Standort Tirol Special Edition Wellness

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TOURISM
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Subject: [ TOURIST HOTSPOTTIROL ]
Between November 1, 2014, and October 31, 2015, some 10.9 million guests visited Tyrol. On
average, they spent 4.2 days in the country and stayed overnight 45.6 million times. Most of the guests
came from Germany (51.1 per cent of total overnight stays), followed by the Netherlands (10.3 per
cent), Austria (8.6 per cent), Switzerland (6.0 per cent) and the United Kingdom (3.7 per cent).With a
staff of around 60,000, the turnover generated was some 8.4 million euro.
The TourismYear 2014/2015
[ specifically SEEN ]
Hobbies Turning Profession
W e have turned our hobbies
into our profession,” say
Barbara and Josef Stock, smiling. In
1976, they opened their restaurant
Bratpfandl in Finkenberg. Both of
them were keen on sports, liked ski-
ing, cycling and hiking.With Barbara,
there was also an interest in massage
and cosmetics.Why not pass this on
to guests, the couple thought at the
beginning of the eighties, and add a
few rooms.Their Sporthotel Stock
opened in 1983, today there are a
“few rooms” more. No less than 110
in all, to be precise, and 160 mem-
bers of staff looking after the guests
all year round.They wouldn’t have
thought that wellness was going to
be such a big hit, the two are saying
today. Moreover, the Sporthotel
Stock only included the term in their
name in 1992, result of an informal
exchange of experiences with other
hoteliers and the consultants Josef
Knabl and Reinhard Schrott which led
to the foundation ofWellness Hotels
Austria.The undertaking – today run
by Barbara and Josef together with
their children Christine and Daniel –
since then has developed enormous-
ly and become the Stock Resort. In
2012, a fifth star was added.
What also has developed are the
guests, Barbara Stock remarks.“The
guest now is more discerning, more
widely traveled, better informed, and
looking for quality.”Thus, for example,
many people in the past didn’t know
about wine,“but today they have
a wine cellar at home.”The Stocks
reacted to these developments with
constant training for their staff, but
also with ideas of their own on how
to meet their guests’ wishes.There
is vegetarian and vegan cooking, for
instance. And guests are also interest-
ed in regional products. Hay-fed milk
and meat comes from a local farmer,
and management sits down together
with the baker to bring bread from
freshly ground corn on the table. Info:
T he people of Thiersee hadn’t
seen anything like it. The
village, home to a little less
than 3,000 inhabitants, looks back
on a long history. First mentioned
in a document in 1224, it used to
belong to Bavaria, was sacked at the
beginning of the eighteenth centu-
ry, during the War of the Spanish Ac-
cession, for more than two hundred
years has been hosting famous pas-
sion plays, has served as location for
numerous film productions, yet an
Ayurveda hotel here in Hintertier-
see, that was new. “In the village, in-
deed throughout the valley, people
said: now he’s gone crazy,” Johann
Mauracher remembers. In 1987, his
family had taken over the Sonnhof,
subsequently to run it “totally tradi-
tionally, with group packages, day
visitors, children free.” Around 2002
the family realized, “this doesn’t
make sense anymore,” and changed
course. It was friends who were en-
thusiastic about Ayurveda, and who
didn’t want to go to India all the
time, who suggested the idea, says
Mauracher, and so they simply went
for it.
“It wasn’t easy,” the entrepreneur
says today, yet it worked better than
expected, not only in spring and
autumn, but throughout the year.
“The guests kept pushing us all the
time with requests and suggestions,”
says Mauracher. In 2006, finally, the
entire hotel was switched to Ayurve-
da and since then, building on the
three cornerstones of Ayurvedic Nu-
trition, Diagnosis & Treatment, and
Yoga & Spirituality, has been offer-
ing medically supervised Ayurvedic
packages. However, from the very
beginning the resort has gone its
very own way, a Tyrolean way. “Our
idea was to adapt Ayurveda to Eu-
rope and to Tyrol, to cook with our
own foodstuffs, herbs and spices so
that the outcome would fit in with
the Ayurvedic concept,” says the
boss of the Ayurveda Resort Sonn-
hof. European Ayurveda at the heart
of the Tyrolean Alps, this is what
the Maurachers call their concept,
which they are spoiling their sixty
guests with all year round, and for
which they also have won numer-
ous awards (e.g. a ranking among
the fifty best spas in the world). A
specialization, Johann Mauracher is
convinced, that the guest is looking
for and that is possible in many ar-
eas. Yet, he adds: “Consistency and
quality are an absolute must.”
