ONE of Thurrock's best business success stories is about to enter another chapter next year after announcing further expansion.

Independently-owned cruise line Cruise & Maritime Voyages (CMV), which is based in West Thurrock and is celebrating its tenth anniversary this year, has announced the acquisition of two more cruise ships to join its expanding fleet - increasing to eight cruise ships in 2021.

CMV will take delivery of P&O Australia's Pacific Dawn and Pacific Aria in Singapore on 2 March and 2 May 2021 respectively. The duo will be officially re-named in summer 2021 following dry docking, some minor upgrade and re-livery works in Singapore before embarking on CMV maiden voyages via the Suez Canal to Northern Europe.

Pacific Dawn, with 798 passenger cabins and carrying about 1,400 passengers will be deployed on the UK market in late May 2021 bolstering much needed capacity and cruising year- round alongside Columbus from Tilbury Cruise Terminal.

Pacific Aria, with 630 passenger cabins and carrying about 1,100 passengers will be deployed on the German market under the TransOcean Kreuzfahrten brand, cruising alongside Vasco da Gama and replacing the 580 passenger Astor. Astor is being re-named Jules Verne and will be re-deployed to the French market in May 2021.

The new ship names will be unveiled next month under CMV's explorer theme.

CMV chief operating officer Christian Verhounig said: "The introduction of two more ships to the global ocean fleet is the next exciting chapter of our strategic growth objectives. This will enable us to service increasing market demand for our traditional brand of cruising. We have now acquired five cruise ships in just five years and are firmly on course in carrying 200,000 passengers in 2021".

Chris Coates, Group Commercial Director added: "As the CMV brand continues to evolve, the growing popularity of our traditional product, classic ships and destination focused cruise programs has encouraged us to accelerate plans to add capacity to the two top European cruise markets in the UK and Germany, which represent 85 per cent of our business.

"These two fine cruise ships perfectly complement our existing fleet providing trade partners and consumers alike with much needed extra capacity. For 2020, we expect close to 70 per cent of capacity to be sold by the year end, in line with expectations."

CMV was launched in 2010 and has established an international network of sales offices and source markets offering home market products with cruise programs in the UK & Ireland, home porting from Tilbury and sailing from 14 other regional ports, Australia, Germany and France for 2021 – supported by sales offices in Fort Lauderdale, USA representing the Americas and in Mexico City.

The CMV Group currently employ nearly 4,000 seafarers and shore side staff and in 2019 will carry almost 150,000 passengers.