Dear Friends,

The 2026 schedule is still in the works. As I mentioned at the end of 2024, we were exploring options to help us address employee shortages, housing issues, and rising expenses while maintaining the same level of service. We took the schedule change very seriously, and there were many discussions on how best to achieve our goals while impacting our communities and customers as little as possible. The importance of these discussions is once again delaying the publication of the 2026 schedule and, thus, our ability to start taking reservations. We appreciated your patience.

Here is where I could insert the obligatory “change is always difficult” paragraph, but we all know change is inevitable, and we want you to know that BIBCO will always do everything we can to change in a reasonable and responsible manner while keeping the implications for our customers at the forefront of our decision-making process.

Last year, we conducted a Survey of passengers who transported Vehicles with us before Memorial Day and after Labor Day to better understand how the schedule affected individuals who traveled with us during that time. We understand this does not capture our entire customer base, but it is a fairly representative population and one we can verify actually traveled during those times.

We greatly appreciate those individuals who took the time to respond to our survey, as your input is greatly appreciated. You can view the results and customers’ individual responses by clicking here: Survey Results.  We know that each individual situation is different. Things like distance to travel, housing, medical appointments, and business concerns all factor into whether a schedule is better or worse for an individual. Since everyone’s situation is Unique, we try to find a balance. Our survey findings indicate that the 2025 shoulder season schedule was acceptable to or better than the 2024 schedule for about 70% of respondents.

We are setting a Target Date to begin accepting reservation of Monday, February 16^th at 8:00 AM. We will not start before that date. Please mark it on your calendar.

The phone lines will be very busy and we will get to you as quickly as we can. Information on making a reservation is available on our website. Reservations can be made by calling Charlevoix at 1-231-547-2311 and on the Island at 1-231-448-2210 Starting at 8:00 am until 5:00 pm on the 16th. We will be manning 6 phone lines and will try to move as quickly as possible. To ensure a smooth reservation process, we kindly request that all our eager customers review the letter posted on our website. It’s packed with essential information you won’t want to miss!

We look forward to serving you in 2026!

BIBCO