 Poster: A snowHead
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its to expensive for me now, this year will probably be my last, over a thousand pounds for a weeks holiday is to much when your on the state pension, my thoughts will now to turn to golf, where a thousand pounds gets me a whole year membership at my local club. its kind of sad in a way, as i really love my skiing, but my regular skiing buddy has at to pack it in due to knee problems, so this year i will be on my own, so its time to say farewell to the slopes and hello to the fairways.
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Sorry to hear that but it’s not a £1000 for a weeks skiing, it’s £1000 minus the cost of a normal week’s holidays abroad.
In effect the skiing may only be £300 extra & that is what you have to weigh up
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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My local climbing wall has just put its rates to £10 per session. That is twice a week for the £1000 ski holiday. Or weekly session at the dry slope.
If I ignore the cost of food and drink a ski holiday costs me about £450 (dividing the season pass by 3 and taking £250 as my share of the drive costs - I have my own apartment but renting an equvilant one would add £300 to the cost)
Summer holidays - 10 days climbing in the Dolomites at least £1500 based in a hotel only using huts occaisionally. FLight cost and rental car push the price up. 10 days climbing in Kalynos - about £800. Oddly it is cheeper to fly to Kos than Venice and there are direct flight.
If you plan it correctly a ski holiday is cheeper than a summer holiday.
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@compostcorner76, if you can find a skiing partner, I think you can still get a week's skiing in a decent ski area for about £600pp, including flight, transfer, accommodation, lift pass and ski hire. Food extra of course, but that need not be expensive if you have a packed lunch and cook your own dinner.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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I goto the Pyrenees for weekend trips and once a year I goto the French Alps in a big group , we book everything directly.
It seems to me that accommodation in the Alps is about 30% more expensive than pre Covid times and there is less of it available, the Pyrenees is more or less the same as before, maybe 10% more expensive...
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| Layne wrote: |
@davidof, I could be interpreting this wrongly (!) but...
https://www.in2013dollars.com/uk/inflation/1990 "if you started with £100, you would need to end with £290.80 in order to "adjust" for inflation" so roughly 3 times.
So those prices in Espace Killy don't seem too far out  |
I'm no expert in economics but doesn't France use the Euro, not the GB Pfund ?
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For those complaining that skiing is too expensive:
- Flights to Calgary £500 return (including ski carriage
- lake Louise spring pass £300 (going off last year's price)
- accomodation £780 per month (probably can get a better deal for long term stay, that's based on normal cost per night).
So around £1600 per month. Of course you have to add food, but you would at home too, and supermarkets there are not much different.
Of course some will point out they don't have one month, which is understandable. However, the issue then is skiing too expensive or is it the travel? For example the £1000 golf membership and £10 per session climbing don't work out much different to a lift pass, the difference is they are considered good value because you live close enough to use them.
Others will say staying in a hostel is unacceptable to them, to which I'd say if you really love and want to ski so much it is not a bad compromise.
As someone that quit their profession to ski and travel more, and does it on a pretty meagre budget, I can tell you there are plenty of ski bums making it happen on way less than some people spend on single trips here. Some people rather complain than make any sacrifices to do something they apparently love.
Ofcourse I'm not saying skiing is incredibly cheap - it will always be more than some other hobbies. I'm also not saying everyone with kids and a mortgage can significantly change their life.
Also it should be noted you don't *need* a lift pass to ski. Get into touring for a cheap and great experience.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Biggest cost can be eating out, we take sandwiches and use a slow cooker for evening meal, we drink very little at home and dont smoke, I spend that money on four or five weeks skiing, we have found cheap accommodation, self drive and take food basics from home, most we buy when there is from the supermarkets in the valley, even found an aldi in sallanches this time too.
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Another point skiing is dear compared to what? Try a week at say centre parcs in school holidays or a week in paris, New York, London or and major city even a week at the seaside is expensive, entry costs to any attraction cost a lot, longleat is £40 &£30 a day for adults and under 16, plus the ice cream and drinks etc, at least a weeks skiing keeps everyone occupied all the time.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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You know it makes sense.
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| robs1 wrote: |
| Another point skiing is dear compared to what? Try a week at say CentreParcs in school holidays or a week in Paris, New York, London or and major city - even a week at the seaside is expensive, entry costs to any attraction cost a lot, longleat is £40 &£30 a day for adults and under 16, plus the ice cream and drinks etc, at least a weeks skiing keeps everyone occupied all the time. |
+1 on this - I've been researching a break for a wedding anniversary in England and it's looking cheaper to go to Switzerland. And no, I'm not going for anything particularly fancy in the UK.
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Just pricing up a trip towards the end of March and the travel costs are pretty eye watering. I'm travelling out on Friday and back on the Tuesday, and for 2 of us, just the transport is coming in at £800. It's basically the same whether we fly or get the train, and doesn't include transfers. A few years ago I would have been paying that at half term!! That's ridiculous. Think I might have to drive instead.
Edit: Flying to Geneva. Might have to look at Turin/Salzburg and some different resorts.
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Poster: A snowHead
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@Timmycb5,
Because you are picking Easter dates?
