Catalan ski resort Baquèira Beret aims to attract one million skiers within three years

Vielha (ACN.- The Catalan ski resort Baquèira Beret is the largest in the Spanish state and is considered to be one of the best in the South of Europe. Skiers can enjoy 120 kilometres of ski slopes which is why the resort is able to attract between 700.000 and 800.000 visitors annually. The company that owns the skiing facilities has been heavily investing every year, to improve the area and offer a better service to its clients, according to the commercial director of the resort, Roberto Buid.

Baquèira Beret aims to attract one million skiers within the next three years, an ambitious objective that would ensure the area becomes one of the most attractive for ski fans. The commercial director of Baquèira Beret, Roberto Build, said to the CNA that they expect to achieve this number of visitors thanks to the improvement in the ski lift systems and the opening of new areas. 

Baquèira Beret is one of the most important companies in the north-west region of the Val d'Aran. The ski industry creates up to 1.100 jobs in the area every winter. About 700 of these employees work on the ski slopes, at restaurants, cafes and in offices. The remaining 400 people, are ski trainers. Roberto Build said that almost all the area benefits from the ski business. The company generates up to 40 million euros annually, but this amount is only a fraction of what the entire ski industry generates for the area, according to Build.

The ski resort offers 120 kilometres to sport fans for skiing, which are divided into 78 pistes of varying difficulty. There are up to 33 ski lifts for getting to the top of the mountains with a capacity to transport more than 57.000 people per hour.

In its almost 50 years of existence, Baqueira has become not only a national reference but also an international one. An example of this is that 20% of skiers at the resort are French even though they come from a country with more of a skiing tradition and more ski resorts than Catalonia.