rrotsinthe snow:therise andfallof BladonLines

lainMartin takesus on a schussdown memory lane,sharingthe colourful story of the 1980schalet holidaytrailblazerand sorelymissedBladonLines

The last glass of 'Parrot Claret' may have been served over 25 years ago, but the chalet company Bladon Lines continues to hold a special place in the hearts of many British skiers, not least because many of today's ski industry leaders started their careers working for the pioneering company. So get comfy and let's start at the beginning ...

When Simon Bladon arrived at Exeter University in 1971,most of his fellow students were hippies with long hair and Afghan coats. The clean-cut Mark Lines, complete with tweed jacket, was more his sort and the two hit it off immediately. After graduating from university, Simon and Mark shared a house in London while working in the City until 1978,when life changed suddenly -Bladon was sacked from his job at Schroders for developing houses in his spare time. He claims: "They said I was moonlighting!

''There was never any question about what was going to happen next," adds Bladon. "Mark told me he'd be handing in his notice immediately. We found three chalets in Verbier and put in £15,000 each. My father was livid."

The following winter, the pair added chalets in Meribel and Courmayeur and turned a small profit, but it was in the company's third winter in 1980/81that the breakthrough happened, albeit by accident.

"It was my job to do the pricing," says Bladon. "We'd recently moved into our first offices and I totally forgot to add in a cost for the new overheads. It meant our holidays were about £30 cheaper than everyone else's."

Early members oftheBladon Linesteamin theirfullparrot gloryinVald'lsere (farleft,photo courtesyof AminMomen), andinZermatt in1993(above) vintage BladonLines brochure,courtesy ofLesleyGlass

The programme completely sold out and the company made a profit of £80,000 [equivalent to £400,000 today].

John Yates-Smith (co-founder of the Val d'Isere specialist YSE Ski) joined the company in 1983. "Until then the ski scene had been Supertravel and John Morgan. Then along came Bladon Lines and they did the job better than any of them," he says. "They were very good at coming up with ideas."

Take the famous Bladon Lines parrot. According to Ed Mannix (founder of Zermatt specialist Matterhorn Chalets), who worked for the company from 1985to 1994: "The jackets were an unremarkable blue, but they had zip-off sleeves. One of the chalet girls swapped her sleeves for yellow ones and the parrot was born!"

Bladon was delighted: "I thought, that's brilliant, let's make it part of our logo." Bladon Lines became synonymous with the multi-coloured bird, helping staff stand out from the crowds of reps at airports and resorts.

Nick Morgan, who founded Le Ski in 1982,recalls that "The parrots were everywhere!". Alastair Scott, the then Sunday Timesski correspondent, described them as "hideously recognisable".

It wasn't just the jackets that were different. When Mannix joined, he realised he could print bespoke labels for chalet wine. "Mark loved this idea and came up with 'Parrot Claret' for the red and 'Parrot Fin' for the white."

Not many ski companies would liken their chalet wine to paraffin today, but the chalets were as different then as the wine.

Simon Hoskyns (co-owner of Alpine Answers) worked in Val d'Isere as a maintenance man in 1987:"Atypical chalet would have five bedrooms and two bathrooms.

The biggest problem was everyone wanting hot water at once -the chalets couldn't take it." Amin Momen (founder and director of Momentum Ski), Bladon Lines' overseas manager from 1986 to 1995, confirms: "We took over people's houses and put them through weekly commercial use. The ovens and electrics were not up to it and sometimes the chalet girls weren't either!"

Working a ski season was, nonetheless, a rite of passage for 20-something 'Sloanes' of the era. They were prepared to work for a pittance, sharing tiny bedrooms under the eaves, for the chance to ski all day and party all night. There's general agreement that there was a definite 'type' of chalet girl. Momen remembers that the training manual warned against bringing 'Barbours and wellies'. "They were nice girls who'd been to the right schools," adds Hoskyns.

John Yates-Smith ran Bladon Lines' operations in Val d'Isere until 1991."It was the days of glorious amateurishness," he says. "The training course was an afternoon in Wandsworth Town Hall."

Resort reps dealt with the problems of hundreds of guests every week, working within the limitations of 20th century technology. There were no mobile phones or internet, so reps were constantly looking for phone boxes.

Gareth Crump (operations director at VIP SKI)worked for Bladon Lines from 1988 to 1997:''You weren't meant to call the UK as it cost too much money. You had to use a Telex instead."

For those readers unfamiliar with the Telex, Momen expounds: "You had to type a message on a computer. That printed out a tape like a Morse code. You then took

.A.Somemore classicBladon Linesbrochures, completewith whatAlastair Scottdescribesas those"hideously recognisable" uniforms that to the transfer company, where they fed it into a machine, which sent your Telex to the UK."

The arrival of the fax machine was a revolution. "Faxes were cutting edge technology," says Crump. "But you had to go to the tourist office to send or receive one, and they were charging us a fortune for every page."

By the '90s it wasn't just technology that was changing: as competitors like Crystal Ski came onto the scene, the days of the upmarket specialist were numbered.

"Bladon Lines over-expanded. It had to sell through travel agencies and cut its margins," explains Morgan. "The company had a loyal following, but had overstretched itself," agrees Hoskyns.

The new entrants fired up hyperinflation in chalet prices. "Crystal were going round with bags of money and waving them at owners," says Mannix.

Momen recalls: "I used to sit down with the owners and renew the contract over a glass of wine. Suddenly they were telling me Crystal was offering much more: they wanted the beds at any price."

In 1995 Inghams bought Bladon Lines. Mannix explains: "Inghams saw what Crystal were up to. Previously, chalets had been the preserve of the upper middle classes. All of a sudden it had gone mass market."

Crump thinks it was more complex. "Inghams was motivated by a huge rivalry with Crystal, but they didn't understand how chalets work."

You can hear the disappointment in Bladon's voice when he says: "The biggest mistake Inghams made was getting rid of the Bladon Lines name."

Bladon Lines may have gone, but many of its former employees still work in the industry. Crump believes the opportunity for quick promotion and high levels of responsibility at any early age helped give staff a valuable grounding in the travel industry. ''You grow up quickly," he says. "As a 20-something you're out there telling SO-year-olds what to do."

Momen echoes Crump's sentiment: "I was in San Vigilio when Bladon Lines told me they'd just sacked their resort manager in Courmayeur. I went from looking after 50 guests each week to more than 250."

And, as Hoskyns explains, there was a real sense of community among the staff: "Bladon Lines gave me a sense of belonging. It was like a family."

"Doing a ski season has a formative effect," confirms Crump. "It was extremely sociable: people made friends for life. And there were thousands of people doing that each year."

Yates-Smith believes Bladon Lines was: "Never run to be a serious player. Mark's attitude was 'I consider that I'm running my own holidays and if people want to come and join us then they are very welcome'."

This attitude chimes, perhaps, with the very British approach to skiing as an activity to enjoy not only with family but with friends, and our preference for chalets over hotels and apartments.

However, the lobby group Seasonal Businesses in Travel notes a 50 per cent reduction in chalet capacity since 2020. Two years ago, Crystal Ski, now the biggest British ski tour operator, cancelled its entire chalet programme.

The final word on a bygone era should perhaps go to founder Simon Bladon, who fondly remembers the annual end of season chalet girl races: "You'd have 200 chalet girls taking over the mountain, all wearing these bright, bright jackets," he sighs. "Allthose parrots in the snow: it was a wonderful sight."