The Ferries Division

The Ferries Division operates multipurpose ferry services carrying both passengers and RoRo freight on strategic short sea routes between Ireland and Britain, Britain and France and direct ferry services between Ireland and France. The division also engages in chartering activities.

The ferry services trade under the Irish Ferries brand. Irish Ferries operates on four routes utilising a fleet of eight vessels, six of which are owned and two of which are chartered-in.

In addition to the modern fleet, Irish Ferries retains rights to access appropriate berthing times at key ports allowing Irish Ferries to facilitate its customers’ preferred sailing times.

The division also owns eight container vessels, following the purchase of the CT Pachuca during 2022, which are time chartered at year end.

Fleet Summary

Operated by Ferries Division

Vessel	Type	Employment
Ulysses	Cruise ferry	Dublin – Holyhead
Isle of Inishmore	Cruise ferry	Dover – Calais
Isle of Innisfree	Cruise ferry	Dover – Calais
Blue Star 1 (chartered-in)	Cruise ferry	Rosslare - Pembroke
Epsilon (chartered-in)	Ropax	Dublin – Holyhead / Cherbourg
Dublin Swift	High speed ferry	Dublin – Holyhead
W.B. Yeats	Cruise ferry	Dublin – Holyhead / Cherbourg
Isle of Inisheer	Ropax	Dover – Calais

Chartered out by Ferries Division

Vessel	Type	Employment
Ranger	LoLo container vessel	Charter – 3rd Party
Elbfeeder	LoLo container vessel	Charter – Inter-Group
Elbtrader	LoLo container vessel	Charter – Inter-Group
Thetis D	LoLo container vessel	Charter – 3rd Party
CT Daniel	LoLo container vessel	Charter – 3rd Party
CT Rotterdam	LoLo container vessel	Charter – Inter-Group
Elbcarrier	LoLo container vessel	Charter – Inter-Group
CT Pachuca	LoLo container vessel	Charter – Inter-Group

 

2022 Overall Ferries Division Performance

Revenue in the division was 127.9% higher than the previous year at €399.9 million (2021: €175.5 million). Revenue in the first half of the year increased by 167.0% to €167.9 million (2021: €62.9 million), while in the second half revenue increased by 106.0%, to €232.0 million (2021: €112.6 million). EBITDA increased to €95.7 million (2021: €23.2 million) while EBIT was €46.4 million compared with €(17.4) million in 2021.

Fuel costs were €104.6 million, an increase of €61.5 million on the prior year. The division achieved a return on capital employed of 14.9% (2021: (5.9%)).

In total, Irish Ferries operated 13,642 sailings in 2022 (2021: 6,331), the increase primarily due to increased sailings on the Dover – Calais route.

Car and Passenger Markets

It is estimated that the overall car market¹, on the routes that we operate (Republic of Ireland to UK/France and the Dover Straits), grew by approximately 147.2% in 2022 to 4,131,000 cars. While encouraging, this level of car carryings is still 23.9% behind 2019 levels.

Irish Ferries’ car carryings during the year were increased over the previous year by 181.6% to 573,400 cars (2021: 203,600 cars). The increase in carryings versus 2021 levels is primarily due to the lifting of Covid-19 travel restrictions and the expansion to a three ship service on the Dover – Calais route.

The total sea passenger market (i.e. comprising car, coach and foot passengers on the Republic of Ireland to UK/France and the Dover Straits) increased by 95.5% on 2021 to a total of 16.6 million passengers. Irish Ferries’ passenger numbers carried increased by 246.7% at 2,315,000 (2021: 667,800).

The Ferries Division delivered 96% of scheduled sailings in 2022 compared with 96% in the previous year across all services.

In 2022, with a return to more normal travel patterns, Irish Ferries focused its passenger messaging on its brand platform “Sea Travel Differently” which not only highlighted the service and hospitality Irish Ferries offers, but also the benefits of sea travel versus air travel, in a year in which many airports suffered significant security delays and airline operators had high levels of cancellations. The new Dover-Calais route continued to be a key focus for marketing and promotions activity in 2022, alongside support for our legacy routes. There was increased use of digital channels for our promotional communication including paid search, digital audio-visual and digital audio including podcasts, in line with consumer media consumption evolution. In October 2022, market research indicated that (in addition to our ongoing brand strength in the Irish market), for the British market 53% of people were aware of Irish Ferries services, and 14% would consider using our Dover – Calais service in the coming year².

