joshua_segal While as a percentage of the skiing population, I don't think the young, rude and reckless has substantially increased. But because of the additional traffic per skiable acre has increased, the impact (pun intended) of these skiers is increased. As to "attitude", the hot doggers and the early boarders had the "attitude", too. When I was in my 20s, I tried skiing a new area every time I went skiing. While it's been years since I hit a new area, I did make it to 176. If I were trying to do that today on a budget, I would do one mega-pass per year and do as many of them as possible - and yes, if the pass was Epic, I would probably even have spent a week in Pennsylvania!
rickbolger riverc0il;c-63326 wrote The corporate skiing model is fueled by older people [edited for brevity]... not younger people... Me thinks you are severely underestimating the analytics and marketing personnel in Broomfield CO
hazlntskier One thing I have noticed is several of the corporate owned areas are not offering "beginner" packages (lift/rental/lesson) separate from buying a pass or ticket (lift only) in advance. This seems to me to be a mistake in my mind if they want to increase the number of skiers. Yes some areas do have school programs, not much for families or adults who want to give it try. I don't know if this because of a one size fits all mentality or they feel that independent small ski areas near urban areas have that market. Why not offer a package with lodging that offers almost zero cost extra to try skiing. However Vail has several areas in PA/OH/MS from Peaks acquisition that I would think fall into this category. As has been mentioned committing to thousands of $$ to go out west without knowing if you are going to enjoy it is asking a lot. One other point I made a couple of years ago is that the corporate owners need manage the areas by the market they serve, not just East/Midwest/Rockies/West geography. Within each of the geographic areas the areas are very different from a market point of view. So me areas need to focus us school groups, new skiers and race leagues to build up their weekday traffic even if weekend traffic is good while others need to focus on people driving for the weekend and condo owners and some need to focus on longer stays (5-7 days) with activities other than the ski area. Vail areas don't seem to be interested in updating web sites or Snowcountry etc. They are better this year with at least some comments on conditions, open terrain and lift status. The emails that Vail sends out vs the ones Boyne mountains is night a day. Vail has nothing about open terrain etc. while Boyne is always very up to date on terrain etc.
