The "Song of Blue Dream", which is committed to building a "national cruise ship", has been anchored in Beihai, Guangxi for two and a half months. According to industry media reports, the cruise ship was impounded by Island Oil, a well-known fuel supplier, at Beihai Port in Guangxi due to arrears of approximately US$600,000 in fuel payments.
"No one knows how much foreign debt Blue Dream Cruises owes." Zhao Yi, the former sales manager of Shanghai Blue Dream International Cruise Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Blue Dream Cruises"), told China News Weekly that he was owed more than 300,000 yuan in salary. According to incomplete statistics from rights protection employees, the company owed material supply fees, contract breach compensation and employee wages before and after the suspension, totaling more than 50 million yuan.
Lembongan Cruises was founded in 2016. This mixed-ownership company was once one of the representatives of local operators in China. Its "Lembongan Star" was the first international cruise ship to resume sailing from its domestic home port after the epidemic. Today, its trajectory coincides with that of many local cruise lines that have sadly exited the industry and ended up mired in disputes over ship sales, unpaid wages and lawsuits.
Zhao Yi revealed that there are about 200 employees who are owed wages, including shore-based personnel and crew members. Since the company suddenly announced the suspension of flights, many people have not even been able to get money to go home for the New Year. The screenshot he provided showed that Wang Peng, the company's former chairman, wrote in a reply to employees: "We will solve everyone's problems as soon as possible after the company disposes of the ship assets." This is what Zhao Yi is worried about. If the old ships cannot be sold smoothly, the company may be dragged into insolvency.
Cruise ship "Blue Dream Song" Photo/Visual China
Suspension becomes suspension of operations
When she learned of the suspension, Yan Jie was still at sea on her voyage to Vietnam. In the early morning of January 4, the cruise ship "Song of Blue Dream" returned to the port of Beihai, Guangxi. As soon as the tourists disembarked from the ship in the morning, the labor service company summoned all seafarers in the afternoon and asked them to sign an "Employment Termination Agreement." She and her colleagues were informed that they must leave the ship before January 6. After the handover is completed, they will receive a "one-time consideration compensation", but it does not include the unpaid salary for December last year and the full-year performance bonus.
Yan Jie recalled that the crew’s wages had been deferred for three consecutive months. Everyone had been worried about the operating situation for a long time, but they didn't expect everything to happen in such a hurry. The voyage of this ship has been scheduled to June 30, 2026. All cabins are outsourced to travel agencies, and the occupancy rate can basically be maintained at more than 90%, which means that the ticket revenue in the next six months is essentially guaranteed. She really didn't understand why the company suddenly unilaterally breached the contract.
Zhao Yi also confirmed that the Blue Dream Cruises sales team signed a six-month "charter" contract with Shenzhen Xinmingyang International Travel Service in 2025. More importantly, the travel agency has paid a deposit of about 10 million yuan. According to the terms of the contract, if Party A (Blue Dream Cruises) breaches the contract, it will face high compensation.
On December 25 last year, Blue Dream Cruises announced the suspension of sailings of the "Blue Dream Song" cruise ship in the name of "hardware upgrade and maintenance". Zhao Yi recalled that at that time, the sales team had strongly recommended that the ship should operate until at least mid-2026 to fulfill the contract and reduce losses, but the company's decision-makers insisted on suspending the voyage immediately. This decision quickly triggered a chain reaction. On January 20 this year, Shenzhen Xinmingyang International Travel Service filed a lawsuit against Blue Dream Cruises in the Shanghai Maritime Court and applied for property preservation.
"This directly led to the freezing of special funds to be paid to crew members." A credit memo provided by Yan Jie showed that a special fund of 5 million yuan for crew wages was issued by Blue Dream Cruises to Shanghai Guoyuan Labor Service Co., Ltd. on January 27. According to the agreement signed by the seafarers after renegotiation on January 5, the money should be released before the Spring Festival to settle arrears of wages and compensation. "But until now, we haven't received a penny." Yan Jie said.
Behind the hasty decision to suspend sailings is a monetization plan that has not been realized. Zhao Yi revealed that at the end of last year, the company intended to sell the "Blue Dream Song" and contacted a Russian operator. "The suspension of sailings is to prepare for subsequent transactions."
But in fact, the ownership of the "Blue Dream Song" is not in the hands of Blue Dream Cruises. According to public reports, the company's director Lu Guangyuan introduced at an industry forum in 2024 that the "Song of Blue Dream" was introduced by the company through offshore leasing in cooperation with China Banking Financial Leasing Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "CDB Financial Leasing"), and then refinanced and leased to Blue Dream Cruises for operation. This was done to reduce the company's burden.
"There is obviously a problem with the capital chain now." Zhao Yi further revealed that Blue Dream Cruises operates the cruise ship through its wholly-owned Hong Kong subsidiary and needs to pay rent to China Bank Financial Leasing regularly and complete the final buyback before the agreed deadline. According to his understanding, the repurchase period is before 2026, but as of now, the repurchase has not been completed. "China News Weekly" called Wang Peng, the former chairman of Blue Dream Cruises, for verification, but received no reply.
After the suspension notice was issued, more than 30 employees in the Shanghai office of Blue Dream Cruises received the "Labor Contract Termination Agreement" one after another at the end of last year. The suspension of flights eventually turned into a shutdown. An employee who has worked in the sales department of Blue Dream Cruises for many years told China News Weekly that the salary owed to each person ranged from tens of thousands of yuan to more than 300,000 yuan. Due to the delay in receiving the arrears, on February 27 this year, the first batch of employees went to court to file a lawsuit and filed a case. According to Qichacha data, Blue Dream Cruises has recently become the person subject to execution in eight cases, involving a total amount of 1.3146 million yuan.
