Snow Business

Andrew Reed

Description

A useful guide for aspiring ski reps, providing insight into a typical winter seasonExplores Swedish culture and traditions- portrays Sweden in an honest, different lightAndrew Reed spent a winter as a ski rep for a well known UK travel company in the resort of re, Sweden. The book is a humorous account of his experiences from the daunting first week of the selection process in Austria, the convoluted journey by road, ship and rail to the resort itself and through the hectic first month of setting up in resort.The chapters that follow reveal a very different type of ski resort to the normal alpine resort with activities that included snowmobile safaris, husky dog sledging, chaotic reindeer rides and visits to the spectacular frozen waterfall. Even the Northern Lights and the real Santa Claus make brief appearances.The book offers a realistic, honest perspective and explains the strains and pressures of the job, including working in close proximity to others over such a long, hard season which finished well beyond the alpine resorts. It will help aspiring reps to prepare by offering useful advice and encouragement, but it is also of interest to the wider ski and travel community.Snow Business is based on Andrew's Nordic adventures and it provides a fascinating insight into the country, its people and its traditions, along with the quirks of the language. It will appeal to those who love all things skiing, or those with an interest in Swedish culture.

Sujets

• Travel writing

Informations

• Publié par: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 28 janvier 2018
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781788033961
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Copyright © 2018 Andrew Reed

The moral right of the author has been asserted.


Apart from any fair dealing for the purposes of research or private study, or criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, this publication may only be reproduced, stored or transmitted, in any form or by any means, with the prior permission in writing of the publishers, or in the case of reprographic reproduction in accordance with the terms of licences issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside those terms should be sent to the publishers.


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ISBN 978 1788033 961

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.


Matador is an imprint of Troubador Publishing Ltd
To Jane
Contents
1. Augusti
Take a Chance on Me