There was strong growth in the number of visits to our website, as well as in the corresponding number of bookings transacted in the year. Our social following increased across all the main platforms including Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, with fans and followers engaging with our content and offers. AI enabled automated web chat was maximised to handle routine passenger enquiries more efficiently, and towards the end of the year was blended with live chat for optimum customer service.

Irish Ferries continued to work throughout the year with state tourism agencies in Ireland (Tourism Ireland and Fáilte Ireland) as well as in our tourism source markets for Wales (Visit Wales) and France (Normandy Tourism and Cotentin Tourism). After a two-year absence, Irish Ferries returned as a headline sponsor of the four-day programme for the St. Patrick’s festival and the return of the parade to the streets of Dublin was important both in marking the kick-off of the tourism season and the return generally to routine tourism activities. We participated in a collaborative “press the green button” campaign with Tourism Ireland in the British and French markets as part of ongoing efforts to encourage tourists to return to Ireland, following the very restrictive Covid-19 conditions in 2021.

Irish Ferries is proud to be selected to receive multiple awards from travel trade professionals in our key Irish and UK markets. Our numerous consecutive wins reflect our focus on delivering excellence in customer service and our warm welcome and wonderful hospitality on-board. We constantly build on this and actively seek feedback from our customers via social media and surveys to continuously improve our service offering and facilities on-board our vessels. This commitment to outstanding service was once again recognised in 2022 with the following awards which were a welcome acknowledgement of the quality experience we offer:

• Ireland:
• ‘Best Ferry Company’ awarded by the Irish Travel Trade News Awards for the 15^th consecutive time.
• 'Best Ferry Company' awarded by the Irish Travel Agents Association for the 11^th consecutive time.
• United Kingdom:
• ‘Best Ferry or Fixed Link Operator’ in the Group Leisure & Travel awards for the 4^th consecutive year. This accolade was particularly important as we extended our Dover-Calais service to groups for the first time in 2022.

Duty Free Sales

With the introduction of duty-free sales for services to/from the UK since 2021, expanding and promoting our duty-free offering has been a key focus on three routes (Dublin-Holyhead, Rosslare-Pembroke and Dover-Calais), as we returned to promoting travel. For all on-board sales, passengers were able to shop online and reserve items for “click and collect” once on-board. Our duty-free prices were competitive at around 50% lower than high street prices, and duty-free stores and their ranges continue to be improved.

1. (Market figures source: Passenger Shipping Association and Cruise & Ferry)

2. (Inclusion in an online nationally representative omnibus survey carried out amongst all adults 16+ by a third-party market research company)

RoRo Freight

The RoRo freight market* between the Republic of Ireland to the UK and France and the Dover Straits fell slightly in 2022. The total number of trucks and trailers decreased by 1.1%, to approximately 4,389,700 units.

Irish Ferries’ freight carryings, at 696,600 freight units (2021: 290,000 freight units), increased by 140.2% versus the prior year. The increased carryings over market performance was enabled through the additional capacity of the three vessel service on the Dover – Calais route.

Irish Ferries has also been proactive in the online environment for freight customers. In recent years high-quality mobile options have been developed, alongside the traditional desktop, whereby customers can access our freight reservations systems with ease. This has facilitated an increasing proportion of our business being booked via our website, www.irishferriesfreight.com.

* (Market figures source: Passenger Shipping Association and Cruise & Ferry)

Chartering

The Group continued to charter a number of vessels to third parties during 2022. Overall external charter revenues were €17.2 million in 2022 (2021: €8.1 million). Of our eight owned LoLo container vessels, five are currently on year-long charters to the Group’s container shipping subsidiary Eucon on routes between Ireland and the Continent whilst three are chartered to third parties. The Oscar Wilde continues on a bareboat hire purchase agreement with MSC Mediterranean Shipping Company SA.

Outlook

We look forward to further growth on all of our routes and taking advantage of the operational expansion undetaken over the last number of years. We are confident that the trends seen in tourism markets in 2022 will continue in the current year and allow us to reach and eventually overtake pre-pandemic levels. With a full year well established three ship operation on our Dover – Calais route, we expect continued growth in our freight carryings on this route.

We are planning for a continued return of traffic from the direct continental routes to the landbridge and are hopeful this will be helped with the implementation of the Windsor Framework.