Team Meetings
We missed them last winter. As long as restrictions allow, we definitely want to get everyone together for a beer twice a month. They will not be compulsory and we’ll keep this page updated with any important points that come up in the meetings.
We’d also like to get back to having social Summit gatherings too. Not least the Summit beano mid season!
COVID
16 months on from the initial resort closure, there is still a lot of uncertainty around how Covid will affect our winter.
However after last season, we are very confident that the resort will stay open and we will be able to work and ski all winter. The biggest question that will affect how busy we are is, how much international travel will there be? Our hope that the vaccine would be the golden ticket out of restrictions feels a little on edge. While there are many countries who have adopted a more open travel policy for those who are double vaccinated (mostly in Europe), some of the countries where many of our guests travel from, are still on the fence.
President Biden has announced he will open America for Europeans ’soon’ and the UK is said to be looking at opening to double vaxed travellers ’soon’ too (not just double vaxed from the NHS which is how it currently stands), but no confirmed dates out there yet.
Of course, this only affects us travelling to the US or to the UK (assuming we are double vaxed). Currently Switzerland is open to UK and US travellers, and as long as they are double vaxed and then they can travel home without quarantine…. so in theory that means our guests can come, ski and head home. In fact, even in the last week there are more Brits and Americans in town again (yippee!).
We are hopeful that this is all moving in the right direction, the worry is that Autumn will hit, numbers will go up and countries will rearrange their amber and red lists… meaning quarantining requirements and massively affecting travel again.
We will keep the COVID page up to date with anything useful to help them travel this year. There are a couple of great tools out there so it is relatively easy for anyone to see where they can go. Also, what is required for entry into Switzerland. So, if you have any clients wondering then point them to https://summitskischool.com/how-will-covid-impact-skiing-in-zermatt (if you come across any good links to add then please let us know)
All of this makes it very hard to our guests to feel confident parting with money for their ski holiday until they know for sure it’s going to go ahead. So we are expecting another winter of lots of pencilled in bookings and late confirmations. One thing we do know, is the guests who want to come to Zermatt will come if they can and we will be ready for them.
A more international team:
With the BREXIT issues you are all aware of still rumbling on, and in response to Zermatt having much higher visitor numbers from closer to home (European and particularly Swiss guests) last winter, we will be hiring more instructors from Europe from this coming winter. We are excited to cover more languages in our team and be able to reach clients who we haven’t been able to before. The lack of languages in our team was especially prevalent last winter but this is something we have been thinking about for some time now.
It’s gutting not to be able to welcome back so many of the team who have spent years in blue. We are still hopeful that in the coming years the Swiss the UK will make an agreement that means we once again will be able to hire back old team members and look at new British applicants alongside their European counterparts.
Our aim for this winter and going forward is to cover more languages in the team and appeal to more clients and ultimately increase the size of our market, creating more work for the whole team.
Team size
On the basis that this winter is likely to be something like the winters of the future (most countries should have all their population vaccinated), we feel it’s appropriate to be back up to full strength and are looking at a team of 30 instructors again.
Training & SPD
Following on from the success of the level 4 training programme last winter, we will be offering level 3 and level 4 training throughout the winter again. The format will alter slightly (to accommodate folk potentially coming from the UK and only allowed to be in CH for 90 days) but will be focused on preparing for the tech exams in Zermatt in March.
Summit team members will get a 30% discount on any training booked. This means it would cost you 336chf per week. We will need a minimum of 3 in a group to run it.
We have gone through the process of becoming a BASI Business Partner which allows us to organise and run BASI courses and gives us the ability to offer some good opportunities to Summit team members who are looking to make steps towards becoming a BASI trainer.
We have also partnered with WEARESNO to provide the training for their gap courses that will run in Zermatt this winter.
New Schools
We are aware of at least 2 new schools starting up in Zermatt next winter. New competition is always a good incentive to up our game and show our clients and partners why we are the best choice in Zermatt and that #summitinstructorsrock! 💪💪💪