Skipedia

The sad demise of the catered chalet ski holiday

by iain on Sep 25, 2023 • 8 Comments

Looking through a recent survey from Le Ski, I was struck by one stat in particular. While it was encouraging to read that the number of UK skiers and snowboarders is predicted to grow by 14% in winter 2023/24, the fact that only 13% stay in catered chalets highlighted how...

Ideas

Will ChatGPT make ‘ski experts’ redundant?

by iain on May 11, 2023 • No Comments

AI (Artificial Intelligence) is changing fast. A few years ago, it was just the name of one of Steven Spielberg’s less good movies, but in 2023 AI has moved from the world of ‘futurologists’ into the mainstream. The chances are that even if you haven’t tried ChatGPT (or Google’s ‘Bard’),...

Iain / Ideas / Tour Operators

‘Parrots in the Snow: the rise and fall of Bladon Lines’ – article in ‘Ski+Board’ magazine

by iain on Mar 8, 2023 • 3 Comments

Iain’s article ‘Parrots in the Snow: the rise and fall of Bladon Lines‘ has now been published in ‘Ski+Board’ magazine. It’s also now available as a special episode of The Ski Podcast My first experience of working in the ski industry came 35 years ago when I went to Chatel...

Iain / Resorts

Ski Touring in Morocco: A Photo Essay

by iain on Feb 8, 2019 • No Comments

Iain from Skipedia recently went ski touring in Morocco. Flying into Marrakech, and then travelling to Imlil (1740m), Iain then spent three nights at the Refuge des Mouflons (3207m), ski touring to different 4000m peaks. Ski hire was from Braemar Mountain Sports, guiding and logistics were organised by Toubkal Guide. You...

Resorts / Tour Operators

‘I’m a modern-day Batman’ says anti-ESF campaigner

by iain on Nov 2, 2014 • No Comments

These are difficult days for the ESF in the UK. The current legal cases against Simon Butler and Le Ski have stirred up plenty of negative sentiment within the British market against the ESF. Both cases – which deal with different aspects of the law – are currently at different...

Tour Operators

Why do chalet girls bake a cake every day?

by iain on Aug 13, 2011 • 2 Comments

Okay, not strictly anything to do with marketing, but just for fun… So why do chalet girls bake a cake every day? As far as I know chalets have always left out a cake for their guests to tuck into for ‘afternoon tea’. After a long day on the slopes,...

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Resorts

Saint Gervais: ‘3rd France ski area’…

by iain on Sep 24, 2014 • No Comments

Flush with the excitement of hosting the newest Folie Douce to hit the Alps, Saint Gervais has been gilding the lily slightly in their advertising to the UK market. We noticed this ad in the October issue of Ski and Snowboard Magazine – ‘445km of slopes’ and ‘3rd France ski area’ (sic). It is true...

Ideas / Resorts

14 Takeaways from the Ski Club of Great Britain Industry Report 2014

by iain on Sep 17, 2014 • No Comments

Phones are getting bigger, movies are getting longer, but ski industry reports are getting smaller. Last week, Crystal Holidays released their annual Ski Industry Report – it totalled just 8 pages and took five minutes to cover. In contrast, their 2013 report was 23 pages long and included significantly more analysis. No estimate of market size...

Mobile / Tour Operators

Crystal Ski Take Digital Customer Service to a New Level

by iain on Sep 10, 2014 • 4 Comments

The Crystal Ski Industry Report today was less about the state of the market and more about their own digital innovations. Market size down 3.6% Perhaps it was the right decision not to focus on a market that was estimated to have fallen another 3.6% since 2012/13. Simon Cross, President of Crystal Ski, commented that...

Resorts / Tour Operators

12 Things We Learned At The ABTOF French Ski Launch 2014

by iain on Sep 9, 2014 • 2 Comments

Journalists, tour operators and resorts gathered in London today for the annual ABTOF and AtoutFrance ski conference – the official French ski launch for this winter season. Here’s some quick snippets that we picked up from the day: Ski Famille won the ABTOF award for Best Innovation – for their absolutely brilliant idea (although...

Tour Operators

Are Neilson being modest about their ski numbers?

by iain on Aug 29, 2014 • No Comments

TTG Digital recently carried a revealing interview with Richard Bowen-Doyle, chairman of Neilson Active Holidays since their management buy-out from Thomas Cook last year. More guests in winter, more profit in summer Among the interesting stats revealed include: The turnover is £75 million to £80 million They carry 40,000 passengers to 9 beach clubs in...

Resorts / Social Media

The Top 40 Ski Resorts on Facebook (Relatively)

by iain on Aug 11, 2014 • No Comments

We have previously looked on Skipedia at which ski resorts in France, Austria and Italy and across Europe have the most Facebook fans. But how useful are absolute figures? Surely you would expect a resort with more visitors to have more Facebook fans? We thought we’d look more closely at the figures to find out who is...

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