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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@Gored, maybe, but they are random dates. The flight out is before Easter too.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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@Gored, I think you're right. Just ran it for the week before and it is way cheaper. FFS, I had assumed that avoiding weekends might have made a bit of a difference, but apparently not.
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with@phil_w, on feeling it is cheaper in many ways, budget airlines have made it possible for us to ski more often in a variety of places, When I started skiing it was all through tour operators, to resorts with bad lifts, I think we get bang for our buck now, we fly budget rent a car and choose a resort within a 2 or 3 hr at a push drive. Self catering when the teenagers are with us, hotel if it's just two, still manage to keep it within a reasonable budget.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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@Timmycb5, schools breakup 31st March, Easter 9th April. Back to school on the 17th
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Hmm, even stupider, if I elect to go a day earlier (on the Thursday), it makes the return on the Tuesday (i.e. the same return day) half the price that if I went on the Friday. WTF is that all about?
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| Timmycb5 wrote: |
| Hmm, even stupider, if I elect to go a day earlier (on the Thursday), it makes the return on the Tuesday (i.e. the same return day) half the price that if I went on the Friday. WTF is that all about? |
Demand driven pricing.
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| Jonny996 wrote: |
| Sorry to hear that but it’s not a £1000 for a weeks skiing, it’s £1000 minus the cost of a normal week’s holidays abroad. |
Yep! That’s definitely how I look at skiing. It’s an excuse to travel to some place different from my home<->work.
(For years, I didn’t take any summer holidays. Because I felt where I CHOOSE to live was because it’s “perfect” for my summer pursuit - cycling. No need to spend money go anywhere else. I suspect if I stop traveling for skiing, I’d be itchy to travel to cycle/kayak. It may be a little less expensive but not by a lot)
Last edited by After all it is free  on Wed 25-01-23 17:33; edited 2 times in total
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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| abc wrote: |
| Timmycb5 wrote: |
| Hmm, even stupider, if I elect to go a day earlier (on the Thursday), it makes the return on the Tuesday (i.e. the same return day) half the price that if I went on the Friday. WTF is that all about? |
Demand driven pricing. |
Doesn't make sense though. Flying out Thursday and back on Tuesday, the price for Tuesday is £X. Flying out Friday and back on Tuesday, and the price for the same flight on the Tuesday in scenario one is twice the price.
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@Timmycb5, Had a quick look on EasyJet. Only 1 flight on the last Saturday of March instead of the usual 5!
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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I think the fact that more airlines use dynamic pricing, combined with three years of Covid-blocked ski holidays for the Brits, means it's particularly tough this year.
3 weeks ago I was looking at flights to Malpensa and Munich for vaguely €150 a person, according to skyscanner. I bit the bullet a couple of days ago, realised I had to select certain times because of other commitments and to allow train from/to MUC, and just paid 850 for two of us 
As above, my logic is that I won't be going for an expensive summer holiday this year and skiing is the only fun I get - so stuff it, we're going.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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| Timmycb5 wrote: |
| abc wrote: |
| Timmycb5 wrote: |
| Hmm, even stupider, if I elect to go a day earlier (on the Thursday), it makes the return on the Tuesday (i.e. the same return day) half the price that if I went on the Friday. WTF is that all about? |
Demand driven pricing. |
Doesn't make sense though. Flying out Thursday and back on Tuesday, the price for Tuesday is £X. Flying out Friday and back on Tuesday, and the price for the same flight on the Tuesday in scenario one is twice the price. |
Demand pricing has been in play for a long time. Generally speaking, flying Friday and Sunday are the most expensive days. For many people, including those flying on business, they are the most convenient days to fly. For example, there was over $600 difference between us flying home on Sunday versus Monday. Since time is not an issue for us, we will stay another night in Europe.
Back to the original question… I think skiing may be getting too expensive. I wonder how many young people, at the start of their careers, or young families, can afford it. That is probably a narrow demographic. From where do the next generation skiers come? The contrary argument is that we are still seeing crowds and tight accommodation in the “better” ski resorts, so what’s the problem? Who knows?
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I had to fly back home for a meeting a couple of weeks ago, snow was so poor here the mrs decided to come as well Geneva to Bristol and back was less than £ 230 in total, would cost more to catch a train from bristol to paddington,
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You know it makes sense.
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@Gored, Easter this year is April 9th not march, however easyjet is cutting back its alpine flights towards the end of march
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Just back from a week in the Grand Domaine, £145 per person for week including 6 day ski pass, cheap holidays are still available if you arent tied to certain areas or dates.
Sunweb is your friend.
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Poster: A snowHead
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| alasdair.graham wrote: |
Just back from a week in the Grand Domaine, £145 per person for week including 6 day ski pass, cheap holidays are still available if you arent tied to certain areas or dates.
Sunweb is your friend. |
Blimey. Where did you stay?
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| Jonny996 wrote: |
Sorry to hear that but it’s not a £1000 for a weeks skiing, it’s £1000 minus the cost of a normal week’s holidays abroad.
