What will help the sport of skiing grow?

[aliebe]

Sorry my phone freaked and posted before I was ready. Nothing to see here

 

[GinBuck]

To me it's our new lack of commitment. I even see it at work signing up for a pot luck! Everyone waits to the last minute waiting to see if something better comes up. Folks just don't want to commit to anything and a skiing takes planning and commitment--gear, practice, travel... Like what has been already discussed with all of the new ways to get outside, the perfect event today is the Tough Mudder. Ever see one? Thousands are there. Why? can sign up at the last minute, doesn't need any special gear, doesn't cost much and takes only a couple hours.

 

[SBrown]

Millennials hurting the ski industry? Not in Colorado

I'm not sure this article addresses the issue convincingly, but maybe there is more somewhere else.

 

[Muleski]

I have started a couple of responses, and morphed all over the place with them. Far away from Tricia's original post re: millenials. The ski "industry" faces a whole host of challenges moving forward, no matter what the segment {Large mega-destination resort to local hills}, or the location {driveable for day skiers, to weekend or longer trips}. And I see it stratifying based on age group as well. Retirees who are life long skiers, some of whom ski a great deal {and many of whom spend little money to do so} down to kids.

But let me get back to the millenials, and what I see going on with a pretty large sample of them. We live in a "nice" community north of Boston. We've lived here for almost 40 years. Almost none of our friends have left. One of the draws to our town is a really active lifestyle. However in the winter, It's quiet. My wife and I grew up as serious weekend skiers, and we never stopped. Or really slowed down. We've skied at least 50 days a season "forever." Our kids grew up with a weekend ski house, and knew nothing less. We were probably the first of our friends to buy a ski house, but as odd as this will sound, we probably know 100+ families in town who followed suit and ski every weekend. As a result many of the kids that our kids {now either side of 30} were in kindergarten with grew up as pretty commmited skiers.

So that crowd are all millennials. Some are working in the ski business, and living in ski towns year round {most out West}. That group covers a wide horizon in terms of what they are doing, and how much they ski. A few have pretty demanding jobs, earn very good incomes, etc. Our kids are in that group. I'd also include some of the "kids" that our kids met in their ski academy years, and raced with through college. A few, but not many, are working in the ski world. Most of those doing this are fortunate to have no college loans, no debt. But, I can almost guarantee that few think this is really sustainable lifestyle. No way to raise a family, no chance of buying a home, etc. High expenses and what don't look like big income opportunities. To become the next Rob Katz, should you be working in the ski world?

As one of my "kids" puts it, he can become the very best at his profession, literally the best in class, best in the world, and he will earn less that he would as third year consultant with one of the top firms {jobs that he was offered in college, BTW}. He also works just as many hours. So this crew thinks that any modicum of fun will be up, soon, as they get squeezed. The only ones who don't look at it that way have so much family money, or are going to marry so much family money that nobody will ever need to work. Like situations where you get a $5Mil mountain home as an engagement present. True stuff.

Our kids also have friends scattered all the country, all working real hard to get established in careers, or well on their way. Some of them are living in cities where they get to ski quite a bit. Or a lot. If you live in Boston, or Denver, you can ski every weekend of the winter as long as you have a plan. Could be a season pass, and a share in a rental ski house. Could be a family ski house. The group who are doing this have located in those cities, among other reasons to keep skiing...a lot. They have friends in Seattle, Portland OR and ME, SF, who are all doing the same. This crew work like dogs during the week, so that they can have the weekend to ski. Even then sometimes they have to work. I often wonder how they have the energy to ski. They do. Many of this group has relocated to these cities because in part, of the skiing. And interestingly, many are in relationships with others who grew up with the same ski passion and activity. So no "convincing."

They also have friends in Chicago, Atlanta, DC, NYC, Dallas.....all over the place. Some go to great effort to get on snow 10 or so days a season. Many of those are dying to get to a place where they can start to ski more, again. Some are not skiing much, and if they are married to, or dating a non skier, the skiing is more like a boys week, or a girls week maybe twice a season. My kids hear from these groups all the time, missing the skiing. It's a good career move to be an attorney with a top DC firm, to be doing a residency in Atlanta, or to be an investment banker in NYC. However it's crushing on a lifelong passion.

