European Journal of Service Management

It follows from the data of Cruise Market Watch (2016) that nowadays there are in total 52 cruise lines managing the fleet of 298 cruise ships on the cruise shipping market. Cruise ship companies aspire to increase the sales volume on a regular basis in order to generate profits, but strong competition on the market forces them into saving and minimizing cruise travel unit costs per one passenger. These activities aim at reducing cruise travel prices to attract more and more travellers. Therefore, cruise travel operators strive to find various solutions, including e.g. those related to modelling the cooperation with goods suppliers and service providers or seek other solutions. The objective of this study is to identify factors affecting the cooperation between cruise ship companies and goods and services producers and providers. The research results can constitute interesting plausible material for entities involved in rendering services on the market of cruise ship tourism in coastal tourist destinations.