More than three million people follow Switzerland as a travel destination in 22 languages on the social media pages of Switzerland Tourism ST. MySwitzerland.com attracts more visitors than any other destination website. One of Jürg Schmid’s biggest strengths was his ability to consistently identify and seize the opportunities offered by digitalisation.

There are a lot of other great events and successes that we can attribute to CEO Jürg Schmid that will go down in the history of Swiss tourism advertising. However, Switzerland Tourism also faced turbulent and difficult times during the Schmid era: the end of the euro exchange rate floor in 2015 (German) was unforgettable, as it proved to be a major challenge for the sector, putting a brake on the growth of overnight stays from the eurozone. Despite having to contend with some dissenting voices, Schmid stuck to his course of continuing to be present in Europe and of keeping up the marketing of Switzerland as a travel destination. The figures prove that his decision was the right one: the turnaround set in during his last year in office – and we can already see the recovery in the euro markets. A big thanks to Jürg Schmid, including from our employees both at home and abroad.

On behalf of the Board of Directors
Jean-François Roth, President of Switzerland Tourism