Which resorts are the cheapest?
Tuesday October 13, 2009 - Email this article to a friend

The survey covered costs such as equipment hire, lift passes, meals and drinks while in the resort.

Eastern Europe is the cheapest place to ski with Romania, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Slovenia the best bargain, according to a survey by Post Office travel services.

Romania's Poiana Brasov was the cheapest for extras and essentials at £195.76 per week.

It found Verbier, Vail and Banff to be the most expensive.

The survey says that the extras and essentials in Courchevel will cost £230.59 and that a 6 day lift pass makes up £129.95. A drop of 11%.

Verbier

Well, this seemed remarkably cheap to us so we checked and found the prices to be accurate but they don't quite tell the whole story.

A lift pass for the vast majority of the season is actually €190 (£176) for 6 days and this is just for the Courchevel area alone. 

A more accurate comparison perhaps, with say Verbier, would be for the full Trois Vallees ski pass in mid-winter; this comes out at €232 (£215) which is actually more than the full Verbier pass that will set you back £206.

So the bald figure of Courchevel's lift pass costing £129.95 and Verbier's £205.99  does not really reflect the reality of the cost of a lift pass.

So where has the figure of £129.95 come from? 

It appears this is one of the prices supplied to The Post Office by the resort itself and it covers the cost of a ticket (€133) for one week in December and 2 weeks in April; low season in other words.

As we said caution is needed with statistics. Last winter we had an on-going battle, out in the Alps, to discover what was really going on.

"French ski resorts have responded well to the pressures imposed by the strong euro by slashing prices and Courchevel now rates as one of the cheapest eurozone ski destinations as a direct result," said The Post Office head of travel services, Sarah Munro.

Now we are sorry to contradict but to say "Courchevel is one of the cheapest Eurozone ski destinations" is rather pushing it.

Here at PlanetSKI we have found that the French are certainly being more competitive in their pricing than other countries and are more willing to negotiate the price.  With 33% of the British market they certainly have the most to loose if the British cut back on their skiing holidays.

It got us thinking here at PlanetSKI.

How can you say what the price of a cup of coffee or a beer is? It depends which bar you go to. Maybe they have tried several locations and averaged them out.

The prices have already been reported as hard facts by some other sources including The Daily Telegraph, The Daily Mail and others.

The Champagne lifetsyleThe resort review book Where to Ski and Snowboard, carried out a similar survey and we reported on it here.  We checked up on a few of the book's figures and they seemed pretty accurate to us.

They actually made Courchevel the most expensive resort anywhere.

Out of interest here is the full table of results, below, from the Post Office.

COMPARATIVE COSTS IN SKI RESORTS

Now we don't want to criticise the whole survey, far from it, and Munro does offer some good advice.

"It's worth comparing the prices of ski equipment hire and lift passes in different resorts as these can make a big difference to the overall cost of a ski holiday," she says.

"While bargain-hunters will still find the lowest prices in Romania and Bulgaria, price should not be the only issue when planning a ski holiday. It's important to choose a resort that matches your ability and expectations."

All we say here at PlanetSKI is to treat statistics and surveys with caution as they often don't tell the whole picture.

If you want to save a few pounds then take a look at our latest offers of deals and discounts which have some discounted holidays on offer and also the PlanetSKI guide to cutting the costs of skiing.

Do check out the latest blog from our content editor, James Cove, as he ponders spin, PR and journalism in the ski world.

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