At the ski lifts, the Catalan resorts might complete a winter campaign at 1,400,000 skier-days, ie an absolute record of more than 200,000 skier-days over the best seasons of recent years.
“We will arrive at a total turnover which will exceed 29 million euros, taking into account the last three weekends before closing. At the ski lifts, this now represents an increase of 10%. And the winter sports clientele has grown, hence the accommodation occupancy rates and attendance at peripheral snow activities. A ski resort is made to develop an attractiveness on the territory and an economic vitality”, rejoices Michel Poudaden the president of the Catalan Snows and mayor of the Angles, a municipality where all the shops have filled up since the month of December.
At the other end of the high Catalan cantons, Porté-Puymorens is also enjoying exceptional success. “At the lifts, we have increased by 20% on the average of the last five years in the world before the Covid. In attendance at 100,000 skier-days and in turnover (at 2.3 million euros). And we have noted the massive return of customers to alpine skiing following a full season of frustration. In fact, this winter, we were treated to an ideal scenario: substantial and early snowfall, roads always clear, cold and sunny and very few storms. So much so that the ski area has remained completely open”, analyzes Éric Charre, the director of the border station with Andorra, which will stop its lifts on the evening of March 27. “These good results allow us to look to the financial future with confidence,” he continues.
“Even my parents had never seen so many people in winter”
At Font-Romeu-Pyrénées 2000, Cerdagne’s flagship resort, there is once more talk of an absolute attendance record (520,000 skier-days) in a context of significant expansion of the catchment area with the loyalty of client-skiers from the Atlantic coast and Brittany. “All the activities in our station are progressing noticeably. We note at the same time the return to the fundamentals of winter sports, that is to say downhill skiing”, confirms Jacques Alvarez, the director of the resort who announces a further 20% increase in the sale of packages at Cambre d’Aze, the station also operated by Altiservice.
A 20% increase in attendance is also what can be seen in hotels and restaurants in Cerdagne-Capcir. “Even my parents had never seen so many people in winter. It is 20% in attendance as in turnover, including in January a month which usually sounds a little hollow between the school holiday periods. But not this year. I even believe that we ran out of hotel beds this winter, ”says Éric Planes, the head of the UMIH (Union of trades in the hotel industry) and the owner of the legendary house Planes, hotels and gourmet restaurant for 127 winter seasons in Saillagouse. And the customers for the table, the bed and the ski come from France but also from Spain, whose border is 12 kilometers away. With a strong feeling of liberation following months of health constraints.