X-Princess exec John Chernesky, now with NCL

[Coral]

Princess Cruises veteran John Chernesky onboard with NCL as SVP sales

 

Most of the Princess cruises do not know him but those of us who watched Princess webinars during COVID saw him frequently. Many of us watched to figure out which pause we were in (and how it affected us), what was going on with refunds and the restart of cruising. He is pretty goofy, probably a good fit for NCL. I didn't realize he had left Princess in October - he previously was Senior VP of Sales and Trade Marketing and North American Sales. Looks like he was with Princess since 1998 in a variety of positions.

 

Seatrade article link

Edited April 11, 2023 by Coral

[Rick&Jeannie]

Interesting...now, when can we expect a similar announcement for John Padgett?

[azbirdmom]

Yes, I saw that.  He disappeared without any announcement before his successor too over his role so I was wondering what happened to him.  Seemed like a decent guy, well, except for his comment during one of his webinars about asking your grandkids for help with the Medallion app if you're having trouble!

[Steelers36]

1 minute ago, azbirdmom said:

Yes, I saw that.  He disappeared without any announcement before his successor too over his role so I was wondering what happened to him.  Seemed like a decent guy, well, except for his comment during one of his webinars about asking your grandkids for help with the Medallion app if you're having trouble!

Maybe he said nothing directly, but there was an announcement about him.  About a year ago, he was taking on a "brand champion" role, but I never heard about him publicly since then (not that I try to keep on PCL exec's).  He appears to have landed his former role with NCL and the incumbent promoted to another role.  I don't have any interest in NCL myself, but hope he does well.

[PescadoAmarillo]

I wondered where he had gone, since he disappeared very abruptly. I was hoping it wasn’t a health issue and am glad to hear it wasn’t. I agree, @azbirdmom, that comment immediately struck me as being sooo out of touch (and I wonder now if he had already disconnected at that time), but he was an excellent source of information and humor for years. 

[azbirdmom]

11 minutes ago, Steelers36 said:

Maybe he said nothing directly, but there was an announcement about him.  About a year ago, he was taking on a "brand champion" role, but I never heard about him publicly since then (not that I try to keep on PCL exec's).  He appears to have landed his former role with NCL and the incumbent promoted to another role.  I don't have any interest in NCL myself, but hope he does well.

 

Ah you are right.  I forgot that he was moved to another role and then quietly disappeared.  I think I saw something a while later that he had his own consulting business but nothing to explain his departure from Princess.

Edited April 12, 2023 by azbirdmom

[azbirdmom]

Found his resume online - he had quite a career with Princess / HAL:

 

 

 

 

[Astro Flyer]

He was silly but enjoyed his webinars more than his replacement Carmen Roig who is too grating to me. When Princess announced he’d be the new brand champion thought his roll might be like Carnival’s John Heald which never happened.
 

John was a 29 year Princess employee whose dad was the last captain of the battleship USS Missouri which is now docked in Pearl Harbor.

[PescadoAmarillo]

1 hour ago, Steelers36 said:

I don't have any interest in NCL myself, but hope he does well.

Here’s the thing that NCL still has that Princess doesn’t…their ship, the Norwegian Spirit, is much like what the Pacific Princess was.  A unique ship built for another cruise line that is very different (and smaller) than the rest of the fleet and that sails to unique itineraries. We loved that ship. It was supposed to be sold a few years ago and wasn’t, and offers some wonderful itineraries (including the South Pacific next winter). 

[snoozecrooze]

There was a feasible chance Princess could have given John Chernesky a type of brand ambassador role, not unlike John Heald or HAL's Seth Wayne. But after Seth Wayne was unceremoniously sacked (done quite tastelessly IMO) and Chernesky never appeared again after being "promoted" to his vague VP emeritus role, I felt like that was the end of the road for him because corporate was clearly trying to cut its losses (and thus his LinkedIn actually demonstrates that). Glad for him that he has a new job now with his decades of experience and I wish him well.