Sun Yue, head of personnel at Blue Dream Cruises, confirmed to China News Weekly that there are currently 27 shore-based employees on the books who are owed wages, involving a total amount of about 5.5 million yuan. She explained that the three existing shareholders were pushing to resolve the funding issue after the company's accounts were frozen. According to the plan confirmed by the shareholders' meeting, the three parties will pay special funds for salary arrears into designated accounts based on their shareholding ratios.
As of now, 40% of the funds borne by the major shareholder Fujian China Transport Investment Group Co., Ltd. have been received, 30% of the funds borne by Zhoushan Islands International Cruise Port Co., Ltd. have been received on March 24, and Qingdao Jurong Industrial Investment Co., Ltd. has borne the other 30%, which is still being coordinated.
"China News Weekly" called Yao Shuai, director of Blue Dream Cruises and Qingdao shareholder representative, and the other party said that the plan of "raising funds according to the share ratio of the three shareholders" "may only be in the motion stage". He himself has not seen the specific documents and has "no grasp" of the current situation of Blue Dream Cruises. The reporter asked Wang Peng, the former chairman of Blue Dream Cruises and the legal representative of Fujian Sinotrans Investment Group, to confirm this contradictory statement, but the other party refused to be interviewed on the grounds of "no time."
It is worth noting that just one day before promising to pay back wages, on February 9 this year, Blue Dream Cruises completed the change of legal representative, and Wang Peng resigned as chairman and general manager. He is still serving as vice chairman of Fujian Air China Ocean Shipping (Group) Co., Ltd. The company was once the largest shareholder holding 80% of the shares of Blue Dream Cruises when it was founded, but it withdrew in 2020.
"The current shareholders of Blue Dream Cruises are only the three mentioned above." Sun Yue emphasized. She said that if the funds from Zhoushan can be received as scheduled, the company will notify the specific plan to pay a total of 70% of the back wages as soon as possible. As for the remaining 30%, the temporary working group she is a member of "theoretically will not give up the recovery." As an employee of China Transport Fujian assigned to Blue Dream Cruises, Sun Yue himself has now returned to the shareholder company. She admitted that it is still unknown how the temporary working group responsible for the aftermath will operate in the future and who will lead it.
Sell one order, pay one order
In Zhao Yi's impression, the decision-making level of Blue Dream Cruises started to signal the suspension of sailings in November last year. Affected by geopolitics, domestic home port cruise companies at that time canceled plans to call ports in Japan, and Blue Dream soon changed all Japan and South Korea tour destinations to Jeju and Busan in South Korea.
"The capital chain is already tight, and the route adjustment is a fatal blow." Zhao Yi explained that unlike customers in mature markets in Europe and the United States who regard cruise ships as vacation destinations, domestic tourists generally still regard cruise ships as a means of transportation. When travel destinations are no longer niche and unique, the cost-effectiveness of cruise travel will be greatly reduced, and lower occupancy rates will most likely prompt travel agencies to cut prices and sell orders.
A veteran who has been in the cruise industry for 23 years told China News Weekly that in terms of the richness of destination tourism resources, it is difficult for the Korean market to completely replace Japan. In competition in markets such as Jeju and Busan that are well known to domestic cruise passengers, price reduction is the most direct way to attract customers. Even the price of Royal Caribbean's "Spectrum of the Seas", which is the most expensive in the industry, has dropped to less than 2,000 yuan for its interior cabin.
In the past operations, Lembeng, which relied on low-price strategies to open up the market, was once known as the "Mixue Ice City" in the cruise industry. Zhao Yi explained that without the premium brought by differentiated routes and facing close competition with larger and newer cruise ships, the company is also worried about the history of "sell one and lose one" repeating itself.
The deeper problem is that there is a mismatch between the old second-hand ships purchased by Blue Dream Cruises and the domestic mainstream cruise consumer market. The two ships, "Blue Dream Star" and "Blue Dream Song", had basically been in service for 20 years when they were "acquired", and their tonnage was generally small, at 25,000 tons and 42,000 tons respectively, which was far lower than the current mainstream large cruise ships of over 100,000 tons. Their cabin types, entertainment facilities and other hardware were inherently deficient, and the limited space also limited on-board consumption scenarios and secondary income.
Zhao Yi gave an example. In order to meet the demand for standard rooms for domestic team tours, the company once installed a wooden board as a partition in the middle of the original large bed. Such a reluctant renovation is far from the comfort and spaciousness that tourists expect from modern cruise ships.
"Planning for cruise operations begins before placing an order with the shipyard." Shanghai Waigaoqiao Shipbuilding Co., Ltd., the builder of the domestic large-scale cruise ship "Ada Magic City", previously pointed out in an interview with China News Weekly that ship owners must clearly define their target customer groups and plan future routes before placing orders, and use this as a guide to design on-board hardware and soft furnishings that meet consumer needs. This "pre-operation, design and customization" model is the key to the success of the cruise project, and also explains why large cruise ships that want to base themselves on the local market must take the road of self-construction, and it is difficult to achieve this by purchasing second-hand ships.
"The hardware is not enough, and the software is difficult to come up with." Yan Jie will join the company in April 2023. "Blue Dream Star" will make its maiden voyage in June of the same year. She only has one month to prepare on-board entertainment activities. At that time, the company canceled its professional dance troupe due to lack of funds. She had to contact a Colombian dance troupe through personal connections and hired them as ordinary crew members, allowing them to perform in addition to daily reception work. Although the salary was slightly higher than that of ordinary crew members, the company overall saved about 4 million yuan. At the same time, the team will organize club activities, such as games, dance classes or craft workshops, on the deck, salon and other locations during the day to enrich the passenger experience as much as possible and reduce customer complaints.
