— With three Seattle-based ships sailing out of Seattle for the five-month cruise season in 2008, Holland America Line contributed US$418 million to the Seattle economy and $576 million in Washington State. These numbers are up from $408 million and $502 million respectively in 2007. In 2009, the company will again base three ships in Seattle for 61 sailings and in 2010, a fourth ship will be based in Seattle sailing roundtrip 14-day cruises to Alaska.
In April 2008, Holland America Line also launched Ship to Shelter with the Port of Seattle to began donating reusable toiletries and other items for use by non profits serving people in need. The program will be continued this year at the new Smith Cove Terminal for cruise ships.
Contributing to the economic impact in 2008 is direct spending of $94,311,377 by the company in Seattle, US$67,541,087 for payroll and US$15,638,059 spent by passengers and crew in shops, restaurants, hotels, museums, local sightseeing attractions and taxicabs. Other expenditures include operating its corporate office, maintaining its ships and provisioning its fleet, plus port fees, charges and taxes.
In 2008, the 1,380 passenger ms Amsterdam, 1,848 passenger ms Oosterdam and 1,916 passenger ms Westerdam sailed roundtrip Seattle on a total of 59 cruises to Alaska with approximately 125,000 passengers.
“We remain committed to the Seattle region,” said Stein Kruse, president and chief executive officer. “Because of the demand for cruises departing from homeports in the United States, we will again have three ships based in Seattle sailing seven-day cruises to Alaska.”
Holland America Line’s economic impact includes maintaining a corporate headquarters in Seattle, local payroll, provisioning ships, passenger spending, crew spending, port fees and taxes, and marketing and sales expenditures in Washington State.
Since moving its headquarters to Seattle in 1983, Holland America Line has increased its fleet from two ships to 14 with a 15th due in summer 2010. The company works with 616 vendors in Seattle and 1,150 vendors across the state. These businesses range from local dairy companies who supply Holland America Line ships with $1.7 million in products each season to local vendors who will provide $4 million in printed collateral for the company.
Holland America Line provisions each ship every other week on the “turn around” sailings. Provisioning a ship means bringing aboard all of the supplies and food products needed for a sailing. For example, the Oosterdam requires some 23,040 eggs and 1,375 gallons of milk each week — coming from local farmers. In addition, local growers supply 147,550 pounds a week in fresh produce.
In 2009, ms Westerdam, ms Zaandam and ms Amsterdam will sail roundtrip seven-day cruises from Seattle. The Westerdam and Amsterdam have been successfully retrofitted to use shore power while alongside, reducing both fuel consumption and emissions. The Port of Seattle estimates each day a ship will use about the same amount of electricity as the Columbia Tower each weekday. The total cost to retrofit was nearly $1 million per ship and there were additional costs of some $1.5 million dockside to establish hook-ups and a transformer.
In April 2008, Holland America Line began donating reusable toiletries and other items through its innovative Ship to Shelter program. In partnership with the Port of Seattle, United States Customs and Border Protection, Cruise Terminals of America and Northwest Harvest, Holland America Line collects valuable and reusable goods from their ships sailing from Seattle and donates them to Seattle area non-profits serving people in need. Besides toiletries, donated items include dishes, cookware, silverware and furniture. The program has also expanded to Port Everglades, Florida and San Diego.
Holland America Line also contributes to the community in other ways, donating both monetary sponsorships and cruises to charitable and non-profit organizations. In the Seattle area, it supports dozens of such organizations such as Seattle Repertory Theatre, Big Brothers Big Sisters, Bellevue Philharmonic Orchestra, Pike Place Market Foundation, Center for Wooden Boats, World Trade Center, Seattle Aquarium, Seattle Men’s & Women’s Chorus, NW Women’s Law Center, UW, Seafair, Boys & Girls Club, Women’s Funding Alliance, INTIMAN Theatre, Seattle Theatre Group, Seattle Children’s Theatre, United Way and Northwest Harvest. The company’s total monetary contributions and in-kind cruise donations in Washington State add up to nearly one million dollars for 2008. The Holland America Line Foundation’s popular On Deck for the Cure program (a series of shipboard walks) which launched two years ago has passed the $1 million dollar mark in total contributions for the Susan G. Komen Foundation.