For some of these kids who skied full time right through college, it becomes very difficult as Christmas approaches.

Where it gets really interesting is the conversation with their friends who grew up with minimal experience in the sport. When our daughter first lived in Denver {she no longer does}, she was blown away at the young crowd and their relative interest in skiing. She would talk about all of the "fake outdoorsy" people, who were dressed head to toe in Patagonia. The guys would basically fake it like they actually could ski. They all wanted to become great skiers fast, and figured if they had money, it would happen. The girls all felt it was a great way to spend time in awesome resort towns, and meet rich guys. Pretty shallow. Not our daughter's types. Basically, a lot of them just could not deal with I-70 and never got into it. Those who had skied all of their lives figured it out and skied a lot.

When they talk to friends in areas that are a long flight to skiing, it sounds like the number of their peers who have any interest in learning to ski is almost ZERO. Why? It's expensive, it's cold, it takes a whole trip when I could be in the Islands, or some other great place. Or maybe they have a whole lot of other outdoor passions. Sports passions.

My take on this is simple. If these kids grew up as serious skiers, most are "all in" and are either still skiing a ton, planning to ski more, or thinking about it. Many that we know miss it, and change is on the way. It's a priority. They will come back to it.

There are others who grew up skiing quite a bit, and will do whatever they can to now ski more. Spend a lot of their income to do so, it they can. Very passionate about it. Probably at the top of any recreation and vacation spending, and use of vacation time. There also seem to be those who grew up skiing a bit who are just not doing it anymore. Too much of a pain in the neck. Non skiing spouse or SO. Maybe a baby. Saving for a house. College loans. Basically not enough passion to overcome the costs, or get creative.

The millennials who want to get into the sport have to have some real drive or spark to do so. Seems to be driven by location, by meeting friends who are skiers, and by having the opportunity and means to do it. There is no getting around the fact that this is an expensive sport. Not that it wasn't in the past.

So from where I see it, there are two challenges here. One is keeping Millenials engaged in the sport. Another, and a much bigger one, is getting them to adopt the sport. That is going to be driven by the matrix of location and income. The further away you are, the more income you'll need. The higher that income, they more you may try it. Perhaps when you have a family.

Then we have the whole issue of being locals in a ski town, working in the ski business. I frankly think it may be THE biggest problem that many of these resorts, towns, etc, face. They acknowledge it, and pretty much ignore the train roaring down the tracks right at them. The cost of living, lack of housing, crummy incomes......all factors.

My kids are more and more expressing possible plans to exit the ski industry, and "sell their souls" to generate very big incomes to enable them and their families to ski the way they did as kids. The most upsetting thought to them is not being able to raise a family as they grew up. And it is not just about skiing. They aren't alone. Most of their friends seem to feel the same way.

BTW, ski bumming is a lost art, IMO. Let's not get into that. HaHa. Whenever somebody hears where our kids live, and assumes they are living life as 1970's ski bums, I want to punch them.

So if we have another generation that defines skiing as a couple of yearly trips, and become patrons of the higher end destination resorts, we could see even more change.

I really hate to think of some of this. Yet visit one of the tiny areas in northern Maine, and you'd think you were stepping back in time. Yet everybody seems to be having a great time. A real community. Done very inexpensively.

I don't see many millenials there. Most are leaving that part of the state. So that setting is not helping much......

 

[Rod9301]

I agree that cost is a big impediment - always tends to be. But, while the cost of a lift ticket or a season pass is not cheap, I don't think it's the cost of skiing itself that is the issue. Rather, I think it is the "all-in" cost that can become an issue for people, in particular for millennials who tend to have less discretionary income.

