Carnival Cruise Line’s President Christine Duffy shared additional insight on the company’s revamped loyalty program in an email sent to member guests.
According to the message, the new Carnival Rewards program is a result of the unprecedented growth of the brand’s customer base.
“With your help, our company has grown in many ways: the number of ships in our fleet, the size of our ships, the number of homeports and the number of guests who sail with us each year,” she stated.
As the company evaluated a better way to reward guests for their business, it concluded that a change to its VIFP Club was the best step forward, Duffy added.
“It was designed in a simpler time when status was based on the number of days spent on our ships. In a smaller, growing company with a modest customer base, that kind of program works,” she continued.
Calling Carnival the world’s most popular cruise line, Duffy added that the current program does not allow the company to deliver recognition to guests based only on sailing frequency.
“As currently configured, status levels have never been adjusted; therefore, reaching status is a permanent, lifetime achievement, and every week more guests are moving into our top tier Platinum and Diamond statuses,” she explained.
As a result, between 2021 and 2024, the number of VIFP’s Platinum guests more than doubled, while the number of Diamond guests tripled.
“On our Excel class ships, on average, more than 1,200 guests are Platinum or Diamond, making it nearly impossible to provide meaningful priority benefits, and we face the same situation on virtually all other ship classes and itineraries,” Duffy continued.
“When so many guests have elite status, it is much more difficult to make everyone feel special. These realities will only continue to erode the recognition and rewards of the current VIFP Club program, and we feel that change is necessary in order to better recognize our guests and give them more choice in how they are rewarded.”
With that in mind, the company introduced Carnival Rewards, which will go into full effect by June 2026.
Replacing the VIFP program, the new loyalty program will see the introduction of a new points-based system that can be earned through cruise fares and onboard spending.
Guests will also be able to earn points from purchases made with the Carnival Rewards Mastercard, a new co-branded credit card set to be launched in 2026.
“More importantly, the points provide many ways to spend on Carnival cruises and onboard activities, providing guests the chance to personalize their rewards when and how they want,” Duffy added.
Spending activity on cruise fares, onboard and other activities will also earn new status qualifiers that can be accumulated to earn status, which will now be temporary.
“These enhancements will allow each guest to customize their rewards and allow us to address the need for changes to the program,” she added.
The existing Red, Gold, Platinum and Diamond levels will remain, but how guests will earn status in the future will be different.
In conjunction with the Carnival Rewards launch on June 1, 2026, existing statuses, with the exception of Diamond-level, will be honored for a two-year period, Duffy said.
The status will be maintained between June 1, 2026, and May 31, 2028, unless subsequent activity qualifies the guest for a higher status level.
Diamond-level guests will retain their status for a six-year period ending May 31,2032.
“We recognize that this is a big change from our current program, but these changes provide our guests with more ways to earn and maintain status with more valuable benefits and greater flexibility in how they choose to use their rewards,” Duffy added.
“We have worked hard to develop Carnival Rewards so that our guests have more choices, more rewards, and more reasons to vacation with us.”
