Blue Water announces Strategic Partnership within Cruise Logistics

Global full-service provider Blue Water announces a new logistics partnership with the shared professional services group supporting Holland America Group, which consists of Princess Cruises, Holland America Line, Seabourn and P&O Australia. As part of the cooperation, Blue Water will be managing the warehouse operations for the Group’s main distribution center in Florida, including order fulfillment, distribution, storage, cross dock and live loads for dry, chilled, and frozen shipments and deliveries for the cruise companies and their 36 ships.

“We are honored to enter this partnership and are proud to once again take one step further in the cruise industry together with our long-lasting customer. Holland America Line was our first cruise client in 1999, and through close partnership both of our companies grew during the next 15 years. It is partly due to our relationship with Holland America Line, that we decided to form a dedicated Strategic Business Unit focusing on the Cruise and Marine Logistics industry” says Kurt Skov, Chairman and Owner of Blue Water.

Operating out of warehouse facilities in Ft. Lauderdale

The 170,000 sq ft warehouse facilities are strategically located in proximity to Fort Lauderdale, a cruise port with 3.89 million passengers in 2019.

The supply chain operation in the facility is a broad mix of logistics solutions ranging from cross docking of dry, chilled, and frozen ship supplies, crew mails, and technical spare parts as well as running a full Vendor-Managed Inventory setup. This requires a certain skillset and knowhow to ensure quality, flexibility and efficiency, and Blue Water was chosen due to its +20 years of experience in exactly these types of processes.

Blue Water's IT systems are customised to fit specific markets and serve as a tool for handling and monitoring every single step of transport and warehousing.

Local partner with global expertise

Aside from the warehouse operation, a global team of experienced professionals at Blue Water’s offices in important cruise hubs worldwide provide round-the-clock services to the cruise ships, such as port agency, customs clearance, stevedoring, crew change, last mile delivery, transportation, and repair works. Naturally, HSSEQ is an integrated part of its business - always with the clients in focus.

Since 1999, Blue Water has been specialised in transport and logistics solutions to the Cruise & Marine industry. Blue Water handles storage, supply, and distribution of all necessities for cruise ships calling at various ports worldwide, including direct-to-ship containers and last mile services.

A long-standing and close cooperation with most of the global Cruise Lines has provided Blue Water with an insight into the rapidly growing leisure industry. Being close to the clients and the clients’ markets has been a top priority since the company was founded. The clients can always rely on swift solutions and service whenever they need it. Blue Water’s Cruise & Marine logistics specialists are ready on the quayside in major hubs such as Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Spain, Denmark, Sweden, Netherlands, France, Singapore, Greenland, Iceland, Portugal, Finland, and Dubai.

“When Covid19 became a reality in March 2020, we quickly identified this as a major threat to our business unit servicing the Cruise Industry. However, due to our long history in the Cruise Market, we decided as a company to maintain our commitment to the industry leaving most of our global Cruise & Marine Logistics Structure intact, because we also identified a need from the cruise lines to finds partners that could provide efficiency, scalability, and innovation to their supply chains after Covid19” says Kasper Sommer, Global Head of Marine Logistics for Blue Water.