Originally from Val d’Isère, where his family is as well known as that of Killy and Goitschel, Benoît Fritsch settled in Lyon in1992, just after the Albertville Winter Olympics. It was then that he set up Front de Neige, an agency which is active on three markets: sports marketing consultancy, which makes up 30% of the agency’s turnover; event organising (50%); seminar business and corporate travel (20%).

Front de Neige employs five permanent staff year round and in the winter months, it employs 12 people to cover the increased work load. “ We work pretty much anywhere in Europe, mostly during the world ski championships,” explains Benoît Fritsch. “We’re largely involved in consultancy work for the sponsors as well as accompanying VIP customers during the major events of the winter season, whether downhill ski, biathlon, cross-country ski, freestyle or snowboard. We initially developed these products for Saint-Louis Sucre as part of a loyalty campaign aimed at their best clients”.

Each trip lasts on average three or four days and combines the sporting element with a bit of culture, which means that the events are chosen because of their proximity to a major cultural attraction. This winter a trip was organised from Lyon to Ruhpolding (Bavaria), considered the Mecca of biathlon. The programme included two days watching the competition from a VIP stand followed by a visit to Salzburg.

It was the same thing for trips to Zakopane, one of the best places for ski jumping, which included a visit to Krakow, Poland’s oldest royal city; to Cortina d’Ampezzo for the Women’s Downhill Ski championships followed by a trip to Venice; and to Sierra Nevada for a freestyle competition with a detour to Grenada.

Something along these lines, involving between 20 and 30 people for a sporting trip, will cost between 600 and 700 € per participant per day for a European destination. Front de Neige also markets similar packages in the French Alps using luxury private chalets to accommodate their clients in Val d’Isère.

On the seminar front there has been a bit of a lull largely caused by the recession and fears of a flu pandemic, but Benoît Fritsch is noticing that business is starting to pick up and at the beginning of February he was involved in organising a meeting in Chamonix for 180 sales executives from the Aoste group with dinner at the Montenvers site, an ice party at the No Escape bar and some team building organised by the Takamaka agency.

As far as the events side of things is concerned, Front de Neige is celebrating ten years working on the Pistes Mauves for Milka, a campaign that takes place during the Christmas and February school holidays in Les Arcs, La Plagne, Alpe d’Huez, La Clusaz, Les Gets, Châtel, Orcières and Pra-Loup, and the agency is also launching various projects for the Coca Cola group. The first of these operations this winter, on behalf of Powerade, involves an agreement with the French ski school, ESF, to supply 21 slalom areas with branded signage, security nets and protective padding.

The second project features the group’s main brand, Coca Cola, with the installation of 250 wooden terminals specifically designed to recycle cans and plastic bottles, with the highest of them located at the top of the Aiguille du Midi. “ We’ve just put in place a facility at our Oullins site which will look after the maintenance of these terminals,” notes Benoît Fritsch. “And with sustainable tourism in mind, I should point out that we have carbon offset the whole of our travel footprint, including that of our clients, over the last five years”.

The most recent change in Front de Neige’s busy life has been the transfer of its headquarters to L’ Uzyne, in Oullins, which it shares with another events agency Malls and a design studio called Vodka Fraise. “L’Uzyne is an old factory based in the Saulaie district close to the new metro. We have 600 m² of office space and 500 m² of warehousing and we all seem to work in harmony with each other,” smiles the boss of Front de Neige.