GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Verbier is now the name of a Swiss Airbus A320 plane, baptized Thursday morning in the Bagnes resort area to which Verbier belongs. The choice of the name, says Swiss, reflects the resort’s importance to Switzerland for international tourism. The Airbus is one of 42 in the Swiss fleet, a family of planes used mainly in Europe, including on popular UK-Swiss ski season flights.
“Verbier is one of Europe’s best-known and most popular tourist destinations,” Lorenzo Stoll, Swiss’s head of Western Switzerland told guests at the baptism.
“And visitors from the UK and Scandinavia in particular prefer flying Swiss to get here. So we’re pleased and proud that one of our aircraft will now carry the Verbier name out into the world, underlining both its importance to Swiss and our commitment to Western Switzerland, where we continue to expand and develop our Geneva hub.”
That last remark reflects an aggressive plan by Swiss to win back market share in the Geneva area, according to Business Traveller, which reports 27 February that
“Swiss’s decision to focus on its Geneva operations in an attempt to reclaim the market share from Easyjet is proving successful, according to the airline. And the carrier claims that its 7.8 per cent passenger growth in the year to January 2014 can be attributed to this strategy … Swiss has been facing stiff competition for the Geneva market share from Easyjet for some time, particularly for ski tourism, due to the low-cost carrier’s strong connections across the UK and its competitive fares.”
However, Swiss decided not to charge a fee for an item of checked-in winter sports equipment in its Geneva Flexi fare – which Easyjet imposes a £60 fee for – and this may have levelled the playing field a little.”
Three well-known personalities from the Swiss skiing world were in Verbier for the airplane’s naming ceremony: Roland Collombin, downhill silver medalist at the 1972 Winter Olympics and Alpine World Championships in Sapporo, Japan and winner of the overall downhill World Cup in 1973 and 1974; Philippe Roux, who earned six podium places in the downhill World Cup between 1973 and 1976; and William Besse, who won four downhill World Cup events including the 1994 classic Lauberhorn race.