Vail: How it's changed skiing and where it might be going.

[marzNC]

One of the former VR managers quoted in this article refused a transfer that involved moving to another region.

December 31, 2021

Epic crowds collide with labor shortages at ski areas

Alex Kaufman thought it would be an amusing website. Something to poke fun at the largest resort operator in North America. So he bought EpicLiftLines.com for $12 last March, just as Vail Resorts anno...

www.durangoherald.com

 

[Lmk92]

Sounds like this sums it up well: “They sold 76% more passes this year and they have $1.5 billion in cash on hand and they are not able to run their mountains.”

Also sounds like this is my last year with Epic (I'm also regretting that purchase for this year)

 

[marzNC]

Here's the article I read several years ago about Rob Katz. This was written after the first urban ski resorts in the midwest had been purchased but well before the expansion in the northeast that started with Stowe and ramped up significantly from an operations standpoint with the acquisitions of Triple Peaks (Okemo, Sunapee) and Peak Resorts (Mount Snow, Hunter, Attitash/Wildcat, Roundtop/Liberty/Whitetail).

December 2016

Rob Katz Is the Most Powerful Man in the Ski Industry

Since becoming the CEO of Vail Resorts in 2006, Katz has led the company in the acquisition of many properties, discounted the cost of season passes, and persuaded his customers to market the brand. What does he have planned next?

www.5280.com

Katz' wife, Elena Amsterdam, established Elana's Pantry in 2006 after the move to Colorado. That was also the year she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

About Elana

About Elana Elana Amsterdam is a powerful influencer in the wellness space. A lifestyle guru, she has been on the cutting edge of healthy living advocacy

elanaspantry.com

 

[Christy]

I think Vail fails to understand that running an Eastern resort is not the same as running one out west. The resorts are smaller, they're not necessarily vacation destinations, and the culture here is completely different. What's more, many of these resorts have been around for decades. They have loyal customers who've been coming to them for generations, and while changes are inevitable when there's an acquisition, the first rule should be not to alienate your most loyal supporters.

It's the same here in WA. Stevens has been around since 1937 and is a day use area, not a resort. There's no room for lodging and it's on USFS land so they can't make it into a resort even if they wanted.

 

[marzNC]

It's the same here in WA. Stevens has been around since 1937 and is a day use area, not a resort. There's no room for lodging and it's on USFS land so they can't make it into a resort even if they wanted.

Also fair to say that the local culture in the Seattle/Tacoma area is not the same as the midwestern cities like Chicago or Detroit. Plus the scale of the mountain is completely different than the midwest or northeast resorts catering to an urban market.

 

[teleskichica]

Holidays and illness have kept me off the hill so this topic has been on my mind all weekend!

I think I read somewhere that Katz was not "from the industry"? This makes a lot more sense now. This revolutionary approach to ski resort management is private equity "investment."

Private equity investment is happening all around us. Friends at a gathering this pas weekend were talking about hailing an Uber home and then mentioned how Google maps directed their driver onto the most harrowing icy or impassable roads. Not to mention how very, very seemingly arbitrarily expensive an Uber is now and that cost doesn't even go the the driver but to the company (a percentage of tips go to the driver). Once upon a time the (now maligned) taxi driver was a driving, living, breathing Thomas Guide who knew every route through the city. You paid a fixed rate and tipped generously to the driver when they successfully and safely delivered you to your destination. Now we pay for an app that utilizes a human to get the job done.

Since Vail (like Uber) is also heavily funded by private equity groups such as Apollo Ski Company this article from 2017 peaked my interest: https://www.powder.com/stories/deer-valley-meet-your-new-corporate-owner/

And this side trail https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/ou...alism-how-private-equity-undermining-economy/ added to the stew of thoughts simmering in the back of my brain.

I know this isn't the true meaning of the word but I always think of "investment" as having a vested interest in success -- commitment to well being. These acquisitions seem more in line with vampiric speculation.

 

[ilovepugs]

I know this isn't the true meaning of the word but I always think of "investment" as having a vested interest in success -- commitment to well being. These acquisitions seem more in line with vampiric speculation.

these days it’s all about the short term gain, long term pain.

 

[Abbi]

@teleskichica ’vampiric’ seems an appropriate word choice.

 

[Christy]

The bad publicity for VR re the Stevens Pass situation is really steamrolling. It has gotten in all the major media outlets--newspaper, tv (there have been long segments on all of the local tv news shows), talk radio, in Seattle, Tacoma, Everett and Spokane. Vail won't talk to anyone but seems busy putting out statements. Props to King 5 for this headline. Actually everyone seems to be having fun using "avalanche" to describe the complaints.

Stevens Pass under avalanche of criticism​

Stevens Pass under avalanche of criticism

An online petition is gaining traction and accusing the owners of the beloved Stevens Pass ski resort of mismanagement.

www.king5.com

**

Seattle's biggest talk radio blowhard is apparently one of the pissed off Stevens skiers.

Dori: Are some local ski resorts giving snow enthusiasts a bait-and-switch?