With season passes like the Epic Pass affording a break-even point after just 6-9 days of skiing (depends on resort, peak/low season, adult /child), skiing itself is not all that expensive. Even if you purchase day lift tickets for $80-$100, that is still not a terribly expensive proposition, considering how much a four hour round of golf at a decent course often costs (around $100 where I live in the NYC area) or how much it costs to rent a tennis court for just a couple of hours (around $100 where I live in the NYC area).

What I think happens is that all the other costs begin to add-up.The majority of skiers are not driving 1-2 hours to a mountain (most people will drive under an hour to play golf and 5-15 minutes to play tennis). For a lot people, skiing requires spending a fair amount of time driving and that means money on gas, tolls, parking...and in some cases may require an overnight stay. Lodging at ski resorts is not cheap, at least not near the mountain, and it can equate to as much, if not more, than the cost of skiing itself. And, while many skiers bring their lunch, it is not always the case since carrying your lunch around as you ski is not that easy or attractive for many people. Food at ski resorts is not cheap either (nothing is), so you can easily spend a fair amount on food.

Then you have equipment costs. All you need for tennis is a $100 racket, some tennis balls and sneakers. For golf a $500 set of clubs will often do the trick. Skiing equipment can get very expensive once you add up the cost of skis, bindings, poles, pants, boots, helmet, gloves..., And, skis need to be waxed/maintained and a lot of ski equipment tends to have a fairly short life span (3-5-10 years max).

But studies show that cost is not as much of a factor as weather / conditions. And we all know what has happened - increased weather volatility. While the average person may be open to spend gin money to go skiing, if they have a bad experience, they will likely not go back, at least not for some time. When it comes to skiing, weather matters more than just about in any other sport (no one likes to play golf or ride a bike in the rain but people do - you can play golf or ride a bike in a huge temp/weather variance). And while snow making can often mitigate the impact of lack of snow, it can not offset temperatures above freezing.

Millennials happen to be a demo group that also has more options today than folks there age had in the past as it relates to how to fill their free time. Travel is cheaper and more efficient, technology has made entertainment such as video games and movies more engrossing and accessible, as well as changed the way millennials socialize (chat on Facebook vs getting together in person). Even as it relates to sports, millennials have gravitated to other sports like triathlon, mountain biking, adventure racing, mixed martial arts, yoga, cross fit,...all of which were not very popular 30, 20 or even 10 years ago.

Below is graph that shows annual skier visits across the four major US ski areas over the past 20 years. On average, the results are flat at best (some growth in the Rockies, flat in the Midwest and down in the East and the Pacific).

View attachment 31355

All the sports you mentioned are cheaper than skiing. Much.

 

[Rod9301]

I can think of a hundred reasons why skiing never was nor ever will be a dominant form of recreation for most people among the genral masses. And honestly, many of those same reasons will counteract most anything one might do to try to grow it.

Skiing is not....
..practical,
..easily accessible,
..cheap,
..easily done,
..warm weathered,
..lacking of required time,
..lacking of required income,
..lacking of required efforts and all else mentioned especially for a family.

How can it be grown? Imo all one can do is market it as much as possible and even then if it falls on deaf ears it isn't going to matter much. Imo you market it (but who will pay for that) and hope you gain an interest from a percentage who now don't ski but will have the desire and opportunities to overcome all the things mentioned in order to do so. Honestly the return on the marketing expense may not be worthwhile and may increase the expense of the recreation in which it was trying to grow in the first place therefore making it even less accessible than it is now.

basically I don't think there is a real answer that would do any miracles. Perhaps do as much as possible to get as many kids involved as you can. I suppose that would be the best route.

But skiing is all these things in Europe too, and yet it's very popular.

I still think the biggest reason is that it costs three times more in the us it costs in Europe.

For example, in France ski race programs for kids are $300 a year, and that includes skis. And coaches are former world cup skiers!

In Tahoe, a weekend race program for kids is almost $4,000 with very mediocre coaches ( looking at 8 year olds)

So how can we be surprised that people don't ski?

