No man, chalet business or holiday company is an island

Saturday, 27 Jan, 2010 0

January is a weird old time…. by now your well under way with your season (yep, there’s no turning back it’s actually happening!), you’re rushed off your feet hosting clients or in our case taking bookings and are already thinking about changes you want to make for next year. However, despite this hive of activity it can also be quite an isolated and lonely time.

Running a ski holiday company – the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth by Independent Mountain marketing manager Olivia Gascoigne

Queue the violins and sad melody!

Anyone, who works in this industry and most importantly in this industry and based in a ski resort, knows that you wave goodbye to your friends at the beginning of December, trying to remember every detail of their faces as you wont be seeing them again until the end of April.

You see, you may be surrounded by guests, the phone ringing and the frantic tap of computer keys as the emails flood in, however, when you’re running your own business and your world consists of you, your partner and your shared dreams, you can fall folly to feeling a little cut off and as Celine Dionne once belted out “All by Myself!” Couple this with the great January snow you haven’t got time to enjoy and having to endure all the other “normal” (i.e those that holiday) people in resort as they head off up the hill with delirious grins on their faces and here commence a bad case of the January Blues!

Here in the office we have been suffering with the classic symptoms (along with dreaded flu bugs brought into resort by aforementioned “normal” folk) Therefore, this week we banished the blues as we decided to mix business with pleasure and pack our bags for a road trip to the Three Valleys to visit a couple of property owners who advertise on our site and also to organise a marriage proposal for one of our clients (more on this in my next blog!).

Wow, what a difference it makes to get out of the office and out of resort meeting like minded people who make you realise that you are not alone in this industry, that other couples out there are working and struggling towards the same goals as you and feel as passionate as you do about your business and the mountains! A huge thanks to Chris and Helen at Chalet Abode in St Martin de Belleville, for helping us banish the blues and re connect with other people out there in the industry in the same boat as us!

This got me thinking…. there must be others out there, like us, running their own business, mid season and in need of a bit of a lift….Hell, there’s no must about it, I know there definitely is as I speak to you on a daily basis for business!

Therefore, from this week on I would like to hear from you! I want to start a conversation between us all as it’s about time, us mountain entrepreneurs and entrepreneurs in general had a mouth piece to air our thoughts, wisdom and general rants. Therefore, think of me as just that – your weekly release from the difficult chalet guests, general slog of running your own business and every day pressure of having to make this season and your company a success!

So what are you waiting for??

Get in touch and let me know what’s infuriating, enlightening or exciting you at the moment and if it’s worth a mention then I will pay homage to it in my next blog!

Send your rants and ramblings to [email protected] and keep your eyes peeled for the next blog to see if your topic gets a mention – well that’s obviously depending on if anyone actually reads this column, if not then I guess it will be just lil old me! (I can hear another Celine classic coming on!)

Got something to say? Then let me have it here [email protected]

Phil Davies

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