Moderate Start To Summer Season For Swiss Lift Co’s

The summer season for the Swiss cable car industry has started off cautiously. After a relatively good May, fewer guests used cable cars in June than in the previous year due to extremely heavy rainfall and storms in the mountains. Overall, first-time entries are 9% lower than in the previous year. Compared to the 5-year average, however, first-time entries are 24% higher.

The summer season monitoring of Swiss Cable Cars (SBS) analyses the number of guests during the summer season from over 100 members from all over Switzerland. Since the cable car companies start at different times due to overhauls of the facilities and preparations for the summer, Swiss Cable Cars traditionally communicates in July about the first two summer months of May and June.

Pleasant start in May, rainy June

The month of May, which is not yet very important for tourism, was still relatively good compared to previous years. In particular, the long weekends of Ascension and Pentecost, which fell in May this year, brought more guests to the mountains than in previous years. The month of June, on the other hand, was characterized by cool temperatures and heavy rainfall and storms in the southern mountain regions. The generally bad weather prevented many tourists from Germany and neighboring countries from taking day trips in June, while tourists from distant markets set off on their trips under gloomy conditions. As a result, there were 9% fewer first-time visitors in May and June than in the previous year.

Regional differences

The start of the season also varied greatly from region to region: the mountain railways in the Vaud Alps were the only ones to record positive growth of 5%. Ticino, at -1%, is close to the previous year's figure, while the Bernese Oberland (-5%), Central Switzerland (-7%), Valais (-10%) and the Fribourg Alps (-14%) are close to the Swiss average. Graubünden and Eastern Switzerland had the most difficult start to the summer season this year, with -27% and -28% respectively compared to May and June 2023 (see Fig. 1).

Comparison with the 5-year average

Compared to the 5-year average, there are 24% more first-time entries. However, the 5-year average includes the first two years of Corona; at the beginning of the 2020 summer season, cable car operations were suspended and at the beginning of the 2021 summer season, official requirements were gradually relaxed. If you exclude these special years and compare the start of the 2024 season with the average for 2022 and 2023, the difference in first-time entries is still -2% (not shown). "This shows that the cable car industry and mountain tourism in general are affected by exceptional weather conditions. We are convinced that, when conditions are good, more day trips will be made in the Swiss mountains during the holiday season," says Berno Stoffel, Director of Swiss Cable Cars (SBS).

When comparing the regions with the five-year average, the Vaud Alps stand out with an increase of 42%, while Central Switzerland has achieved the same increase (see Figure 2). The Bernese Oberland has an increase of a third. The Fribourg Alps have 25% more first-time entries than the average of the five previous seasons, Valais 14% and Ticino 12% more. In this context, the season also started worse in Eastern Switzerland (-4%) and Graubünden (-25%).

"Last summer's results set the bar very high. Now the holiday season is just around the corner and our members have an attractive offer that appeals to different target groups and offers everyone unforgettable moments in the mountains," Stoffel concluded.