“The 2022 Hall of Fame Winners are an extraordinary group of industry leaders with an unwavering passion and perseverance to drive the cruise industry forward despite the many challenges we have all faced,” said Kelly Craighead, CLIA President and CEO. “They are innovators, visionaries, and champions of our industry and CLIA is honored to recognize their hard work, commitment, and dedication.”
Lifetime Achievement Award Winner
Awarded to an individual who is a lifetime champion of cruise travel and has made monumental contributions to the cruise industry.
- Adolfo M. Perez, CTC – Senior Vice President of Global Sales & Trade Marketing, Carnival Cruise Line
Adolfo Perez, a 40-year veteran of Carnival Cruise Line, is Carnival’s Senior Vice President, Global Sales, and Trade Marketing. In his current capacity, Perez is responsible for Carnival’s business development teams, sales strategy and operations, and trade marketing functions. Additionally, he leads operations for Carnival’s UK and Australia business, international sales, and the company’s charters, meetings, and incentives business. Perez, having always understood the value of the travel advisor distribution channel, has been championing and advocating for the trade for decades. Since taking on this role he has introduced several successful initiatives to reinvigorate and fortify relationships with travel advisors including increasing commissions, launching the company’s Travel Agents Rock support programs, and expanding Carnival’s relationships with consortia partners. Additionally, he added new sales territories designed to provide even better direct travel agent support. Under his leadership, Carnival launched Why Use a Travel Agent, the industry’s first-ever consumer-focused campaign to reinforce travel advisor value. Perez notes that his most important goal at Carnival is to be the travel agent’s advocate and voice at the Carnival headquarters, a role he takes very seriously.
Adolfo shares his passion for the cruise industry through his weekly column in Travel Weekly and his role as a board member for the Greater Miami Convention & Visitors Bureau. He hosts a bi-weekly From Adolfo’s Desk LIVE webinar with guests from across Carnival and the industry and has a passion for reaching advisors one-on-one through his active Facebook page which has over 60,000 followers.
Perez joined Carnival in 1982 as an embarkation agent and has held multiple managerial positions within the company’s reservations and sales departments over the past four decades. These roles have included vice president of contact center sales, overseeing the line’s reservations call centers where he developed many relationships within the travel agent community. Perez was tasked with setting up and running Carnival’s UK sales and marketing office in London from 2011-2013. Prior to joining sales and trade marketing, he served as the company’s vice president of new markets and new product marketing and was responsible for developing the company’s first ever Hispanic marketing campaign in 2014 and launching many of the company’s new product offerings including the Carnival Vista launch, Carnival LIVE, Camp Ocean, and Carnival Journeys.
A resident of Miami Beach, FL, Perez earned both his undergraduate and MBA degrees from Florida International University in Miami, as well as a Certified Travel Counselor (CTC) designation from the Institute of Certified Travel Agents (ICTA).
Travel Agency Innovator Award Winner
Awarded to a CLIA Travel Agency Member or Premier Agency Member that has demonstrated innovative and visionary leadership in their approach to promoting cruise travel, growing their cruise travel sales, and supporting their affiliated travel advisors.
- Danny Genung, MCC – Harr Travel, President, and CEO
Danny is the CEO of Harr Travel, and has taken over 150 cruises, spent over 850 plus days at sea and visited more than 100 countries. He has had the joy of hosting thousands of guests on curated cruises, tours, and resort experiences over the last two decades. These experiences, and the friendships Danny has made along the way, have shaped his life and are at the heart of Harr Travel. Through their YouTube channel and incredible staff, Harr Travel works to share the love of facilitating travel dreams to make them a reality. Their mission is to minimize the pain points of travel so that customers can focus on making memories and enjoying themselves. Danny has an amazing group of people that he works with every day and is thankful for their devotion to their customers and the industry. Travel is back and better than ever. This last year and a half Harr Travel has filmed 50+ resorts and cruise ships, along with nearly 500 room and suite tours. Danny not only has the best partners in the industry, but it is those at home who make it all possible. Danny’s wife and daughter are the best co-pilots he could ever ask for and getting to share the world with them is his greatest joy.
Elite Cruise Counsellor of the Year Award Winner
Awarded to a CLIA Individual Agent Member who has demonstrated their career commitment to professional development through achievement of Elite Cruise Counsellor or Elite Cruise Counsellor Scholar status – the pinnacle of CLIA certification – with the requisite sales requirements as well as significantly impacted the travel agent landscape through contributions to their agency.
- Christopher J. Grum, ECC – Premier Custom Travel
Chris was born in Dallas, Texas but has lived all over the country. He grew up in New York and Pennsylvania, while his twenty-five-year span as a radio personality included time in East Texas, Boston, Las Vegas, and Houston. For the last ten years of his broadcast career, he was part of one of the longest-running morning shows in radio history. His love of travel took Chris all over the world and for many years he was an amateur travel advisor, giving friends and family advice on their vacation destinations. Towards the end of his radio career, he knew he wanted to own and operate his own business, and a travel agency made perfect sense. The company he founded, Premier Custom Travel, is based in Iowa Colony, a suburb of Houston, Texas. Chris is not only a CLIA-certified Elite Cruise Counsellor (ECC), but also a CLIA Luxury Cruise Specialist (LCS), a CLIA-certified Travel Agency Executive (TAE), and he has earned the Certified Travel Counselor (CTC) designation from the Institute of Certified Travel Agents. He also holds a seat on CLIA’s STARBoard, the Strategic Trade Advisory and Review Board. Chris lives in Iowa Colony, Texas with his girlfriend Melissa and their cats Otto (who serves as the company's mascot and official office kitty) and Sammy. In his spare time, Chris enjoys going to see live theatre and traveling. He is the co-author of the upcoming book, The Travel Advisor's Handbook, launching in the spring of 2023.
