Glion Institute of Higher Education: the Montreux hotel school, its luxury business degree and what a Kempinski general manager says about it

Glion Institute of Higher Education sits on the hillside above Montreux, looking down on Lake Geneva, and for sixty years it has been the second name a luxury recruiter mentions after Lausanne. It has two things the other Swiss schools do not have in the same combination: a campus in London, and a bachelor’s degree in luxury business rather than hospitality alone. This page sets out what the school is, how its programs are built, what its accreditation means after the Swiss decision of July 2025, where it ranks and on what, and what Ralph Radtke, who ran Çırağan Palace Kempinski Istanbul when I interviewed him, says about training there.

What Glion is

The school was founded in 1962 as the Institut International de Glion by Walter Hunziker and Frédéric Tissot, with the first courses taught in French. A second Swiss campus opened in Bulle, in the canton of Fribourg, in 1989, and a London campus followed in 2013. In 2016 the school was acquired by Sommet Education, which also owns Les Roches and whose parent is the investment group Eurazeo. The school’s home page gives the founding year and the two countries; the Wikipedia article carries the rest of the timeline, and I have used it only for dates the school does not publish on the pages I read.

The American accreditor’s own account is the most concrete public description of the school. In a September 2021 report the New England Commission of Higher Education described three campuses, Glion and Bulle in Switzerland and a small one in London, about 1,600 students, and bachelor’s and master’s degrees mainly in hospitality and luxury management. It recorded that about half of alumni work in hospitality and tourism and the other half in luxury goods, marketing, events, banking and finance.

Accreditation changed in 2025. Glion had long held NECHE institutional accreditation. On 15 July 2025 the Swiss Accreditation Council recognized it as a University of Applied Sciences Institute under the Swiss Higher Education Act, after what the school’s announcement describes as a two year evaluation against the Swiss law and the European Standards and Guidelines. In Switzerland that designation is legally protected, and only an institution with federal institutional accreditation may use it. The distinction between that status, a quality label such as EduQua, and a degree awarded through a British partner university is the subject of the Swiss hotel schools page. Wikipedia also lists accreditations from QAA and AACSB for Glion; I could not verify those on the school’s own pages and do not rely on them.

Programs and how they are taught

Glion lists two bachelor’s degrees and five master’s degrees on its home page. The bachelors are the Bachelor in International Hospitality Business and the Bachelor in Luxury Business. The masters are the Master in International Hospitality Business, with three specializations, Guest Experience and Service Design, Entrepreneurship and Innovation, and Wellness and Longevity; the Master in Luxury Experience and Brand Management; and the Master in Real Estate, Finance and Hotel Development. The school also runs executive master’s programs and short courses, and a Global Executive Master in Hospitality Leadership with ESSEC Business School.

The practical spine of the bachelor is the pair of internships. NECHE’s report states that “Every Glion undergraduate student spends two six-month stints working in hospitality around the world,” and names placements at The Ritz-Carlton in Barcelona and the Grand Hyatt in Hong Kong. The school’s own luxury business brochure says the program “incorporates two six-month professional internships and an on-the-job experience,” though its introduction also refers to three professional internships; the two six month placements are the figure both sources agree on. The brochure recommends that the first internship be in luxury hospitality and the second focus on managerial competence.

The luxury business degree is what sets Glion apart on paper. Its curriculum covers luxury distribution and luxury marketing, corporate finance, digital marketing, data analysis and strategic brand management, and the school lists Rémy Cointreau among graduate employers and Louis Vuitton among guest speakers. The degree is for the student who wants the training a hotel school gives, including the two internships, but intends to work in a fashion house, a jeweler or a luxury group rather than a hotel. The NECHE report also recorded a plan for a two Michelin star restaurant on campus staffed by students; I have not found the school confirming that it opened, so treat it as a plan.

Glion does not describe a separate preparatory year in the way EHL and Les Roches do. The language of instruction is English on the pages I read, though the school does not state it as a rule.