An avalanche of listeners lit up the KIRO Radio text line after Dori described getting the cold shoulder from Vail Resorts, which owns Stevens Pass.

mynorthwest.com

But an avalanche of Dori Monson Show listeners lit up the KIRO Radio text line Wednesday after Dori described getting the cold shoulder from Vail Resorts, despite his repeated attempts to interview an official with the Colorado-based company that owns Stevens Pass, about 45 miles east of Everett off Highway 2.

Dori’s questions echo those of listeners: Why are waits at Stevens Pass so long? Why are only half of Stevens’ 10 chairlifts open? Where is the staffing for parking shuttles, lot snow-clearing and traffic direction? And why do these problems exist in the first place when most Stevens Pass season ticket holders have already shelled out $500 to $1,000 for these services?

“Skiers are salt-of-the-earth people who chose a healthy sport,” says Dori. “Even the egg guy who advertises on KIRO with his granddaughter Harley goes skiing 80 times a year.”

Selling packages that promise access to the entire mountain but really offer only a few chairs that force people to stand in ridiculously long lines is bait-and-switch, Dori says.

 

[MissySki]

I love that this keeps getting more traction. The more and more scrutiny and pressure the better. We want to make it as hard as possible for them to just sit around doing nothing and not having to answer for it.

 

[teleskichica]

I feel rather angry and helpless watching something like this happen to Stevens or any other smaller resorts. I heard someone on the skill hill say yesterday, "Oh, it's because nobody wants to work." There are those people who don't want to work but many people do. Let's look at this though. When you are paid $15 an hour and it is a 100 mile commute and gas is $4.10 a gallon, the first four hours of your day are (2 hours for driving and 2 hours to pay for the gas let alone car maintenance and insurance) you are better off working the much maligned McDonald's job with benefits than a seasonal volatile position at XX resort. We need a better model.

I don't blame Katz. They can (maybe even will) fire him and he will be discarded much in the same way all the passholder "investor"/customers will. Katz has merely been very effective at making money for himself by making whatever private equity firms are behind this as much money as possible, and when he no longer can, he'll no longer be necessary. I hope the equity investment firms get the pants sued off them and this anger and outrage sets a precedent fighting back against the parasitic ultra-wealthy private equity "investment" firms currently preying on our hospitals and housing market too.

 

[Iwannaski]

“Nobody wants to work” is a real trigger phrase for me.

I’ve heard it a bunch and the people who say it generally do not understand front line work at all. If they DO have front line experience, it’s from a different era, where the wages may have actually been fairer and/or people were kinder.

I have worked in a few different foodservice roles (more than 20 years ago) and I have to say, I don’t think I ever experienced some of the behaviors I see people exhibit today. I suspect the worst behaved people are the ones who then say things like “nobody wants to work” …

 

[teleskichica]

@Iwannaski -- I didn't take too well to their comment either and they got a very long rebuttal response. 100% to what you said.

 

[Christy]

If nobody wanted to work, then Baker, White Pass, Crystal, Snoqualmie and Mission Ridge would also be 60% closed with no grooming, plowing, food service, etc.

The fact that only Stevens is 60% closed with no staff to groom or plow either tells us there is something specifically wrong at Stevens.

 

[marzNC]

If nobody wanted to work, then Baker, White Pass, Crystal, Snoqualmie and Mission Ridge would also be 60% closed with no grooming, plowing, food service, etc.

The fact that only Stevens is 60% closed with no staff to groom or plow either tells us there is something specifically wrong at Stevens.

Similar comparisons are being made in PA, VR, and NH.

 

[ski diva]

Have any of you heard how Vail is reducing hours or days at a number of resorts they've acquired?

From the latest posting in the Storm Skiing Journal:

At least five Vail resorts announced curtailed operating plans in the past weeks. New Hampshire’s Crotched, a sort-of party resort that has historically stayed open until 3 a.m. on select weekend nights, will contract its schedule to five days per week and shutter night skiing by 9 p.m. Snow Valley, Missouri, announced that it would only operate Fridays through Sundays. Unlike New Hampshire skiers, who have several other Vail options within driving distance, Snow Creek is 274 miles from the nearest Vail-owned ski area – Hidden Valley, on the other side of the state. The closest competition is Mount Crescent, Iowa, 165 miles to the north. The ski area will only offer night skiing on Fridays. Hidden Valley in Missouri and Mad River and Boston Mills in Ohio will all open this weekend with reduced hours for the season.

 

[newboots]

Somewhere on Facebook I saw a link to an article from a local paper about Wildcat and Attitash - much the same complaints as for Stevens Pass (and there was an issue with a small Vail property near Kansas City). It seems like these problems are nationwide, which should certainly tell us all something. (And NOT that "people don't want to work.")

Oh, @ski diva just mentioned the Kansas City (Missouri) resort (above).

 

[ski diva]

This is all so sad. It seems to me that once they have your money for your pass, their obligation to provide service seems to end.

 

[marzNC]

Have any of you heard how Vail is reducing hours or days at a number of resorts they've acquired?

That happened at the former Snowtime resorts in PA. Started for 2020-21 so locals were hoping it was a pandemic adjustment. But the same more limited night hours for 2021-22.

 

[newboots]

And as always, there are continuing complaints about Hunter (Catskills).