 

[Nancy Hummel]

I was raised in St. Louis. My parents did not ski. I moved to Denver when I was 35. I was single at the time. My only skiing experience was a week long cross country ski camp at Silver Star Mountain. I
was heavily into running and triathlons at the time. I thought I would give alpine skiing a shot but it was not a huge desire.

I found a ski club in Breckenridge that had a house that slept 60 people. The dues were $400 a year. I met some fun people and had a place to stay. Breckenridge had just started their unlimited lesson program for $99.00. I was able to spend weekends in the mountains and learn to ski, very inexpensively. I do not think skiing would be as much a part of my life as it is, if it were not for those first few years.

 

[Frankly]

Then we have the whole issue of being locals in a ski town, working in the ski business. I frankly think it may be THE biggest problem that many of these resorts, towns, etc, face. They acknowledge it, and pretty much ignore the train roaring down the tracks right at them. The cost of living, lack of housing, crummy incomes......all factors.

One of the things that surprises me, having played a small part in the dot.com boom, is how prevalent going to work still is. For many jobs there are few reasons we have to be on location, at the office, all week, all day. Or why, when information and educational materials are abundant and practically free, do we spend a quarter million dollars or go into long term debt to attend (private) college when from a practical matter, if you can do the work who cares where you went to college or where your desk is located?

To go a step further, if a sport like skiing supplied for those social benefits and connections that people feel they need to organize their lives around - having to be downtown in congested polluted city or sitting in a lecture hall in some campus - then they could be in the mountains.

Sorry I am right of Attila but the remaining egalitarian in me says that if you can do the work well then it doesn't matter where you are located or where you went to school. And all our technology, from Skype to smart phones and everything else should be enabling our freedom from 9 to 5. Instead we have 7 to 7 drudgery....

The joke with my high achiever daughter is that she should only go to school for maybe two hours as she could ingest all of the day's lessons in that time, the rest is BS. Same applies to many jobs.

It's some weird human, probably American trait that we feel this. Once all the manual labor is automated people will still feel obliged to show up to supervise each other.

Anyway the answer to growing skiing is tied to larger economic and social issues. Note that the intense growth years for skiing were during times of economic prosperity and nuclear families where Mom could organize things while Pops earned enough to pay for the whole ride (not that 1970s ski culture didn't encourage a lot of divorces). Maybe we didn't have optimal buying power but when the average middle class family had a 1700 sq ft house, one car, and ate potatoes and Jello versus our 3000 sq ft houses, multiple luxury cars, and sushi maybe Ozzie and Harriet had more time and cash for lift tickets and sticks?

/rant

 

[SBrown]

I guess my kids are millenials, although on the younger edge. I still subsidize as much skiing as they want me to, and honestly I probably always will. Both grew up skiing, although not as seriously as some of your kids, traveling even to Europe and Whistler. Those are great memories, but I don't see repeats happening for a while. Between work, school, and friends, it's just difficult. I agree that they will want to recreate that stuff when they are older and have their own families, so I want to keep them in the game as much as possible. They do enjoy going with their friends most of all, of course. My daughter would never go alone. My son would ski alone if he were close (ie, he used to go up for the afternoon at Purg when he lived in Durango), but he definitely wouldn't be doing the I-70 slog w/o a crew.

 

[Muleski]

I guess my kids are millenials, although on the younger edge. I still subsidize as much skiing as they want me to, and honestly I probably always will. Both grew up skiing, although not as seriously as some of your kids, traveling even to Europe and Whistler. Those are great memories, but I don't see repeats happening for a while. Between work, school, and friends, it's just difficult. I agree that they will want to recreate that stuff when they are older and have their own families, so I want to keep them in the game as much as possible. They do enjoy going with their friends most of all, of course. My daughter would never go alone. My son would ski alone if he were close (ie, he used to go up for the afternoon at Purg when he lived in Durango), but he definitely wouldn't be doing the I-70 slog w/o a crew.

