Why is Italy much cheaper than France, Austria or Switzerland?

A snowHead

14th Jan self catering small resort I don't think that's all that cheap ist it?

A snowHead

@Mother hucker, should be as cheap as chips

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

@Matrix, I reckon I could do cheaper than 2800 if I could be bothered to hunt about

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@Mother hucker, Of course. But depends on what level of accommodation is being booked or desired. But yes it’s a quiet week.

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@Mother hucker, @Matrix, The OP is looking at a 'bundled' holiday.

From their other thread

"Rang Crystal today & got a great quote of 2,800 euro for 7 nights flights, accommodation, transfers & luggage. The accommodation is Residence Campo Smith apartments

Also included in the price is a ski bundle for the girls including ski school, lift pass & equipment hire. Travelling Jan 14th '24."

https://snowheads.com/ski-forum/viewtopic.php?t=162364

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@Mother hucker, @Matrix, And the OP is flying from Dublin, which doesn’t have as many TO options as we do from Mainland UK, for their first ski hols with 2 young kids it makes sense at that price all in.

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Yes, I think it does too.

After all it is free

Had 3 trips to Italy in the last 5 years, two in Selva and one in Cervinia, and didn't notice any price difference to my Austria trips over the same time period. I think the Crystal sales rep wanted to keep things nice and simple. Get the sale done and move onto the next call.

She did price Austria for me, did it myself also on crystals website. In Niderau (apologies for spelling!), it was much more expensive as they had no free child's place left (which we are getting in Bardonecchia) & no ski bundle discount, she added all the ski hire, lift pass & ski school separately. Also Salzburg flight leaves Dublin at 14.15 in the afternoon & the Turin flight was 06.10 in the morning with a shorter transfer..

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She did price Austria for me, did it myself also on crystals website. In Niderau (apologies for spelling!), it was much more expensive as they had no free child's place left (which we are getting in Bardonecchia) & no ski bundle discount, she added all the ski hire, lift pass & ski school separately. Also Salzburg flight leaves Dublin at 14.15 in the afternoon & the Turin flight was 06.10 in the morning with a shorter transfer..

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@geoffknight, Roger that

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Slightly biased as my other half is Italian and my MIL thinks that the Dolomites are God's mountains and why on earth would you go anywhere else but I'd agree that accomodation and lift passes aren't that much cheaper but the food, the coffee, the bombardino, the Aperol spritz that you don't have to sacrifice a limb to buy... Stunning food on the mountain that's way cheaper than it's equivalent in France. Off to the Dolomites on the 1st jan and I CANNOT wait! Very Happy

i am an Austria fan since 2007..sometimes in Italy usually S.Tirol
However the package i got for Flaine is unbeatable for Austria or S. Tirol
Ok, towels etc i have to bring my self
But otherwise i cannot find this prices in Austria or Italy and if yes not 300m from the lifts or the ski school

But this is only for appartments. For hotels Austia is cheaper than France. Italy also (i think)

You know it makes sense.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

@Skifamily22,
It is all down to individual perception. People look for different things from a ski holiday. For what one requires Italy may be the cheapest option. For what another looks for it may be Switzerland.
Crude example. Two people, equal ski ability, book comparable accommodation in (say) Morzine and Val D'Isere end of March, plus lift pass, ski hire etc. Chances are the Morzine trip will be much cheaper. But if the weather is warm the skiing in Morzine (low altitude) would be limited, whilst unaffected in Val D'Isere (high altitude). The person in Val D'Isere would actually have had a cheaper trip per mile skiied than the one in Morzine.

A snowHead

@Kenzie, but if a storm rolls in and its high winds, you'll still be skiing in morzine but VDI chance are the mountain maybe closed. Just for the record I'd go VDI over Morzine every time

A snowHead

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

@Mother hucker,
I refer you to 'Crude example'.
But based on my time doing seasons in Tignes:- a couple who'd done a season snowboarding in Tignes decided to do the following one in Morzine as accommodation and lift pass were cheaper. By early March they were letting us know that due to the snow conditions they'd made a mistake - the longer Espace Killy ski season, plus more reliable snow meant the extra costs were more than compensated for by the extra snowboarding.

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@BobinCH, Maybe I have mis-interpreted your words? Xmas week has never been regarded as secure for snow at low altitudes in my own lifetime. Back with my first ski trip in the in the 1970`s it was felt that end Dec was 'iffy'. Even with access to 'high', resorts had to be chosen with care!

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After all it is free

This doesn't really have anything to do with skiing: everything in Italy is cheaper than the equivalent in AT, CH or FR, whether you're in Courmayeur, Lake Garda or Rome. Apart from petrol/diesel anyway; that always seems a lot more expensive in IT.

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One thing I noticed last year was the costs on the mountain. In France a large beer was around 9€ which was a big increase since my last visit but in Italy it was still about 4€, so not any more than before the covid issue. It just seemed that Italy weren’t trying to catch up on lost revenue and wanted to make it attractive to visit. Just my observation.

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@geepee, where in France and where in Italy?

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@mooney058,
Where in France can you get a beer on the mountain for less than 9 euro?
Ive purposely paid 12 euro+ for a decent beer, to not drink the 9 euro crap!

