering is when an electoral boundary or national border is drawn so as to secure and maintain a political and electoral majority for one particular faction or interest group - normally based on ethnicity, social class, religion etc ..

 

I do have google ...

 

So in what sense is it gerrymandering ?

[thesultanofsheight]

Oh come on. It may have the union's name on it looks like its pure political jerrymandering

 

Gerrymandering is when an electoral boundary or national border is drawn so as to secure and maintain a political and electoral majority for one particular faction or interest group - normally based on ethnicity, social class, religion etc ..

 

I do have google ...

 

So in what sense is it gerrymandering ?

 

And is what sense are you holding yourself up as Mr Pedantic tonight?

[pongo]

Oh come on. It may have the union's name on it looks like its pure political jerrymandering

 

Gerrymandering is when an electoral boundary or national border is drawn so as to secure and maintain a political and electoral majority for one particular faction or interest group - normally based on ethnicity, social class, religion etc ..

 

I do have google ...

 

So in what sense is it gerrymandering ?

 

And is what sense are you holding yourself up as Mr Pedantic tonight?

 

I am not being pedantic. I am asking a straight question. I am trying to understand what you mean by gerrymandering in this context.