2. December
Money, Money, Money

3. Januari
Happy New Year

4. Februari
I Do, I Do, I Do

5. Mars
Does Your Mother Know?

6. April
S.O.S.

Snow Business: The Soundtrack



1
Augusti
Take a Chance on Me
A hot sunny afternoon in Surbiton may seem like a strange place to start an account of a winter spent in the frozen north of Sweden, but the Sanctuary Lodge was the UK head quarters of the holiday company I was hoping to be employed by for the forthcoming winter season.
The imposing Victorian villa sheltered from the heat under tall leafy English oaks and overgrown conifers and was strangely quiet. It appeared there weren’t many applicants attending the first interviews for a ski season in mid-August. I checked in with reception and was directed up the wide staircase to wait in a lobby on the first floor, where a couple of others looked up and acknowledged my arrival. I returned the nods and half smiles and took my seat by the window. I watched a squirrel flit about in the garden for a short while before I was called in to another room ahead of the others.
In the expansive but oddly empty room sat just two people behind an oversized dark wood desk with an array of papers; application forms with passport photos pinned or stapled to the top left corner of each one. The lady that had called me in returned to her seat to the side of the desk and ushered me to the single chair with a brisk wave of her hand.
After friendly introductions were made, we went through my application form and discussed my “ need to take a career break” as I had described it (not my current unemployed status and my strong desire, verging on desperation, to get some respite from endless job applications and rejections or indecision on the part of employers). Had I really thought what it meant to give up what they presumed to be a well paid job for a lowly paid job with very long hours? I would be living away from England and friends and sometimes dealing with stressed members of the public who had paid a lot of money for their family’s once-a-year ski holiday. Err… yes, I was sure it was what I wanted to do and, if I had to live in the mountains and be paid to ski every day for it, I was ready for it.
“Of course, you won’t get to ski every day, you know. There’s a lot of behind the scenes paperwork and we run a very tight ship with budgets, etc,” warned the man with the tweed jacket.
“That’s fine,” I replied. “Having worked in an office environment for a few years, I am used to keeping financial records up to date and dealing with people. I see that as the main part of the job and the skiing as a benefit.” Smart answer, I thought, although I hoped they didn’t think it too smart.
“And you are sure you want to go to Sweden?”
“Absolutely. I know people there, I’ve travelled around the country a bit and I like the customs and the people. And I already speak a little Swedish,” I proffered, taking a bit of a gamble that none of them did. They didn’t. And nor did they test the limit of my really useful sixteen Swedish words and my ability to count to ten very slowly. Apart from those basics, I could say “my hovercraft is full of eels,” as I could in French, German and Italian. Some people like to learn to say “I love you” in different languages; my friends are a little different and that phrase was one we liked to perfect. They also wouldn’t be able to test my skiing ability here in Surbiton so, if I passed this interview, at the very least I would get a free week in Austria at their rep training week which would take me out of grey London. The application form had required a minimum of ten weeks’ skiing. I had done only seven but, on the form, I had put eleven and had researched the locations of where and when those spurious weeks had been.
After a few more minutes’ relaxed chat, they wrapped it up and thanked me for coming along, adding that I should sit outside and wait to be called in to one of the other rooms. When I returned to the lobby, some more hopeful reps had appeared fresh from their initial interviews. It wasn’t long before we were divided up into groups of eight and led to various rooms where we each had to give a presentation on ourselves, do a short maths test, answer questions on the role of a resort representative, and were tested on our knowledge of the winter season brochure (where to find the information on flight times, learn to ski packages basically, the small print ) . The session finished up with a selling test, where we were each asked to sell the benefits of a particular fruit to the group. The reason being that one of the most important parts of the job was selling excursions and the more you sold, the more the holiday company made, and the more you as a rep made.
I left the building and walked back to my car feeling quite pleased with the way things had gone and thinking that surely there wouldn’t be loads of people, if anyone, wanting to go to Sweden – would there? Surely all the cool people wanted to do a season in Val D’Isere or Chamonix or St Anton. No one else I had spoken to had ever heard of Åre (pronounced oreh or more easily aura ) and certainly didn’t know you could actually go alpine skiing there. The usual comments were “Isn’t Sweden all cold and dark in the winter?” and “Don’t they just go cross country skiing, eat herring and beat each other with birch twigs?” The more people held that view, the better my chances were, I reckoned.
Two weeks later, I duly received confirmation that they would like to offer me a place on their grandly named ‘Winter 96/97 Overseas Representatives Training Seminar’, which was planned for early December. My contract and confirmation of the resort in which I would be working was subject to the satisfactory completion of the training course. They had stressed at the interview that a place on the course was no guarantee of a job but anyone committing to the week should give serious consideration to leaving their employment. They requested a cheque for £70 and confirmation of acceptance of the offer, £35 of that was to be refunded upon the successful completion of the season and the return of the uniform. I would be sent further details including travel arrangements in due course.
In late October, I received a letter containing my joining instructions (should I choose to continue to accept, of course – well they had my £70 now so what choice had I?). The letter advised of the Corporate Training Day, set for Friday 29th November at Sandown Park Racecourse near Esher, following which all the staff would depart for their European training course in France, Austria or Italy. Now it was beginning to feel real and exciting but I still had some purchases to make. They suggested a shopping list, in no particular order:
Everyone
• Alarm clock (two to be on the safe side).
• Adapter plug.
• Calculator.
• Stationery e.g. stapler, ruler, coloured pens, Tippex, rubber, scissors, Sellotape, glue (they must have got all of that straight from a Blue Peter annual, surely?).
• Thermal underwear (following logically on from Sellotape and glue, of course).
• Ski wear e.g. jacket, trousers, gloves, goggles, sunglasses (there was, I felt, a more than average chance I would have thrown all those things into the luggage without this helpful suggestion).
• Toiletries – especially contact lens solution (…and the title of this section was… everyone ?).
• Money to start you off with (because they thought you were going to earn enough from selling excursions to survive – or they knew that you would, in your training week, make it your business to tap up the experienced rep for all the scams you could possibly legitimately and safely run).
• Footwear with a non-slip sole (already thought of that) – We recommend “Timberland-style” boots. ( Good product placement , I thought. However, I had my own non-slip dark brown leather boots from Millets that I had owned for several years so I figured I’d save a bit of cash and take those, assuming they’d pass the non-slip test).
• Iron (no explanation here but I assumed they meant one for ironing clothes rather than just iron weights or vitamin tablets. There was no “e.g.” so I was left slightly flummoxed. It could have been “e.g. for flattening clothes” but no clues at all, nothing).
• Dairy (I think that was a typo).
Resort Reps
• A typewriter or PC, if you have one (this was back in mid 1990s).
• Cash box (lockable) – Resort managers / Head Reps (foolishly I went out and bought one and took it out with me but never used it and have not done so to this day).
• Bum-bag /