As far as his staff is concerned,
the entrepreneur encourages them
to keep investing their energy and
their know-how into the Ayurveda
Resort Sonnhof. “This is the reason
why I always wanted to have a year-
round business. Without this con-
stancy you will not be able to keep
the quality.” And he expects them
to keep in balance, to live according
to the principles of the Indian art of
healing. Which Johann Mauracher
himself has been doing for a long
time. For more information go to
]
With Consistency and Quality
There were quite a few who called him crazy when Johann Mauracher turned his
Sonnhof into an Ayurveda Resort. Today, the latter is booked out all year round.
At the Sonnhof Resort the Tyrolean
interpretation of Ayurveda, the Indian
art of healing, has successfully been
put into practice.
“A few beds extra” became the Sporthotel Stock and, in 2012, the Stock Resort.Picture:Stock Resort
Picture:marketing deluxe
FACTS. NEWS.
[ Subject:Tourism ]
Tourism, besides industry, is the most
important sector in Austria’s overall econo-
my. One business segment in tourism grow-
ing even more strongly than others is the
area of health-oriented hotels. A study done
at the Danube University Krems looked at
the Austrian health tourism as an economic
factor.The results have shown that the num-
ber of businesses relying on health tourism
Tyrol alone has grown from 331 to 395,
between 2011 and 2014, which amounts to
an annual growth rate of 6.4 per cent.
In the mid-eighties, a small group of
Tyrolean hoteliers sat down together
with two business consultants in order to
exchange experiences.They subsequently
worked out a concept that was new to the
Alps, entitled “Leben mitWellness” (Living
withWellness). In 1992, an association of
TyroleanWellness Hotels was founded.
After changing its name toWellness Hotels
Austria and BestWellness Hotels Austria,
the association since 2015 has been calling
itself Best AlpineWellness Hotels.Today, it
counts nineteen selected, family-run well-
ness hotels in the Alps among its members,
which, besides recreation, exercise, body
and cosmetic treatments, also offer individ-
ual dietary programs. For more information
go to
H ere with us,” says Franz-Jo-
sef Pirktl with a smile, “cli-
mate change has begun as
early as the nineteen-eighties.” When
he says “here with us” the boss of the
Alpine Resort Schwarz means the
Mieminger Plateau, a medium-alti-
tude terrace above the upper Inn-
tal valley in Tyrol. In the summer,
until then, the guests had come for
the landscape and for hiking in the
stunning mountain scenery. In the
winter, they had been drawn by the
cross-country ski tracks on the sunny
plateau. “When we couldn’t rely any
longer on the snow, though, we had
to look for alternatives,” says Pirktl.
“And the answer was wellness.”
In those days, it was his father who
ran the hotel, the main building of
which was erected in 1694. In the
nineteen-forties the first summer
visitors came, and Franz Pirktl sen.
enlarged the eight-room country inn
to bus capacity. The nineteen-eight-
ies then saw steps towards individual
guests and wellness. “At first,” Pirktl
jun. admits, “that meant a few extras
on the side: sauna, swimming pool,
and steam bath, simple wellness pro-
grams like dew cures and treading
water.” It was also at that time that he
looked for allies, in order “not to have
to reinvent everything ourselves,”
the hotelier says. In 1992, a number
of like-minded family-owned hotels
came together to form the Best Well-
ness Hotels Austria, today called the
Best Alpine Wellness Hotels. Over
the years, and decades, the clientele
has developed at the same rate that
the hotel and its wellness packages
have done: “They are very savvy when
it comes to matters of health. For us
this means that we have to keep mov-
ing forward.”
Hence the professionalism that
the Alpine Resort Schwarz offers its
maximally 240 guests on more lev-
els than one. For instance, there are
5,500 square meters of water, sauna
and relax landscapes, including well-
ness program. Besides a 27-hole golf
course, there are natural bathing
ponds, an award-winning garden, as
well as a private clinic – and, above
all, a staff of 240 people: “The in-
frastructure in Tyrol has developed
enormously. There can hardly be
another region where you’ll find as
many hotels with such an infrastruc-
ture.” However, as Pirktl points out,
the guests of the future expect ever
more authentic, original and regional
offerings. “This power place the Alps,
with its clean air and its nature, is be-
ing rediscovered.” Only fitting, there-
fore, that the Alpine Resort Schwarz
should present the Mieminger Pla-
teau in all its variety all year round.
“Here with us,” says Pirktl, “every sea-
son is beautiful.” For more informa-
tion go to ]
A lack of snow caused the Pirktl family to look for alternatives for their guests in the eighties.
“A few wellness applications on the side” turned into a philosophy of “sustainable health and well-being.”
“The guests have developed too”
Picture:Andreas Friedle
Alpine Resort Schwarz: from eight-room country inn to wellness oasis.
Franz-Josef Pirktl:“This power place
the Alps is being rediscovered.”
Picture:Alpenresort Schwarz
Picture:StandortagenturTirol