Logistics and Toursim International Research Journal

Supply Chain Management: The Case Of Cruise Sector In Greece And Italy

Mihail Diakomihalis

Accounting and Finance Department, University of Ioannina, Psathaki, Preveza, 48100, Greece

Nikolaos-Marios Diakomichalis

University of the Aegean (MSc) Business Consultant, Thessaloniki, Greece

Keywords: cruise company, supply chain management, outsourcing decision

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Abstract

:  Τhe paper investigates the factors that affect and influence the choice for own supply chain or outsourcing of a cruise company, within the frame of the different cruise ship size and the operation in dissimilar geographic area, considering also the factors of differentiated Cruise Product, the Characteristics of the cruise company and of the passengers, the cost and the supply strategy of the company, as to their  participation in the final alternative supply decision of a cruise itinerary. For the purposes of this research, a small deluxe cruise company, offering specialized programs and a larger mass cruise company, headquartered in Greece and operating East- Mediterranean, are compared between them, as well as with another couple of these types of companies headquartered in Italy, and operating Central Mediterranean were selected for a comparison study. The methodology applied is the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) which is a flexible multi-criteria method for decision making and priorities ranking. “Passenger characteristics” is the most significant Criterion for the Italian SCC and LCC, while “Cost” and “Supply strategy” are the most significant Criteria for the Greek SCC and LCC respectively. “Characteristics of cruise company” seems to be the least important Criterion for the Italian SCC and for the LCC of both countries. “Supply strategy” depicts the greatest difference between the Greek LCC (1^st) and SCC (6^th) but also between the Italian SCC (2^nd) and the LCC (3^rd).