The backstory

We started off in Andy’s living room in 1989 (well, his parent’s if we’re honest). He skied a bit and saved £1000 from organising ski races and torchlight descents and took it to Barclays who lent him another £5000. He bought a typewriter and fax machine and rented an office in the Alps.

He started by finding property, finance and reliable tenants for UK Investors in the Alps (you could buy anything you wanted for £60k in 1988!) but frustrated by how hard it was to find tenants that he could trust, he decided he would have to do it himself, and the seed of VIP SKI was born.

Andy stuffed our first brochure by hand in his parent’s living room in 1989, the cathode ray television and VHS recorder in the background testament to an earlier epoch (and his advancing age). Two resorts, Morzine & Chamonix, 1 member of staff (him) and no clients (yet). 3 lines in the classified travel section of the Sunday Times (£25.50 + VAT) and we were off.

After 10 years of renting other people’s property we started our own joint venture building projects in 2001, finding land where we wanted to operate and conjuring partnerships to deliver chalets that we knew would please our guests. Design and build is Andy’s hobby, much of our current portfolio started in his head; from Bear Lodge in Les Arcs to Bellevarde in Val d’Isère and all of our new Avoriaz chalets.

We’ve tried hard to focus on the quality of our service. We know that yesterday’s luxury is today’s expectation and so as we refurbish what we built ten years ago, replace jacuzzis with swimming pools, DVDs with Netflix, and keys with cards, Andy is relentless (many of us would say obstinate) in his granular pursuit of better food, wine, service and care.

We’ve definitely grown up a lot over the years, we didn’t do childcare until Andy had kids (!), putting feedback live on our website was scary but the best thing we have ever done. Today we struggle to reconcile energy, waste, the environment and our day job of selling very non-carbon neutral experiences, but we are doing our best.

It’s been a bit of a journey over the last three decades to be honest; one or two awards, together with erupting volcanoes, recessions, pandemics, Brexit, et al. Andy has some help these days, there are a couple of hundred of us to look after you now in the Alps. All of us here because we share his passion to be the very best that we can be.

We all love what we do and sharing it with others.