On The Deck: Andy Harmer,
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In one week’s time, on 1 May, the PSA is going to disband after 50 years. The change will mean that any current ferry members of the PSA will move over to the Chamber of Shipping and all current cruise members will become part of a new organisation, CLIA UK and Ireland. However, what will these changes mean on a day-to-day basis? CLIA (Cruise Lines International Association) has been the body which has traditionally presided over the US cruise industry and will now be setting up divisions in countries around the world. To all intents and purposes the UK is joining a global body. In the second of two special On The Decks we bring you an interview with Cruise News columnist Andy Harmer who will now become the director of CLIA UK and Ireland.
Can you explain the decision to form CLIA UK and Ireland?
What’s clear is that we’re now working as part of a global cruise industry. So it’s very difficult to talk about that industry in the context of one country anymore – or even a continent. It’s very much a global industry. Not least because our ships transport our guests globally but also because there’s a lot of UK cruise lines and a lot of US or German owned companies which sail out of the UK. It seemed exactly the right opportunity to work as a global organisation. While the PSA has been around for 50 years and ACE (under both guises) for around 25 years, we can learn a lot from our colleagues who work out of North America or Australasia. It allows us to become far more effective in the UK.
What changes will there be for British cruise lines?
Their membership will be with CLIA UK and Ireland and they will also be offered membership of CLIA Europe and CLIA Global. So actually their efforts to reach individual travel agents in individual countries can be done much more effectively. We’ve created organisations that are going to help cruise lines with their marketing efforts.
How can you reassure the smaller British cruise lines that they won’t lose their voice to the bigger corporations?
You have to remember that from London we are running an organisation to benefit all our members. That includes the US cruise lines that sail out of the UK as well as the British cruise lines. We will continue to work with them through meetings and our committee structure and everything else we do to make sure we grow the UK cruise market. All of the cruise lines benefit from that growth. Now, because we can focus on the cruise industry (with the movement of the ferry companies to the Chamber of Shipping) and put more on marketing, talking to the consumer and engaging with the travel agent – cruise lines should see far more benefit from the change.
Have you received much support from the cruise lines in the transition from the PSA to CLIA UK and Ireland?
Yes we have, in fact recently we signed All Leisure Group as our most recent member. So it’s been very positive. We’ve also had an increased interest from travel agents who know that our focus will be on travel agent training. So it’s being viewed as a positive by both travel agents and cruise lines. With ACE we were a very forward thinking agency, with events like the Selling Cruise Conference, Columbus Day and River Expo – that organisation now has access to a new level of resources, which will benefit all our members.
And what’s happening with ACE going forward?
ACE as a brand will disappear on 30 April and we will become CLIA UK and Ireland. We’ve started talking about the new brand this year and we will continue to talk about CLIA UK and Ireland as the new name for ACE. Our URL will continue to be cruiseexperts.org and agents will still find our award winning training and resources there.
So essentially travel agents won’t see wholesale changes?
We will have our new fantastic logo, which agents will hopefully be using in their shop windows and on their websites. So it will be under a new name but agents will continue to be able to work towards accreditation and additionally as we learn more and share resources so will our agents. An example of what we’re doing in the UK which is being considered as best practice throughout the industry is our River Cruise Conference in Cologne. We’re already talking to CLIA Australasia about whether they will send travel agents to the event as well. It’s those events, which have happened nationally, that will now benefit the entire global industry.
So as a closing statement why do you think this is a positive move for the British industry?
The benefits to our members – both travel agents and cruise lines – is that we’ve become a new association made up of 55 cruise lines operating globally. We’ll be able to work on enhancing our training, shared marketing, promotional activities and networking opportunities. Now because we’re focusing on those two key areas of our work – which is travel agent training & engagement and consumer marketing & PR campaigns – the benefit will be as we continue to grow the cruise industry out of this country everybody will benefit from that growth.