Snow surrender

Méribel ski resort

As Highlife celebrates it’s 15th year organising ski and snowboarding holidays, Alan Moynihan recalls the inspiration for starting the exclusive business and the measured thinking behind its growth path.

As the phrase goes: ‘necessity is the mother of invention’ and this was clearly the case 14 years ago when three friends – dissatisfied with the inconvenient travel and poor accommodation and service, saw a gap in the market for an exclusive ski holiday operator.

Simon Egan, David Hogan and Alan Moynihan decided to create a something different and take a fresh approach to ensure a unique experience for holidaymakers heading for the slopes. And so Highlife was established with the specific objective of ensuring guests had only happy memories from their ski holiday.

“Having worked away from home for a number of year’s in a variety of start-up and established businesses, I decided that whenever I returned to Ireland it would be with a view to setting something up for myself,” Alan Moynihan recalls. “I sat down with Simon and David at a very early stage and we had similar views and ambitions, and once that was established, it was easy to take the next steps.”

VISION AND DRIVE

With a clear vision, the trio set out to find good quality accommodation in world-class ski resorts – in places that they could guarantee guests would enjoy excellent food and wine, with an exceptional level of service, and most importantly, a great skiing experience.

In theory setting up a travel business such as Highlife sounds relatively straightforward, but despite their strong networks and connections, they did have to push hard to get word out that they were in this new line of business.

Another challenge for most businesses is funding – especially in the start-up phase. “We tapped in to a county enterprise board feasibility fund which gave us some well needed cash in our first year,” Moynihan says. “It wasn’t huge by any means, but it gave us some money to invest in our own technology, which has proved fundamental in terms of the success of our business.”

While the funding Highlife received was sufficient to get the business off the ground, Moynihan does think that more can be done to support and nurture early stage enterprises as they embark on new venture.

“The real potential for growth in the Irish economy is in the SME sector, and this needs to be fostered with further investment and support structures,” he says.

Given there are numerous operators in the space providing ski holiday packages, there must be a point of difference for Highlife to stand out from its competition.

“For us, it’s all about the service,” Moynihan points out. “Our guests initially book with us because they know they will go to world-class ski resorts and stay in comfortable chalets. But the reason they come back again-and-again is because they know they will deal with a team of enthusiastic, experienced people who are willing to go the extra mile to ensure they enjoy a great holiday both on and off the slopes.

FROM STRENGTH TO STRENGTH 

Since its establishment, Highlife has seen demand for its ski holiday’s increase year-on-year with short breaks proving particularly popular with guests who may not be able to take a full week away from work.

And because Highlife often schedules flights from Dublin, they can tailor itineraries, which has proved particularly attractive to a growing base of corporate clients.

… we have been able to maintain the personal touch and hands on service that has turned our guests into friends and has kept them returning

According to Moynihan growing the company has been very rewarding. “It is a bit of a balancing act because while there appears to be room to grow things further, we are always very mindful of keeping our service levels high. I’ve already stressed the importance of recruiting the right people to help ensure these levels are maintained, but developing reliable systems and processes are further challenges that need to be met to ensure we deliver our promise to our guests. By building our company slowly, expanding one chalet at a time, we have been able to maintain the personal touch and hands on service that has turned our guests into friends and has kept them returning year after year.”

The director’s also sets ambitious targets and high satisfaction ratios, with one of the co-director’s Simon spending a significant part of his time monitoring guest’s experiences when they return in order to establish if they’ve enjoyed the Highlife experience.

Given Highlife’s ethos of measuring and evaluating customer experience, how important is team to the success of the company? “The people who work with Highlife are everything – without them, we don’t have a business,” Moynihan insists. “We spend lots of time recruiting, inducting, and training our team to make sure they can deliver the range of services that we sell.”

LEADING THE WAY

When it comes to leadership and motivating the team Moynihan is a firm believer in leading by example. “I won’t ask somebody to do something that I’m not prepared to do myself,” he says. I also think it’s really important to show appreciation for what your team are doing. A job well done deserves praise and you should always take the time to thank your team.

With regard to the travel industry’s performance, Moynihan says he sees it as robust sector due to in the main to a nation of people who have an ingrained hunger to travel. “There was of course a notable drop in demand in 2008/09, but this only made us stronger as it forced us to revisit how we market our holidays to make sure that our guests could better understand where they were getting their value for money.”

The people who work with Highlife are everything – without them, we don’t have a business

And now that the economic conditions have improved, this has clearly translated into increased business Highlife. “The company is stronger now than it has ever been”, Moynihan “and its great to still be a part of an organisation that is hungry for positive change.”

So what next for the dynamic trio and their company? “We are always on the lookout for new opportunities and have a few ideas that are being considered but nothing specific that we’re ready to unveil … just yet,” he says cautiously. After building the company steadily over the last 15 years, it’s a case of watch this space to see what’s next for Highlife.

Simon Egan, David Hogan, Alan Moynihan, co-founders of Highlife