A View to the Top

Fiona Stevens could spend all her days at social tennis or lunching with her Remuera friends. Except she’s hell-bent on powering New Zealand’s alpine athletes to the top of the world.

Words by Kate Coughlan  Photographs by Mark Smith

FUND-RAISING FOR CHARITIES or sports teams is a task requiring dedication and tireless effort. Sausage sizzles and cake stalls are not the tools Fiona Stevens is employing in her crusade to create a foundation to fund New Zealand’s skiers, snowboarders and free-skiers at international level. 

This former Saatchi hotshot and, in her day, one of New Zealand’s greatest skiers, has created a brand for alpine sport. Under her Black on White brand our Ski Blacks would, in Fiona’s Snowvision, become as famous as our All Blacks. She aims to establish a capital fund of $5 million to pay for coaching the alpine athletes, to transport them to events and to supply resources required to compete at a meaningful level internationally.

The fund-raising campaign hinges on three key areas; sponsorships, donations and ski clinics. Fiona has organized a sponsored television programme on Sky featuring highlights from the Alpine World Cup. Sponsors will also support individual teams. This winter Fiona, and another New Zealand ski great Claudia Riegler, will run private ski clinics.

“Talent alone doesn’t get you there. Well-meaning voluntary help is great and it is the basis of a lot of New Zealand’s sporting effort, but it needs a strong commercial approach to get athletes to the top of the world.”

This is experience speaking. As a brilliant 15-year-old skier Fiona was chosen to train and compete in Europe. Her parents, high-country station owners from Springfield, didn’t want her travelling alone so were pleased that two other talented Canterbury 15-year-olds, Anna Archibald and Julia Allison, formed a team to train together in Switzerland.

“What motivates me is for the athletes of today to have the opportunities we didn’t. People are not going to achieve their potential if the resources are not there and that is not only about money. But having funds does allow you to have the right programmes in place.”

It makes Fiona laugh today to recall life in the 1970s when she was competing in international races and training in Europe every winter.

“We could only afford to hire one coach so we were sometimes attached to other international teams. We were on the road by ourselves, our own nutritionists, our own drivers, our own ski tuners. I remember three of us and our coach arriving in Paris with six pairs of skis each. We rented a tiny Fiat Uno and had to get ourselves to Grenoble. We slept in the car.” Little wonder that the following day during a meeting with a potential sponsor Fiona fell asleep.

This daughter of the high country sits in her listed Remuera house (the home of significant 1930s New Zealand architect Reginald Ford) mapping out a brand strategy that goes beyond even her passion for alpine sports. “If the Ski Blacks do well, it helps to establish New Zealand’s winter brand as a tourist destination. They become part of a global branding campaign that says New Zealand is a winter playground.”

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