I'd put your gang firmly in the "experienced skiers who will keep at it." It's interesting to see how things go when they are in college, and just out. I've seen it pretty well driven by family and friends. In terms of gender, I have seen the young guys stick with it, and even ramp it up, particularly if they have a group of friends who ski. I have seen young women get derailed a bit when their fronds may not ski, or ski much. So that having brunch might be more fun. Or the dreaded boyfriend who does not ski. I've seen most come back to it.

If our kids were not working in the business, there is no question in my mind that we'd help subsidize it, at least for a few years. When our daughter lived and worked in Denver, her Xmas gift was a couple of season passes. The parents of her real ski buddies did the same. I'm proud of just how hard she "worked" to juggle real work and skiing. She missed very few weekend ski days, and became pretty skilled at ducking out for a run to be working on her iPhone. She also enjoys the occasional day skiing by herself.

In terms of this topic, the I-70 "slog" is a challenge, specific to Denver, in dragging more millennials into the sport. With their hours, it's not so much fun.

I'm all with keeping your kids in the sport, and keeping their passion fueled.

 

[Muleski]

One of the things that surprises me, having played a small part in the dot.com boom, is how prevalent going to work still is. For many jobs there are few reasons we have to be on location, at the office, all week, all day. Or why, when information and educational materials are abundant and practically free, do we spend a quarter million dollars or go into long term debt to attend (private) college when from a practical matter, if you can do the work who cares where you went to college or where your desk is located?

To go a step further, if a sport like skiing supplied for those social benefits and connections that people feel they need to organize their lives around - having to be downtown in congested polluted city or sitting in a lecture hall in some campus - then they could be in the mountains.

Sorry I am right of Attila but the remaining egalitarian in me says that if you can do the work well then it doesn't matter where you are located or where you went to school. And all our technology, from Skype to smart phones and everything else should be enabling our freedom from 9 to 5. Instead we have 7 to 7 drudgery....

The joke with my high achiever daughter is that she should only go to school for maybe two hours as she could ingest all of the day's lessons in that time, the rest is BS. Same applies to many jobs.

It's some weird human, probably American trait that we feel this. Once all the manual labor is automated people will still feel obliged to show up to supervise each other.

Anyway the answer to growing skiing is tied to larger economic and social issues. Note that the intense growth years for skiing were during times of economic prosperity and nuclear families where Mom could organize things while Pops earned enough to pay for the whole ride (not that 1970s ski culture didn't encourage a lot of divorces). Maybe we didn't have optimal buying power but when the average middle class family had a 1700 sq ft house, one car, and ate potatoes and Jello versus our 3000 sq ft houses, multiple luxury cars, and sushi maybe Ozzie and Harriet had more time and cash for lift tickets and sticks?

/rant

Oops, hit send by mistake! More to follow, later.....

 

[Jacob]

But skiing is all these things in Europe too, and yet it's very popular.

I still think the biggest reason is that it costs three times more in the us it costs in Europe.

For example, in France ski race programs for kids are $300 a year, and that includes skis. And coaches are former world cup skiers!

In Tahoe, a weekend race program for kids is almost $4,000 with very mediocre coaches ( looking at 8 year olds)

So how can we be surprised that people don't ski?

It's not just that European resorts charge less money. Their whole business model is different and is based on getting large numbers of people on the mountain for several days in a row (usually on week-long trips). The best way to understand the difference is to imagine if Park City was in Europe.

First, the three resorts would've been fully interlinked at least 20 years ago, and they'd share a single trail map to highlight the amount of terrain on offer. Second, there would be fewer vacation homes around the mountain and far more hotel rooms and apartments at the base and around town. Third, the lift tickets would be cheaper and would have multi-day discounts with a free beginner lift at each base and walk-up rates the same as online.

If you're a destination skier who's not rich, everything about that business model makes it easier and more affordable to go skiing more often and for longer periods of time (a full week instead of a long weekend).

