Vail Stinks 2020/2021

yardsale

I'll start - Sam can go next...

With the exception of everything covid, their communications on a resort level stinks. No webcams unless you know how to backdoor in. No updates on opening operations. No updates on snowmaking efforts. No info on when the ski shops / tuning will open. A website that is vanilla as a quart of Wilcox's ice cream. A 2 1/2 wait to reserve just 7 days on an unlimited pass. They bring nothing, nada, zilch.

Looking forward to getting to Bromley more often.

newpylong

Yea, they suck. The McDonalds of ski resort management.

joshua_segal

They just went thru a huge expansion. They're facing multi-million dollar losses and they are trying to deal with the unprecedented COVID-19. While your opinions may prove correct, I would cut them some slack, at least for this year, on the basis of the pandemic.

yardsale

joshua_segal

5 years ago or so. Seems like the OG poster might have been on to something wink wink

yardsale

how hard is it to communicate in real time with your passholders? how hard is it to give your local hill managers the ability to show what is going on at the local Vail franchise. If they can communicate about covid, why cant they communicate about the other stuff.

When my oldest started at CU Boulder in 2010, we went out to VAIL Inc every year. Back then, their websites and communication skills varied by resort and was acceptable. Now, they, evidently, don't give a crap because they've sold xx million passes.

Nope, they deserve no slack. Quite frankly, the difference in communication between Peak and Vail is staggering.

Chuckstah

Vail communication and customer service sucks. The rest, we shall see. But I don't have high hopes.

Schweig_1

Stowe had some nice webcams on their website....until yesterday.
Now all they have is Epic’s reservation and pass page.
The same is true for Mt. Snow’s and Okemo’s webcam pages.
At least the webcams of their competitors like Killington, Stratton and Sugarbush are still active.

———->>> EDIT:
As of 11/11/2020 webcams are up and running!

jaytrem

The Stowe cams should still be there. Vail was having issues with at least some if their sites where the click through button was just reloading the same page. So there was no easy way to get to the resorts regular site. Not sure if there was any way. Seems to be fixed now.

NELSBEER

Today Vail added click thru to the original ski area splash screens. Looks like getting the reservation screens up ontime was established as a priority with relinking the area information coming next. Managers establish the priorities, programmers lose sleep implementing them.

In the last few months Vail has centralized marketing and web design. I suspect there will be growing pains in many areas as they standardize panels, integrate area specific inputs (trails, grooming, weather...) and deal with system capacity needs. Required customization for Covid-19 will make progress more difficult.⛷️

yardsale

Keystone sold out for week of reservations. Not a good sign.

jaytrem

NELSBEER;c-44344 wroteToday Vail added click thru to the original ski area splash screens.

The click thru was there on the 6th, it just wasn't working for all the resorts. Keystone's would not work for me that day, but another one did, Stowe's maybe? Pretty sure I tried Mount Snow too, but I forget the results. Was amazed that they managed to essentially shut down their own websites. As far as I could tell, any links found by googling were redirected to the waiting room, tried incognito mode too with the same results.

Beast Patroller

joshua_segal;c-44339 wroteThey just went thru a huge expansion. They're facing multi-million dollar losses and they are trying to deal with the unprecedented COVID-19. While your opinions may prove correct, I would cut them some slack, at least for this year, on the basis of the pandemic.

If they want to be the "BIG DOG" then they better act like one and not a scared little lap dog! I haven't seen anything good come from Vail since they bought Peaks out last year. I know they weren't "running " day to day operations last winter (until March 14th's shutdown) but Mount Snow was a crapfest every weekend & holidays. Couldn't find a parking spot unless you showed up before 7AM and they had the gall to take a large section of the closest lot and make it valet parking for $35.00 a day? This is New England (Vermont) not ritzy Vail or Aspen.

Now, you can't access anything at the mountain/ website and customer service is a joke! My wife & I mistakenly bought our Epic passes mostly because we didn't want to lose our credits for last season but with all the hoops we going to have to jump through we are seriously considering asking for a refund even though they won't refund our credits. Before we do I would like to talk to a "live" person but that seems impossible.

So...as far as "cutting them some slack", they haven't earned that from me!

joshua_segal

Beast Patroller;c-44349 wrote
joshua_segal;c-44339 wroteThey just went thru a huge expansion. They're facing multi-million dollar losses and they are trying to deal with the unprecedented COVID-19. While your opinions may prove correct, I would cut them some slack, at least for this year, on the basis of the pandemic.
... but Mount Snow was a crapfest every weekend & holidays. Couldn't find a parking spot unless you showed up before 7AM and they had the gall to take a large section of the closest lot and make it valet parking for $35.00 a day? This is New England (Vermont) not ritzy Vail or Aspen.

...

I'm afraid you walked into my favorite oxymoron: No one skis there. It's too crowded!

jgreco

I'm just here for the Vail hate. 👍

Beast Patroller

I'm afraid you walked into my favorite oxymoron: No one skis there. It's too crowded!

You did get me. In defense, it never use to be as bad as it has been the last couple of years and Vail is going to make it worse.

I also just came home from our place up there and I hate to say it but I'm not excited at all for them to open. I'd rather go snow shoeing or maybe buy a sled and go snowmobiling?

joshua_segal

Beast Patroller;c-44354 wrote
I'm afraid you walked into my favorite oxymoron: No one skis there. It's too crowded!
You did get me. In defense, it never use to be as bad as it has been the last couple of years and Vail is going to make it worse.

I also just came home from our place up there and I hate to say it but I'm not excited at all for them to open. I'd rather go snow shoeing or maybe buy a sled and go snowmobiling?

Disclaimer: I'm not a big fan of Mount Snow. But Peak Resorts did a good job bringing it into the 21st Century after the demise of ASC and bringing in the crowds. Last season, it ran under the Peak Resorts model with Vail ownership. This season is really the first season that they are being incorporated into the Vail model.

So to date, I don't think you can yet either credit or blame Vail for anything at Mount Snow except perhaps the Season Pass SNAFU.

Beast Patroller

Disclaimer: I'm not a big fan of Mount Snow. But Peak Resorts did a good job bringing it into the 21st Century after the demise of ASC and bringing in the crowds. Last season, it ran under the Peak Resorts model with Vail ownership. This season is really the first season that they are being incorporated into the Vail model.

So to date, I don't think you can yet either credit or blame Vail for anything at Mount Snow except perhaps the Season Pass SNAFU.

That may be true but Vail did institute the valet parking last winter which is a joke. Mount Snow is in Vermont not Colorado and if you really want to have "special parking" you can buy a parking season pass for $300.00! My point of Vail making the crowds worse is now instead of 14 mountains on your pass you have 37 mountains which means more people showing up. This year may not be as bad BUT now we have to deal with this stupid reservation system which could (and will) lock out some passholders who use Mount Snow as their home mountain. We are the ones who support the mountain along with the valley businesses with our taxes & patronage and should get first crack at the reservations not someone from another Epic mountain.

BarringtonLevy

Has anyone gotten word if Mount Snow is going full RFID for this season?

NELSBEER

Over at Crotched the transceivers to support RFID are in place and reportedly ready to go.

Over a period of time a team of implementators installed servers, terminals and wired things up @ VAIL standards. These look like cookie cutter, standards based, implmentations that should work well out of the box.

Mount Snow should be equally ready to go.

rickbolger

Full Disclosure: just sold some MTN stock. Not complaining about Vail right now :)

yardsale

I guess to get real time info, you have to succumb to Silicon Valley / Big Tech.

Opening postponed an hour ago via Facebook, Twitter, Instagram. My son in CO let me know. No updates to the website.