10 things to think about as a chalet host

Whats it really like being a chalet host?

Being a chalet host in the French Alps is not easy, it can be really hard work. The bloke you share a room with is a nutter, its minus 20, your guests this week are a bunch of wankers and your wine delivery cant gt up the hill because of the weather. Is it that bad really, no of course not. . . you wake up on your ONE day off and there is6ft of fresh powder and you know exactly where to go to get at least 2 lines of fresh snow before the punters recover from their hangovers, you have had an adrenaline pumped day on the hill and you head back to resort for a drink before you start work, serve up a pro dinner and head to the bar with your guests. Good day, well done!!

10 tips for the prospective chalet host

The tips below aim to give you an insight into what its like to be a chalet host and how you can make your life easier. The lifestyle is idyllic, if you want to go work abroad in the french alps you will have an amazing time. You meet like minded people and spend your days doing what you love, ressources for working a ski season.

Have a plan for your Ski Season – What do you want to get out of your ski season. Are you just going out to the mountains to work abroad, I hope not! Are you just going out to have a good time, better get some cash together then because the job will not last long. Knowing what you want from your ski season is important! Its is an image of who you are, you are going to meet a new people, you are going to have new experiences. Do you want more responsibility for extra money? Do you want to live in the french alps indefinitely, if you do or think you might like to then you may as well get started and be as career focused as possible by networking and seeing what opportunities present them selves. If you just want to go out their and have a good time boarding and work comes second think about the minimum you need to do to get the job done. Is their a easier job you could do, is their a job that will give me more time on the mountain. If you get yourself organised and work hard at the beginning I recon that being a host is one of the best Ski season jobs if you want to maximise your time on the mountain. Having said that their will be other options, especially in the first couple of weeks during training where you may be able to change jobs.
Working as a successfull chalet host means Prep Prep Prep – Having worked in hopitlity this came kinda easy to me. Essentially if you want any easy and stress free life when you working a ski season as a chalet host the way to go about it is to prepare everything you can as early as you can. The company you are working for will probably supply you with a menu for each day. Have a look through it and see what you can do the day before or while you are waiting for your guests to get out of bed. It you can save 5 minutes here and there it means you get more time on the mountain.
Apply Early or Be Flexible – Applying as early as possible has many advantages. It means you get to pick the ski resorts you want to work at and you have a higher chance of working at them. You also get to give preferences such as working on your own or as part of a team. However its also important to be flexible and prepared as all of these things can change when you begin your training, understand that you could be doing a completely different job in another resort. The advantage of all of this is that if you do apply late it is not the end of the world, people are always dropping out, changing job roles etc. Depending on the company you are working for your training could last up to 2 weeks, during this you will have plenty of time to work out if their are some opportunities to change roles.
Work for a company which offers wine to their guests – Check out the packages your ski company offers. Do they supply wine to the guests, is the menu good? Not only will this help you in your interview and training but you will be able to get a sense of what freebie’s you will be able to take advantage of while you are working in resort. I used to drink 2-4 bottles of wine from my chalet a week, that’s a big saving not to mention allot of wicked nights.
Have a get it done attitude – This is especially important at the beginning of the season when its a little crazy. Working for some companies in the french alps is not as simple as cleaning, cooking and hosting. Setting up is a huge part of the process, smaller companies often have one base and rent chalets all over the alps just for the winter ski season. The logistics of organising staff, equipment etc can be difficult and time consuming, if you are able to help you will get noticed. You might have to take on a little more responsibility initially but you could end up getting payed and extra £100 a week by the end of the season, by which time there is a clear system in place and it nice and easy going, well worth the extra hassle at the beginning of the season.
Deep clean well at the start of the season – At the begging of the season the lifts are closed, their ain’t many people about so its a good time to get cleaning. If you get your chalet spotless at this point it will be alot easier to keep clean through the season. The time it takes you to clean a room might be 20-30mins, if you have to go around scrubbing under the sink when you could be out on the mountain you are going to be pissed off. It also means your guests will be happy…. see point number 7.
Be an enthusiastic HOST - The clue is in the job title. One of the most important thing for me about being a chalet host is being a host, sounds simple doesn’t it. There is of course another reason why this is so important, if you do it right and you get tips. I was getting 100-200 euro a week, a nice contribution to my beer fund. Couple of quick thoughts on the best ways to extract tips be a good host; Be yourself ; tell them how much you like working in the mountains for the company you are working for ; get excited about things, I got excited about testing a snowboard so the guests i had that week bought it for me ; show an interest in what they have been doing, even if its the same old shit you have herd over the last 5 weks; get the basics right, cooking and cleaning; spend time with them, take them to the bar or take them on a personal tour of the ski area which includes a nice little cliff drop you found the other day.
Compare the packages your offered – There are just so many ski companies out there how do you choose between them. They all offer you different things, as a standard you will get accommodation, food, lift pass, ski or board hire, transfers to and from the resort you are working in and of course crap pay. The variations of these are whats important. Do you really want to sit on a bus for 24 hours to get to resort, look at companies which offer flights to and from resort. Do you want to live with your guests, great if they are a good fun loving bunch but can be a pain if you don’t get on with them all that well. One of the most import things is the lift pass, is it a full area pass or just for the resort you are in. If your working in Meribel you want a three valleys pass, can you negotiate? Also have a look at the price and the type of client the company is targeting. If the price is high the likely hood is that the accommodation and chalet you are working in are going to be top dollar, cheaper prices means you might get short changed on the accommodation and chalet you work in but you are likely to meet younger more up for it guests. Its also a good idea to ask what size of chalet you will be looking after is, I was on my own and looked after 12 people, this is not the norm, usually anything over 10 and there will be at least 2 of you.
Learn the cooking Basics – If you really cant cook then being a chalet host probably ain’t for you. All you really need is to have an interest in cooking and be willing to give it a go. There are plenty of course which you can go on to learn the basics, The chalet academy is one of the better ones, Simon the chap who does is a good bloke to and that helps. In reality if your going to the alps to work a ski season you will be thought everything you need to know for cooking the menu which the company wants you to cook. All you need to do is pay some attention in training and you will be fine. This is great, no need to fork out extra cash, right!! In reality something always goes wrong, the training is shit and you get complaints the whole season, not cool. Or, you burn something and need to knock something up quickly and you have no idea what you are doing. This is why i would definitely recommend being able to cook something, have some quick fixes which you can always throw together in 10-1 minutes. This will really help you out.
Remember it will get easier – The first month is hard work. I ain’t going to lie, finding your routine, dealing with the hours you are working. If you have not skied or boarded before your body will be aching and you will feel like you will never be able to do that red which you keep bailing out on. It gets better, you start to get things done, instead of taking you 10-12 hours to do a complete turn around you get it down to 4 hours, your amazing on a board and the good snow is just abut to dump. Its time to start enjoying!!!

Ready to work a ski season as a chalet host?

I have by no means covered everything here and there is allot to think about to get the most out of working a ski season in the french alps. Its not hard and by just thinking about a few of the things above you can make your life allot easier. I am not going to be doing a season for a while so if your heading of this season then i can tell you, whoever you are, i’m jealous. I have left you with a bit of reality in the video below. . . . .

There is allot of toilet cleaning if you work for Mark Warner by the loos of it !!!!

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