[Coral]

After watching John Chernesky several times during those videos - it wouldn't surprise me if he quit to re-group. It had to be incredibly difficult and frustrating dealing with all of those cancellation and pauses. Dealing with travel agents who hadn't been paid in years and getting them excited about booking cruises when many of us knew, they would be cancelled again and again. Plus, the amount of agents who literally lost their jobs during the pandemic. That had to be one stressful job. 

[Desert Cruisers]

14 hours ago, azbirdmom said:

Yes, I saw that.  He disappeared without any announcement before his successor too over his role so I was wondering what happened to him.  Seemed like a decent guy, well, except for his comment during one of his webinars about asking your grandkids for help with the Medallion app if you're having trouble!

When he made that comment, it was totally inappropriate and insulting.  He lost significant credibility with his audience.

[azbirdmom]

13 hours ago, Coral said:

After watching John Chernesky several times during those videos - it wouldn't surprise me if he quit to re-group. It had to be incredibly difficult and frustrating dealing with all of those cancellation and pauses. Dealing with travel agents who hadn't been paid in years and getting them excited about booking cruises when many of us knew, they would be cancelled again and again. Plus, the amount of agents who literally lost their jobs during the pandemic. That had to be one stressful job. 

 

Completely agree.  And on top of that Princess decided to go full speed ahead with the new Medallion app and its "spiffy" features instead of spending precious resources to ensure that the baseline product and communications were flawless.  That's what infuriated me back around the time of the restart.  They couldn't give their CSRs accurate information about refunds and status of sailings yet they made it worse by forcing the incomplete app on consumers thus increasing the call volume.  Their decisions made a bad situation worse and to be the person standing in front of a frustrated advisor group cheerfully pushing the "amazing" app had to be extremely stressful.

[cruisequeen4ever]

I really liked him. It’s a shame Princess has lost Jan and now him. 

[macmax]

On 4/12/2023 at 12:01 PM, PescadoAmarillo said:

Here’s the thing that NCL still has that Princess doesn’t…their ship, the Norwegian Spirit, is much like what the Pacific Princess was.  A unique ship built for another cruise line that is very different (and smaller) than the rest of the fleet and that sails to unique itineraries. We loved that ship. It was supposed to be sold a few years ago and wasn’t, and offers some wonderful itineraries (including the South Pacific next winter). 

Pacific Princess is now the Azamara Onward.

[cheezenip]

On 4/11/2023 at 4:11 PM, Rick&Jeannie said:

Interesting...now, when can we expect a similar announcement for John Padgett?

One could only hope. I'll take one for the team and ask Santa if I could have an EARLY Christmas present this year!! 😇

[PescadoAmarillo]

For those with access, John Chernesky is the cover story in Travel Age West this week. 

[Steelers36]

4 minutes ago, PescadoAmarillo said:

For those with access, John Chernesky is the cover story in Travel Age West this week. 

That photo reminds me of Ken Jennings.

[PescadoAmarillo]

1 minute ago, Steelers36 said:

That photo reminds me of Ken Jennings.

I had to Google him. 😆 If it’s not sports, I don’t watch it. 

[AtlantaCruiser72]

My guess is he was forced out of Princess involuntarily.  Had he left of his own volition surely there would have been some sort of non-compete clause that would have prevented him from assuming a nearly identical role with NCL in such a short period of time.

[cruisingrob21]

17 hours ago, AtlantaCruiser72 said:

My guess is he was forced out of Princess involuntarily.  Had he left of his own volition surely there would have been some sort of non-compete clause that would have prevented him from assuming a nearly identical role with NCL in such a short period of time.

It sure seems like it.  Although he probably had to contractually wait for a certain number of months before joining any competing company in the industry.  He was always entertaining and upbeat and seemed to understand the average Princess Passenger better than the current person in his old role.  Fortunately, much of the staff that was under him still remains.

[GonzoWCS]

Interesting news. Thanks.

 

Cheers

[Coral]

My guess is he quit on his own due to burnout. 
 

He had to get agents excited to continually rebook their cancelled cruises time and time again.