Swiss firm drills Alpine vaults for ultra-wealthy with million-franc leases
Thomas Gasser's company Brünig Mega Safe is constructing 20 underground bunkers over 100 m deep in the Brunig Pass, offering 99-year leases starting at about one million Swiss francs.
Swiss entrepreneur Thomas Gasser, through his firm Brünig Mega Safe, is excavating a series of massive underground chambers beneath the Brunig Pass, close to Lungern. The plan calls for twenty vaults, each more than 100 metres below the surface, designed to hold high-value assets such as artworks, precious metals, rare wines and exotic automobiles. Clients will lease the spaces for 99 years, paying roughly one million Swiss francs, and will hold title to the unit, allowing them to treat it like any other property, including mortgaging it.
The largest cavern will be about the size of a football field, and the project, backed by a workforce of over 300 specialists in tunnelling and explosives, aims to open next year. Security is described as comparable to that of the Swiss National Bank, with a multi-stage access protocol that includes an airlock and undisclosed checks. Gasser notes that the market for ultra-secure storage is expanding as wealthy individuals seek to protect wealth from geopolitical uncertainty.
Why it matters
It shows how growing global instability is driving ultra-wealthy clients to seek extreme, high-cost security solutions.
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