St. Moritz, located in the Engadin Valley of Switzerland, is all set to tap the Indian market. Presently, St. Moritz receives about 5000 overnight stays from India and it is popular for its winter sports activity. Regarded as the birthplace of Winter Tourism, last year this destination celebrated 150 years of winter tourism.
Speaking to T3, Ariane Ehrat, Chief Executive Officer, Tourism Organisation Engadin St. Moritz said, “India is one of the key markets which we want to target, as it has enormous potential. One of the main challenges with this market is that our destination is not very popular amongst the Indians. Moreover, there is a general perception about St. Moritz being an expensive destination. We want to make the Indian travellers aware that this destination is affordable for every type of traveller.”
Globally, film tourism, especially Bollywood tourism has played a major role in increasing tourist footfalls to many destinations. Some of the destinations have already started incentivising film tourism. Ehrat said, “We would love to increase film tourism in St. Moritz. Many films have been already shot in the various regions of Switzerland; we are not competing with our own regions. But we are surely open to facilitate, if Bollywood wants to foray our region.”
Previously, this Alpine skiing resort has been a host for various skiing events. St. Moritz has hosted the Alpine World Ski Championships in 1934, 1948, 1974 and 2003. In 2017, St. Moritz will once again host this championship for the fifth time. Around 50 teams will be participating in the event and the destination expects around 80,000 more overnight stays during this championship.
Speaking about winter tourism activities, specifically for the Indian market, Ehrat added, “Nowadays Indians are showing more interest towards sports tourism, but extreme adventure activities are still not popular in India. We offer various soft adventure activities and also customise our extreme adventure activities to suit the taste of the Indian travellers. Recently we have launched a niche product called ‘Yoga on Snow’. This attraction can go well with the Indian audience as Yoga is extremely popular in India.”
Currently, the biggest source markets for St. Moritz are domestic tourists from Switzerland itself, followed by Germany, Italy, United Kingdom, USA, Belgium, Luxembourg and France.
