This time back in 2009 we were all set up in Zakopane with a new website online, a van signed up ready to shuttle people about, but worryingly still no guests booked in. A few contacts, friends, people who had randomly found us online slowly trickled in and White Side Holidays’ first season in Zakopane, 2009/2010 was in full swing. A winter full of fun, laughter, pride and new friendships, the agonising wait for guests to book in had been worth it.
The number of guests we entertained across our whole first winter had seemed a lot at the time, the responsibility, scheduling, worrying about what might go wrong, but as spring came around and the snow melted we looked back and were happy with how it had gone. The number of guests doubled the following winter, it doubled the winter after that and again a couple of years later to a level that we never would have expected where we had to eventually cap numbers to keep providing the ski holidays we wanted to provide.
White Side Holidays Poland started as a way to enjoy winters skiing and being outside a lot ourselves, it quickly grew in to something more. Groups of guests come back winter after winter; we have people coming out this 2023/2024 season who first skied with us back in 2009, kids that we taught as 4/5 year olds now coming back alone as adults and families that have skied with us 10+ times. We thought there would be a few people from the UK coming over to Poland to ski with us, we’ve had guests flying in from around the world, the current list of countries people have actually flown in from stands at 27, from as far as Burkina Faso, Puerto Rico, Brazil, New Zealand and Mexico.
Staff wise White Side Holidays Poland has grown from an idea and a couple of people doing everything to winters that involve Staszel Transport company managing the endless ski transfers and airport transfers, 15-20 people working in busy weeks and even people volunteering to help in return for a free lift pass. The list of names of people who have helped us grow is way too long to write out but thank you to everyone who has been and continue to be involved.
2023/2024 will be our 15th winter season in Zakopane, a quieter time post covid and lots of changes in and around Zakopane since we set up originally but we’re still here and still have the same aim as always, which is to provide fun and professional ski holidays.
If you’d like to ski with us this winter or next then feel free to get in touch or keep an eye on our Facebook page for updates from Zakopane. Only 3 months until we’re back on the slopes!