5 mins with: Sébastien Mérignargues - DIRECTOR OF AVORIAZ
Take a coffee and enjoy an insight into Sébastien Mérignargues role as Director of Avoriaz in charge of one of the most famous winter stations in Europe, not just France. Sébastien talks passionately about the legacy he leaves there, shaping sustainability initiatives which continue to elevate Avoriaz as the pinnacle in mountain destinations in the World.
Sébastien Mérignargues @Avoriaz 1800
Born in the Catalan Pyrenees, Sebastien was rooted in the mountains where he spent his summers growing up. However, during his early years, his family relocated to the Paris region, and financial constraints meant they couldn't indulge in winter sports. Yet, his passion for skiing and snowboarding grew stronger, fueled by iconic images of snowboarding, particularly from Didier Lafond's film Apocalypse Snow featuring Régis Rolland. At the age of 18, after landing his first well-paying jobs, he was able to fulfil his dream by enrolling in a snowboarding course at UCPA in 1986. Coincidentally, this was in Tignes, the very resort he went on to manage between 2002 and 2014. With 38 years of snowboarding experience under his belt, he proudly calls himself an “exclusive cross-country skier,” as he never learned to ski!
Photo: Avoriaz 1800
What was your favourite part of the job? And the hardest... I've geared my career towards living in the mountains. So what I obviously prefer in my job is to be there all year round and to be able to make the most of the superb playground it is. It's nice to be able to mix work and leisure easily in the same day. I don't see any really difficult parts in my job, but of course, as station manager there are responsibilities including some more complicated periods to manage, but that's part of the job which i’ve been doing for over 30 years. If I'd found it too complicated, I'd have changed it and that's not on the agenda for me.
Your most challenging piste or day on the mountain.. Of course, when you're in Avoriaz and you think of a difficult run, the Swiss Wall immediately comes to mind. It's a real challenge. After that, it all depends on the snow conditions. Un-groomed, icy with huge bumps, my thighs remember well the noire de la Sache in Tignes. It's not as steep as the Suisse Wall, but it's longer and, above all, only 10 to 12m wide. I also remember a derby on the Meije, which was off-piste, but ultra bumpy and icy, with over 2000m of vertical drop in race mode...
Photo: @Avoriaz1800 / @jbbieuville
How would you describe a perfect day? It snowed all night. It's really cold. The powder is light and deep. I take out my swallow tail, equip myself with the avalanche transceiver and slip the shovel and probe into my rucksack. I join my sons and my partner. And off we go to enjoy this wonderful day…
Your favorite event in Avoriaz. “In terms of events, I'd have to say the Roc On Snow. It takes place on the first 3 days of the winter season, and gets the season off to a great start. More than 80 brands come to try out their equipment, and in particular their new products, to over 6,000 registered riders. And, of course, it's all part of a 3-day, 3-evening party atmosphere! There's also a magnificent event in Avoriaz every day when the skies are clear enough: the sunset over the valley, as seen from the Plateau. Every evening, many people immortalize this moment in photos. It's even more spectacular, with its shimmering colors, when clouds enliven the sky”
Photo: @Avoriaz1800 / @samingles
Describe a great ski / snowboard tour in Avoriaz, that we could follow... I'm not sure it's a tour to describe in detail for everyone. It's more of an outing for a nice, fairly committed off-piste. I'm not a mountain guide though, so I wouldn't just send anyone there. On the other hand, initiated riders know and appreciate the Pointe de Vorlaz for its north and north-west faces.
What's your favorite viewpoint in Avoriaz? The most spectacular is undoubtedly from the Hauts Forts summit, which overlooks the resort and offers a 360° panoramic view of the Dents du Midi, the Dents Blanches, the Mont Blanc massif, the Morzine valley, the whole of the Chablais region, Lake Geneva and, of course, Avoriaz. Otherwise, I love the impressive silhouette of the Dents du Midi, which can be seen from many parts of the resort, winter and summer alike.
As a 100% pedestrian resort with a number of sustainable initiatives, what are you most proud of? “On a personal level it was not me responsible creating what Avoriaz now is. I feel lucky enough to have been chosen to work on maintaining the fabulous legacy left by the 3 geniuses who thought up a pedestrian resort 60 years ago: Mrs Jean Vuarnet, Philippe Labro and Gérard Brémond. It's all the more remarkable that they had this audacity at a time when our Western societies were developing with the car at the heart of every project: cars for all, motorways reeways, suburbs.. I do my utmost to maintain and build on this heritage”.
Photo: @Avoraiz 1800 - @Pascal Gombert
As far as my mission is concerned, I was proud to have met the objective set by the Avoriaz Board: to increase the number of people staying in the resort. To achieve this, at the end of 2020 we defined 3 key areas of focus: snow sports, sustainable development and summer too. The results are convincing. We've just racked up:
7 consecutive record-breaking seasons: 4 summers (2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024) and 3 winters (2022, 2023 and 2024).
We have gone from 190,00 to 308,000 overnight stays in summer and from 1,305,000 to 1,456,000 overnight stays in winter.
All of this without increasing the stock of beds over the past 10 years. New buildings have replaced old ones. In other words, without concreting over the mountains. It's obviously the work of an entire team that has made this success possible. So its all thanks to them.
Photo: @Avoriaz 1800 - @JulienGONTARD
What is Avoriaz's most important sustainable initiative? Undoubtedly the original choice, the vision so relevant today that dates back to the 1960s: the 100% pedestrian resort. 60 years later, Avoriaz is still the only totally pedestrian resort in Europe. This is a major asset for holidaymakers who are increasingly looking for nature and relaxation.
What are Avoriaz's latest sustainable initiatives for the coming season? It's a process of continuous improvement. We list all our sustainable tourism initiatives in a manifesto that is regularly updated. It now runs to around twenty pages, which I invite you to discover: Docu Actions Avo (1) (calameo.com) - To answer your question more directly, I'd like to mention the last 2 projects we've been working on:
Photo: @Avoriaz 1800 - @Nikoo R
Earlier this month, Avoriaz won an award at the Sommets du Tourisme for its innovative management of water resources: aquatic area, golf course, watering of green spaces and even washing of mountain bikes, with a logic of recycling and economy pushed to the limit.
Before the end of the year, Avoriaz will publish its Carbon Footprint. And I'm not talking about the resort management or the lift company, but the whole resort: accommodation, shops, activities, services... all year round.
This will be a first for an entire mountain resort. We've been working on it for 20 months. The aim is not to come up with a figure for the resort's carbon impact. Of course it will be there. And of course it will be far too high. Our ambition goes further. It consists of imagining the trajectory for improving this carbon footprint in the years to come, via a strategy deployed according to a programmable action plan. In other words, to know where we stand, so we can make the choices today that will improve the situation tomorrow. Sebastien Megn, Direcot of Avoriaz 1800 Station, Portes du Soleil.
Avoriaz, Morzine and Les Gets are all linked together with easy access for visitors to ski / board all three resorts easily in a day. These 3 magnifecent towns sit with the Portes du Soleil region which boasts 650km of pistes, 12 stations in total and an event packed calendar though out Winter and Summer. In fact The next installment will be more information on the sustainability initiaives installed and progressed my Morzine and also Les Gets. Thank you for reading and see you soon for apres!