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... treating 25 percent of your potential customer base like lepers and criminals might have had something to do with it.
Are you saying that smokers make up 25% of the 'cruise customers'? I've never been on one, but that figure sounds pretty high to me. I'm curious what percentage of the population smokes. From the statistics I have read, the smoker's predominate the lower income brackets. I'd attribute the lack of passengers to the stock market setbacks, the recent recession and the lost jobs in the IT industry. Cruises aren't typically a cheap thing. The economy was probably more of a factor than anything else.

Uh huh.... you've never been on one.... I gotta admit, you really are pretty funny. Just because someone is a smoker you think they are in a "lower income bracket"? What world are you living in? As long as you live in the "statistics realm", you will never be able to make honest, weightful judgements about real life outside of that realm. Not being able to smoke on a cruise that costs a decent fare, yet denies me a pleasure I enjoy, is the reason I don't go anymore!

Right.
Let's start a cruise line.
Lets see now, what do our customers want?
Some want to swim, lets put in a pool.
Some want to topless sunbathe, lets add a topless sun deck.
Some want to gamble, lets put in slot machines.
Some want to drink, lets add a couple of lounges.
Some want to hear music, lets put in a theater.
Some want to smoke - nope - can't have that !