 

[Tricia]

To me it's our new lack of commitment. I even see it at work signing up for a pot luck! Everyone waits to the last minute waiting to see if something better comes up. Folks just don't want to commit to anything and a skiing takes planning and commitment--gear, practice, travel... Like what has been already discussed with all of the new ways to get outside, the perfect event today is the Tough Mudder. Ever see one? Thousands are there. Why? can sign up at the last minute, doesn't need any special gear, doesn't cost much and takes only a couple hours.

I see this to an extent.
I have a close friend who skis occasionally. She and I have been trying to get together to ski for 4 years but haven't done it yet.
Both of us say, "lets see how it looks next week."
We should commit and do it.

Millennials hurting the ski industry? Not in Colorado

I'm not sure this article addresses the issue convincingly, but maybe there is more somewhere else.

Funny, I've been talking to @LKLA about this.
What is the recipe that makes Colorado so desirable? Is it because its easy to get to?
When I lived in Michigan, I had the Epic pass because I knew I could go to Colorado on a road trip (18 hrs) with friends sharing the driving. When I got to Colorado I could plan where to ski based on which side of the pass the snow fell.

I have started a couple of responses, and morphed all over the place with them. Far away from Tricia's original post

Yeah, because nothing in a discussion community morphs, right??



IMHO so much of this relies on feeder hills. Case in point, this thread.
Where did you start skiing?
When a forum consisting of passionate skiers has a poll that said that over 75% of us started at a feeder hill, most of which are living much closer to the mountains in adulthood...That says something.

 

[Tricia]

About Park City, the resort highlighted in the original article of this thread.
When we visit PC, we see tons of activity, from training centers to the olympic museum.
I'm a little surprised that they aren't seeing growth considering all the activities on the mountain.

Park City and Deer Valley have never really targeted the age group that is now called the Millennials.
That age group has always been the Snowbird, Alta, Solitude skier.

When the Millennials age a little, will they switch gears and hit Park City & Deer Valley? Maybe, maybe not.

 

[Jully]

IMHO so much of this relies on feeder hills. Case in point, this thread.
Where did you start skiing?
When a forum consisting of passionate skiers has a poll that said that over 75% of us started at a feeder hill, most of which are living much closer to the mountains in adulthood...That says something.

That ties into all the comments in this thread saying that urban centers need their own feeder hill to really make progress with cheap hourly ticket options. If the indoor ski area at Meadowlands ever opens by NYC, we could really see if that model is popular and/or successful.

Lots of feeder hills around cities have closed due to snow issues, but synthetic surfaces could bring about a revival.

Maybe in 20 years there will be a lot more feeder hill/areas available near urban areas? That would be pretty wild as the number has been steadily decreasing since the 90s, but I personally feel that is where the growth is.

 

[Fishbowl]

I don’t really understand what you guys mean by “feeder hills”. Small resorts are not in business to send their customers off to bigger hills, and beginners tend to prefer destination resorts for their variety of terrain, ski schools and adjacent activities. Just asking. I get the general concept, but local resorts “feeding” destination resorts doesn’t seem valid in today’s market?

 

[Muleski]

There are a lot of alpine teams, WC down to American Ski Academies training right now, indoors in Europe. They are heading to the glaciers soon, but many are sending a week or two indoors. In the icebox, the freezer, whatever nickname they attach. Is it skiing? Maybe not what we all like, but it's making turns in man make snow. A lot of turns. These facilities are located far away from the mountains. Cities like Munich. Holland.

Who knows? They appeal to me more than the artificial mats, and other no snow trainers. But, at some level, it's all fun and all skiing. But the first time I saw the inside of one, it was a bit shocking. No natural light, let alone sun. AC on....cold.

 

[dbostedo]

I don’t really understand what you guys mean by “feeder hills”. Small resorts are not in business to send their customers off to bigger hills, and beginners tend to prefer destination resorts for their variety of terrain, ski schools and adjacent activities. Just asking. I get the general concept, but local resorts “feeding” destination resorts doesn’t seem valid in today’s market?