Earlier this year I spent a week in 3V and a week in AdH and paid between 6.5 and 8 euros for an on-mountain beer. Off to Italy next month so will compare.

You know it makes sense.

There was a thread recently - I can't seem to find it - discussing where a company had done a systematic comparison of a family ski holiday costs in different countries, on a like-for-like basis. It worked out the cost using individual items such as flights, equipment rental, accommodation, ski pass, etc plus a similar level of accommodation and things like nearness to lifts. I recall it was interesting that in fact, the difference between countries only came down to about £100/person for a 5-day break other than for instruction. Instruction in Switzerland was far more expensive than anywhere else and turned that £100 difference into more like £2-300, with Austria coming second in the instruction cost league.

Now, even £100/person isn't trivial if we're looking at a family of four or five, and for many people (especially when learning) instruction isn't optional. But it did underline that the when making comparisons it's important for it to be an apples-to-apples judgement. And that for a large segment of ski holidaymakers, particularly those who don't need instruction, the assumption that 'Italy=cheap / Switzerland=expensive' may not apply or, that the difference in cost may be less of factor than the difference in transfer convenience, size and type of ski area, choice of restaurants, and so on.

That holiday in Italy may be cheap because it's a 3-hour transfer, you're walking 30 minutes to the main lift or have to spend 20 minutes waiting for the ski bus, are in a 100Km ski area, and have to share your WiFi with 40 other guests. Whereas that holiday in Austria may be more expensive because it's a 90-minute transfer, you're within 50m walk of the main lift, have access to 250Kms of slopes, get your own internet connection, and are in the middle of the hire shops and restaurants. The factors affecting the final price are numerous and are often hard to tease out of any comparison. And that's before you have to account for personal differences e.g. those who insist on eating a big meal at lunchtime with alcohol, versus others who just go for a plate of chips or a bowl of soup with a coke, and that some resorts are noticeably quieter in peak weeks than others - which may be something that you'd pay a premium for, or not, as the case may be.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

Just on the "Christmas skiing" discussion, I've never seen Christmas as reliable, or prime time. 15 consecutive seasons in Les Saisies, where the main skiing is from the village at 1600 with the top only just over 2000, saw very few years when the snow was really great, though it was usually OK and ALWAYS better than sitting in front of the telly at home. As a family before we had our own place we always went cheapest January week after New Year and, again, had mixed snow. Particularly poor in Alpbach one year. Poorish in Kapaonik.

Many of the lower altitude resorts in France don't even open till Christmas week, though might have weekend skiing available earlier in December when conditions permit.

A snowHead

And I distinctly remember a rather dismal hour in Mottaret having been deposited by bus, killing a rather dismal hour with a lot of baggage and three small kids, wandering round in the rain trying not to spend money whilst we located the rental agency to get the key to our apartment at 4 pm.

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@LaForet,
Post Office do one every year https://www.postoffice.co.uk/travel-money/ski-report

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

I've skiied in Bardonnechia and it was a OK but I wouldn't go back. Small ski area but most importantly, fragmented and when we went, there was no snow at the base (obviously, poor snow is always a possibility, anywhere, but the ski area isn't that high). What I was trying to say was that that this question is very hard to answer because everyone's holiday criteria are different, and in particular, what trade-offs people will make are also very different. I don't doubt that the overall cost of living in Italy is probably lower than in Austria and Switzerland, but I wouldn't discount an entire country's ski areas because of that: you can get a cheap ski holiday in Switzerland, just like anywhere else, but it'll work for someone with a certain profile and not others.

The other factor, of course, is TO vs DIY. TO offerings are a particular, highly selective subset of possible Alpine holidays and there is a whole separate discussion to be had around whether you can't do better - even just in terms of cost - with self-drive and self-cater.

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As with the overall question in this thread, it is as daft to make claims about how much a beer costs in "France" as it is to declare how much a beer costs in the UK. It depends where you go. There is as great a difference between the cost of a lunch, or a hot chocolate, or a beer, on French mountains as there is between the "average cost" (whatever that is) in the different countries. When we first discovered Les Saisies, by accident, we had spent the previous week in Courchevel. A beer and plat de jour" where we first met the French proprietors of what became our local piste-side restaurant was literally half the price of Courchevel - and we always avoided the expensive places in Courchevel.

I'm sure the same is true in Italy etc. One of the most expensive beers I've bought in recent years was by the sea in Italy. Not an obviously smart place - small resort along the coast from Genova. Was worth every penny, but wasn't cheap.

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I'm sitting in a restaurant in les arcs at the moment eating venison in a red wine and carrot sauce with palenta. The price including water and bread 18 euros, which is a couple euro more than last year. It is more or less the same as in the dolomites in the summer. There is inflation everywhere.

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@johnE, €18!
How many atoms wide is the slice of venison? I’m sure you could count them Little Angel

After all it is free

Fair size chunks I'd reckon about 125 gms. To me a normal helping I'd have at home.

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The dolomites this summer were expensive and packed.

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Why is Italy much cheaper than France, Austria or Switzerland?

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