Visiting Switzerland

In Saint-Moritz recently, a billionaire had a troupe of camels flown in to amuse his daughter. For the occasion, the ski slopes were closed and numerous security guards watched over the camels, the daughter and the member of the ruling Al-Maktoum family of Dubai who paid for it all.

It was emblematic of behavior at the glitzy resort and other of its ilk. Russians, English, and Italians – they all spend without counting in the luxury ski stations like Gstaad, Zermatt, Verbier, and Saint-Moritz, particularly during the Christmas and New Years holidays.

Steel magnate Lakshmi Mittal, whose personal fortune is estimated to be in excess of $30 billion, enjoys inviting important guests to evenings at his villa in the station of Chantarella in the Grisons. He is known to bring in elephants for the festivities. His children are no less extravagant. When they frequent the bars in Saint-Moritz they down two dozen bottles of Roederer Rosé champagne in an evening. At CHF 1400 per bottle, the drinks bill often rises over CHF 30,000.

CHF 30,000 is just the price of 3 cocktails at the Coco Club in Verbier, where the disco’s special house cocktail is composed of King Vintage champagne, Hennessey Ellipse cognac, and a secret something (probably less expensive), and all served in a sculpted chalet of ice.

The manager of the Coco Club claims that they have sold 5 or 6 of these cocktails and offered gratis two of them – one to Richard Branson (he could have paid for it) and the other to Jodie Kidd, a model (the reader is left to imagine the circumstances).

Russians are more and more visible in the luxury ski stations and are known to spend thousands on Champagne, vodka and whisky.

In Saint-Moritz recently, a client at the Hotel Kempinski accompanied his meal with a bottle of Chateau Lafite from 1784 (price: CHF 140,000). Local stores selling luxury watches and jewelry report similarly extravagant impetuous purchases – the client who walks in and buys a CHF 160,000 watch or piece of jewelry.

According to Blick, roughly CHF 10,000,000 of purchases are made each day in Saint-Moritz during the holidays. Some store owners report wealthy clients entering and purchasing entire aisles of merchandise.

The company Indigo Lodges, intending to capitalize on the money spigot of visiting billionaires, has inaugurated a series of luxury chalets at Zermatt, Saint-Moritz, Verbier, Gstaad, Crans-Montana, and Saas-Fee. The price of a week of rental runs from CHF 50,000 to 130,000. Indigo Lodges claims to have rented lodges to David Beckham.
For the super wealthy, they have a chalet for CHF 250,000 / week in Verbier, the location of which they will not divulge for ‘reasons of security,’ and which has an indoor pool, a small concert hall, and a private cinema for 20 people.