I think the easiest explanation might be this... If there hadn't been an affordable hill within an hour from my house when I was young, I wouldn't have learned to ski, and wouldn't now be making trips to destination resorts every winter. So the local hill ended up feeding some business to the large resorts later.

I still visit the feeder hills too... it's not meant to be a negative. I think the percentage of folks that jump right into skiing by flying to big resorts to learn and not skiing locally first is very small.

Note, this probably does apply to folks who actually live near the big resorts.

 

[RuleMiHa]

The Summit Daily has an article titled - As baby boomers leave the ski slopes, millennials fail to fill the gap

This makes me wonder what will draw the next generation to the slopes.
Do we need to develop more activity at the mountain so that it will draw a bigger crowd, or do we need to scale back and make it about skiing at its purest?

Is it -

• Cost
• Customer experience
• Other outside activities drawing their attention

I just looked this article and looked at the graph and realized that (at least for that graph) some gross misinterpretations are being made. While it is true that younger generations are skiing less (based on the graph used in the article) they failed to control for the fact that in general younger people ski less.

The graph covers twenty years, but each generation group is from nine to 30+ years, therefore the graph is much more representative of the age adjusted skier than it is of whether each generation is skiing less when matched for age and stage of life. If you track # of days skied by each generation and then find the comparable year where the generations were the SAME AGE the numbers are stable.

For instance Pre-Boomers (greater than 70) contributed the most days per group at 10.1 for last season, whereas the next most prolific group was BB1's who contributed 8.1 days. Sounds awful except that 20 years ago (don't know average or mean ages of groups so don't know proper comparison years) Pre-Boomers were only contributing 8.2 days.

If you look at the more recent generations, Gen X vs. Millenials (both 15 year generations). Millenials are participating at a higher rate than Gen X was 15 years ago. This year M's had a 5.3 rate v Gen X score of 4.8 15 years ago (when the generations would be of equivalent ages).

For almost every age matched group I looked at the numbers are eerily similar, it seems as though stage of life is a much stronger predictor of skiing behavior than generation.

If that is the case (and we really can't know without seeing the skiing behavior of each generation at every age) we are chasing the wrong problem. If any generation looks like it's undercontributing relative to prior years it is Gen X and that may or may not be true depending on average age.

I'm not saying there's not a problem but when I look at that graph (and the frankly piss poor data analysis) I'm concerned that we're never going to fix a problem that hasn't been defined properly. Maybe the problem isn't younger generations skiing less, maybe it's just that there are so fewer people in each subsequent generation after the boomers that they can't make up the difference. The solution may still be more activities but if that is the case they need to be distributed to attract more than just the youngest generations who by default have less time and money.

 

[Chris Walker]

I don’t really understand what you guys mean by “feeder hills”. Small resorts are not in business to send their customers off to bigger hills, and beginners tend to prefer destination resorts for their variety of terrain, ski schools and adjacent activities. Just asking. I get the general concept, but local resorts “feeding” destination resorts doesn’t seem valid in today’s market?

Certainly small ski areas are not in business to send their customers off to bigger hills, that's just what happens. It never made sense to me for a beginner to pay top dollar at a major resort to learn how to ski. The bunny hill at Snowmass is no better than the bunny hill at a small ski area closer to a population center. The ski school at either is perfectly competent to get a beginner up and making turns. The local area is going to be a whole lot easier to get to, less hassle, and an order of magnitude less expensive. Now at a certain point, that customer is going to grow in skill and seek bigger, more adventurous terrain. That's when they will likely gravitate to the major resorts. Sure the small mom-and-pop resort would prefer they stay and spend money there, but they'd have better luck serving new beginners who don't need that bigger. more adventurous terrain.

This model works for everyone. The beginners have a cost-effective and accessible way to learn skiing, the mega resorts have a constant flow of new, eager skiers looking for adventure. The "feeder" hills have a viable business model. I see it as a recent phenomenon that through marketing and adding these side activities, the mega resorts are pulling in the business that previously would have gone to the feeders, thus pricing out a big chunk of that new business. That's the concern for future viability of the industry.