Winter wonderlands

Skiing is gaining popularity among Middle East clients and travel agents need to know their white stuff.

Traditionally a niche market confined to expat snow fans, winter sports as a travel product is growing in popularity as Kathi Everden reports

now in the desert is no longer the strange phenomenon it once was. There was a covering of the white stuff in the mountains of Ras Al Khaimah a few years ago, and plans for a winter resort there remain active if not actioned as yet.

Without a physical product in the region, it was the launch of the first indoor ski slope at the Mall of the Emirates some five years ago that quietly served to excite interest in the cold stuff, introducing snow, ski and snow boarding to a wider audience.

According to Marco Heinrich, regional manager, destination development, Europe & The Americas, for Emirates Holidays, there has been a noticeable shift from mall to mountain: “We are seeing people start at Ski Dubai; try out winter sports in Lebanon and then go on to the slopes in Europe or the United States.”

In addition, the local slopes have proved useful to provide training for the travel trade: “One of the challenges is trade awareness — here we are training our own staff as well as agents, taking them to Ski Dubai just to touch snow and try out a lift, as well as doing product presentations. And we are also planning a Fam trip for our staff next year too.”

Product knowledge is key in the arena of winter sports — agents have to deal either with keen skiers who are well aware of what they need in a destination, or with novice families perhaps trying out a winter holiday for the first time.

In either case, the trade has to offer more than just a flight and hotel to Austria, France or Switzerland.

And while it remains a small market — well under 5% of the total for Emirates Holidays for instance — it has been noted as a market with potential to expand: “The demand for winter sports is still low out of the region, but it is constantly increasing and we think it will become a major trend, even among locals, in the next few years,” says Klaus Ehrenbrandtner, Middle East director for the Austrian National Tourist Office (ANTO).

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Those with experience in catering to winter demand point to several areas of potential, where even the least-experienced agency could move in to the sale of snow and the allure of the winter wonderland.

Emirates Holidays’ Heinrich highlights the trend for local Arab travellers to try out a winter product: “Over the past six years, since we launched our dedicated winter holiday brochure, we have noticed that Arabs are starting to travel to ski destinations — not going so much for the sport, but for the winter city atmosphere.

“Although Arabs only make up 20% of our total winter holiday traffic, this has doubled from 10% over the years — and we are selling in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait now too, as well as the UAE.”

In addition, according to Paul Clabburn, group general manager at Bahrain International Travel Group (BIT), there is a growing market for Arab nationals with top-end luxury budgets: “They like to take over quality chalets in well-known, high profile resorts, mostly in Europe — but occasionally in the US, often by those who have been at university there.”

As well as winter sports, Clabburn identifies a market for cold wintry destinations, where both Arab and expat travellers are looking to discover something very different from their Middle East environment: “There is a market not necessarily interested in winter sports but who do want to vacation in the mountains in the snow.”

Clabburn stresses that it is imperative for agents to have knowledge of the different resorts to be able to sell and turn this dream in to a reality — rather than a nightmare — avoiding the concrete resorts that proliferate in France for example, and selling high-end rustic villages nearby or the quaint resorts of Austria and Switzerland.