There are several things that must be taken into consideration when traveling with a group: hotel, restaurants, meeting rooms, equipment, activities, entertainment, and many, many other assorted details. Planning group travel can quickly become a nightmare as costs begin to stack up and overwhelm many companies meager travel budgets. Making cuts to save money on trips such as these will result in less than stellar trip reviews from those in the group. This has the potential to damage employee morale and negatively effect productivity. Instead of planning an expensive trip on land, companies and organization should consider taking their group on an incentive cruise to the Bahamas.

With land travel, every aspect of the trip has to be planned on an individual basis. The hotel may not have a restaurant or have only one dining option. A separate meeting room may have to be secured, and all of the equipment needed may not be provided by the meeting facility. When the meeting is over, employees may not know where to find local entertainment or activities they would enjoy. Furthermore, employees have no real incentive to build camaraderie or spend time with one another outside of schedule meetings. Finding transportation for the group from the hotel to restaurants, activities, and meeting spaces can also be difficult.

Now consider a cruise. A cruise can be all inclusive, and meeting planners can customize the cruise to meet the needs of their clients. Compared to land travel, a customized cruise can save companies up to 40 percent. This is because meals, meeting rooms, equipment, activities, entertainment, and many other services are inclusive of the cruise fare. This means that taking a group cruise to the Bahamas can be less expensive than planning a trip on land. In addition, the Bahamas is a tropical, exotic destination that will be seen as exciting and adventurous. Because everything is included in a cruise, employees can band together and participate in activities as a group. This helps to build solidarity and cohesion among the company's top performers and management.

Taking a group on a cruise to the Bahamas is definitely more feasible that most companies realize. Instead of spending thousands of dollars on hotels and expensive restaurants, save money and book a custom cruise. A cruise to the Bahamas will be memorable, and it will give new employees an incentive to work harder and achieve greatness. Incentive travel programs are integral to the success of a company and retention of top talent. Incentive travel program such as a group cruise to the Bahamas is an excellent to draw top talent to a company, inspire success, and give the organization a distinct edge.

Planning group cruises and meetings at sea has always been a relatively simple task. This is largely due to the ease of planning that comes with all-inclusive pricing and the convenience of organizing lodging, meeting space, food and beverage, entertainment and décor in one simple process. However, Seasite.com has now made it even easier to plan corporate cruises and meetings on cruise ships with the introduction of their user-friendly planner guides.

These new cruise planning guides go well beyond the typical ship information available to travel planners and include the information that you really need to know when planning functions at sea. These easy-to-use guides include previously unpublished information, such as:

• Capacity of function rooms
• Information about outdoor function venues
• Meeting space grids
• Information about group dining options

This meeting-specific information that is critical to meeting planners and corporate travel planners has never before been made easily available, until now.

Check out Seasite.com’s cruise planning guides the next time you need to plan a meeting or event at sea, and you will see just how simple these online cruise planning tools are to use.

Follow these simple steps to easily access ship information for your next event:

1. Go to Seasite.com.
2. From the home page, click on Meeting Venues.
3. Select a ship from the A-Z ship directory.
4. When the ship details appear, click on Planner’s Guide.

In a previous post, we discussed how simple it can be to plan a romantic river cruise wedding if the opportunity to plan a wedding every came your way. There are plenty of other types of events and travel that are perfect for river cruises, including incentive travel, executive retreats and small corporate events. Aside from these obvious options, river cruises are particularly well-suited for fundraising events, social gatherings and other events that call for a more intimate setting.

If you are planning a fundraiser for a non-profit organization or for a charitable cause that your corporation supports, a dinner river cruise is an excellent option that attendees will enjoy and can prove to be a huge moneymaker. If your target donors are higher-end, you may also consider planning a weekend or multiple day river cruise. The donors will appreciate having the opportunity to support a worthy cause by partaking in something more unique and enticing than a typical gala in a hotel ballroom.

River cruises are also ideal for small corporate events, such as meet and greets, small award ceremonies, celebrations or client appreciation cocktail parties. There are river cruises available just about anywhere there is a river, making this an affordable option that can be organized locally or at an appealing, faraway location, depending on your event budget and the travel availability of your participants.

To make planning group cruises easy and convenient, check out the information and tools available on Seasite.com.