Who it is for and how to get in

Glion suits three students in particular. The one who wants Switzerland and London in a single degree, since study moves between the campuses. The one who wants luxury as a sector, not hospitality as a trade, and would otherwise be choosing between a hotel school and a business school. And the one for whom a British campus matters for later work in the United Kingdom.

The school’s pages that I could reach do not set out admission requirements in detail, and its admissions pages were blocked to me. Prospective students should take the requirements, intake dates and fees from the school’s site directly. As a matter of structure, the bachelor runs about three years of study plus the two internships, which is shorter than EHL’s four years including the Preparatory Year.

Alumni and outcomes

The school’s home page states a 98 percent graduate employment rate, more than 3,600 industry partners and an alumni network of more than 17,500 people. These are the school’s own figures and are not audited by anyone I can cite. NECHE’s 2021 report put graduate employment at “well over 90%,” which is the independent number.

On rankings, Glion rose from sixth in the 2025 QS World University Rankings by Subject for Hospitality and Leisure Management to third in the 2026 edition. Sommet Education’s release on the results gives Glion an academic reputation score of 89.9 and an employer reputation score of 93.5, a little behind its sister school Les Roches at 91.3 and 94.0. I read the full 2026 table through a third party reproduction rather than on the QS site. QS scores the subject on reputation surveys and research citations; a three place rise says the surveyed recruiters and academics named Glion more often, not that the teaching changed.

What the hoteliers in my books say

One general manager in A Wealth of Insight is a Glion graduate: Ralph Radtke, then general manager of Çırağan Palace Kempinski Istanbul and now also a regional vice president of the group. He came to the school after he had already worked in a hotel.

“In 1972, at the age of twenty, I secured my first permanent job in the industry as a room service waiter and cashier at Le Bristol in Paris. After some time there, I decided to pursue additional studies in hotel management and food and beverage, graduating from Glion Hotel School in Switzerland. While in school, I completed two trainings at Hotel Cipriani in Venice. I first served as chef de rang, and then as assistant manager of the restaurant. After graduating, I became front office secretary at the Ritz Paris, before serving as personal assistant to Charles Ritz.” Ralph Radtke, in A Wealth of Insight (2017)

The order of his sentences is the lesson. A hotel first, then the school, with two training periods in a Venetian hotel inside the course, then the Ritz. What he took from the whole sequence was not a technique.

“Throughout these experiences, enthusiasm, passion, and honesty stood out as hallmark traits of how to lead and how to be successful in this industry.” Ralph Radtke, in A Wealth of Insight (2017)

No other hotelier in my books names Glion. Tom Roelens, then general manager of Four Seasons Resort Lanaʻi, does not say which hotel school he attended, but he does describe deciding on one young.

“When I first announced at a very young age that I wanted to go to hotel school, eyebrows raised, but once my parents saw my passion for hospitality and for being of service, they allowed me to flourish.” Tom Roelens, in A Wealth of Insight (2017)

How to decide

If London matters to you, or luxury outside hotels does, Glion is the Swiss school built for that. If neither does, compare it closely with Les Roches, which shares its owner and much of its structure; the comparison page sets the two side by side. Ask Glion where last year’s luxury business graduates went, and how many of them went into hotels. Then read the second chapter of The Luxury of Attention, The Apprenticeship, which is about the part of the education that Radtke got at Le Bristol, the Cipriani and the Ritz rather than in Glion’s classrooms.

“No one in this book taught themselves. Every master in these pages is the product of another master.” The Luxury of Attention (2026), Chapter 2

Sources

• Glion, home page
• Glion brochure, Bachelor in Luxury Business
• Hospitality Net, Glion awarded Swiss federal accreditation (July 2025)
• NECHE, Pit Stop 28: Glion Institute of Higher Education (September 2021)
• Hospitality Net, Sommet Education release on the 2026 QS rankings
• Reproduction of the QS World University Rankings by Subject 2026, Hospitality and Leisure Management
• ESSEC Alumni, Global Executive Master in Hospitality Leadership by ESSEC and Glion (2023)
• Wikipedia, Glion Institute of Higher Education