In effect the skiing may only be £300 extra & that is what you have to weigh up |
Hmmmm. That's only if you make your one week ski holiday your only holiday of the year. We still have a summer holiday. Nothing fancy, a week at Eurocamp in August, which we love for completely different reasons to skiing. But, still needs funding. Costs us about £2k for the week (all in). Family of 4. Then £1k a head on skiing.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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@telford_mike,
Perfectly nice one bed apartment. Too good to be true
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| ulmerhutte wrote: |
Back to the original question… I think skiing may be getting too expensive. |
Based on what? SO far in this thread I haven't seen anything to support the idea that skiing costs have risen more than inflation. Too expensive for you? If your earnings have fallen behind inflation then yeah, of course, or if other life costs have increased more for whatever reason, but is there any actual evidence that the overall cost, inflation-adjusted, of a ski holiday is significantly higher than it was five, ten or twenty years ago?
Edit: One other point that just occurred to me is to wonder how much one's perception of it being more expensive may be influenced by higher expectations? I mean, when you were younger and less experienced (and earned less) perhaps staying in a shared-bathroom chalet with a set dinner of mediocre quality with wine you could use to clean a paintbrush provided by your chalet host and a twenty minute hike to the ski lift might have been the best you could aspire to, but most people who've been doing ski holidays for a long time have probably become used to much higher levels of luxury, privacy, quality and convenience. All of which come at an increased cost.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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+1 ^ I think what we're seeing reflected here is that the UK has fallen behind ski destination countries in terms of wages dropping against inflation - a failure to recover from the 2008 financial crisis; being hit by Brexit; and a failure to recover from the Pandemic as other countries have managed to do. The energy crisis affects everyone roughly equally and while it has had an effect, I think it's secondary. Basically, we're getting poorer compared to ski destination countries, so for Brits, yes, ski holidays may be getting more expensive in terms of £GBP. And for some at the ceiling of their budget, this makes them unaffordable.
But I'd also echo that subjectively, compared to family ski holidays 20 years ago, I'm not seeing current costs as much different, adjusted for inflation. Perhaps that's because we quickly switched from TO holidays to self-drive and self-cater in both the Alps and the USA. We never went in for catered chalets. Personally, I'm amazed at how cheap flights still are, considering there's an energy crisis: they're still nowhere near the cost they were 30 years ago. I suspect that if you're prepared to adapt - such as choosing a destination easily accessible by public transport from a major hub like Geneva, Turin or Zurich, or switching from catered chalet to self-catered, or switching from flying to self-drive - then you can find something at a comparable budget to before.
You probably do have to put in more effort now in terms of constructing your holiday from individual components, which can be time-consuming. And you have to research each component more carefully before committing - you can't just book a flight or accommodation first, and then leave the rest 'till later: there are certainly many more SnowHead threads this year from people who've done that only to have a problem with the cost or availability of transfers, car rental or accommodation.
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| Chaletbeauroc wrote: |
| SO far in this thread I haven't seen anything to support the idea that skiing costs have risen more than inflation.. |
I just posted a load of facts supporting the idea that they have.
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Like a few people here have mentioned, as people get older they possibly are looking for more upmarket accommodation, and have more specific requirements for location instead of just grabbing a last minute bargain wherever was cheap when they were younger. Also when people first start work they are more likely to be single and go on a ski holiday with a group of mates who each are paying their share, that's very different cost to when you are older and paying for your kids as well ! Add in the need to travel in school holidays and yes it looks a lot more expensive than you were used to when you started out.
When I recently made a booking for this year there was less availability than in previous years so it's clearly still affordable to plenty of people. if it was too expensive, the resorts would not be able to fill the accommodation. This was not in the UK school holiday weeks either. Myself and other people I know have children who are now working but still at the start of their careers and so we still pay for their trip so for them so I guess they also think its not too expensive (yet) 
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I mean, is there anything OTHER than budget flying in Europe? Even the national carriers don't include food or luggage!
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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| davidof wrote: |
| Chaletbeauroc wrote: |
| SO far in this thread I haven't seen anything to support the idea that skiing costs have risen more than inflation.. |
I just posted a load of facts supporting the idea that they have. |
I understand where you're coming from and that your original posts were effectively suffixed '... more expensive in France'. And the topic has drifted and extended as they tend to do to include ' ... more expensive for Brits.'. I've gone away to do some research and I've found it all very sensitive to the basket of items that you use to define inflation and how far you go back from the present day. The road tolls measure is interesting because it is something that the self-drive skiers will have in their holiday basket. But to be really conclusive, you'd need the same analysis for flights, fuel, accommodation, dining and groceries. Plus ski passes and equipment hire. Once you go outside France, then you'd need to analyse travel insurance, vehicle insurance and ideally normalise for currency changes (perhaps with a Euro equivalent of the USD$ Purchasing Power Parity measure). It's all a bit of a challenge!
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| kat.ryb wrote: |
I mean, is there anything OTHER than budget flying in Europe? Even the national carriers don't include food or luggage! |
BA club europe, 2xhold baggage, cabin baggage, as much food and drink as you consume in the BA lounge, and more food and drink during the journey.
It's often not that expensive either, club europe prices have not changed much since I used to travel to Europe a lot for work, that was over 20 years ago. Sometimes you can do Avios upgrades too at the last minute.
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