I think it's getting priced out of that income range. It's such an elite sport (winter skiing/snowboarding) now, who can afford to pay $130 in lift tickets and these parking fees, stay in the hotel, etc? I think any remnents of "middle class" are quickly dying. And evidently this works, brings in the cash, etc.
The end is nigh. Vail swallows up the big one.
- Thread starter kidwoo
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Best ski documentary of all time. And don't even get me started on the acting. Oscars all the way around.
I've been an avid snowboarder since 1990. My kids and wife and I enjoy skiing, but I can hardly justify $200 worth of lift tickets for the snow and ice of the midwest, and I surely can't justify the cost of a family of 4 out west for the weekend.
I hate to say it, but I believe I'll be hanging up the snowsports soon and just riding my fatbike around.
This is why I stopped skiing. A seasons pass up here will cost anywhere from $200-$500 for ONE person. If you get the cheaper ones, you're going to have to deal with no day skiing on weekends and some blackout dates. On top of the cost, the hills around here were always covered in ice, shitty snow and the lift lines were insane.
Oh and at the majority of hills here, you're at the bottom of the runs in under a minute on some of them. Yay fun.
DH biking up here is limited to pretty much one ski resort. A bike pass if you buy it in the fall is about $190, but jumps up to $330 before the season starts. That is 16 DH trails, one of them which has an XC like finish. Free parking, though. The resort definitely caters to all the weekend warrior families. They have recently built a new mountain coaster thing, theres an airbag you can jump into (lol wut?), extensive/expensive mini-golf course, Segway rides etc. Bikers are not their priority, but I don't blame them. This past weekend on Sunday, there was MAYBE 50-60 DH riders at the entire place. They've kept trails closed in the past all season because its too much work to open them or they are building things like the mini-golf and coaster. Only recently did they put in a bike wash station.. I try not to complain about anything there though, its great that we have one "good" place to ride. BUT, for a few years my buddies and I just purchased passes to Bromont as the trails are wayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy better and the cost is far cheaper.
Ramble ramble ramble.
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I feel ya
They only way I ever got my days in was because I worked at a mountain. I have 3 kids now and it's ridiculous what I would have spend for a day or two riding the snow with the family.
I'm buying my kids mtbs/dirt bikes and maybe a snowmachine if we moved out west. I already have a camper so we are set on a place to sleep.
You do realize that the upper middle class is actually a much larger percentage and that the % of the overal population doesn't matter. It's like saying Cannes and Saint Tropez shouldn't cather to the rich because it's 0,01% of the population. What matters is which target group brings more money and how big they are in your demographic. Poor people rarely go to big expensive bikepark in our inresonably expensive sport.
Jeesh, make up your mind.
I really don't give a shit about percentages.
My trip was affordable for a week. Last time I went was $3k. This time was $1600. The difference? 6 went this time, we didn't rent a car, we bought our groceries in Squamish, we ate out 1 night, we stayed further away...
The only part Whistler resort got from me was the $220 for the pass. If another trip cost me $200 more cause of lift tickets, I'm not going to deny a week long trip to do what I love - on the worlds best trails.
Face it, if you want to go to ride the world's best, at least to try it, you'll come up with the money. We all do it when we want a new bike. Right?
A little bit of history. Killington was owned by a company known as ASC, American Ski Company. ASC bought a dozen resorts over the years. They then sold off one resort at a time till they folded all together. But they made Killington what it is. Intrawest did it too. Tremblant, Snowshoe, mtn Creek... Whistler! Do any of these places have something in common? Skiing and DH. But Intrawest did the same as ASC. It sold off one at a time. Vail is the newcomer to this game.
I can't predict the future and neither can you or the "economist" on TV every day. Someone will be right though and others will be wrong. I'm not predicting anything and you shouldn't either. Mtn Creek a couple years ago is another great example...
My trip was affordable for a week. Last time I went was $3k. This time was $1600. The difference? 6 went this time, we didn't rent a car, we bought our groceries in Squamish, we ate out 1 night, we stayed further away...
The only part Whistler resort got from me was the $220 for the pass. If another trip cost me $200 more cause of lift tickets, I'm not going to deny a week long trip to do what I love - on the worlds best trails.
Face it, if you want to go to ride the world's best, at least to try it, you'll come up with the money. We all do it when we want a new bike. Right?
A little bit of history. Killington was owned by a company known as ASC, American Ski Company. ASC bought a dozen resorts over the years. They then sold off one resort at a time till they folded all together. But they made Killington what it is. Intrawest did it too. Tremblant, Snowshoe, mtn Creek... Whistler! Do any of these places have something in common? Skiing and DH. But Intrawest did the same as ASC. It sold off one at a time. Vail is the newcomer to this game.
I can't predict the future and neither can you or the "economist" on TV every day. Someone will be right though and others will be wrong. I'm not predicting anything and you shouldn't either. Mtn Creek a couple years ago is another great example...
if they slash our $1600 seasons passes (full price no early discount, blahblahblah) for the winter like they're claiming, we're already winning http://vancouversun.com/business/local-business/vail-resorts-makes-1-4-billion-takeover-offer-for-whistler-blackcomb
Welcome to the American borg, my new assimilant.
Winter decisions don't really affect a lot of this forum (and if I'm up there in winter it's in pemberton with a sled) but I can definitely say this about what's happened in Tahoe: cheap multimountain pass prices have completely fucked the ski areas here. After two years of about quadruple the number of people on snow days, I just don't buy passes any more. I can't stand the crowds.
Whistler's huge and still effectively one mountain/operation so it would be a little different. I hope for your sake, the place doesn't get more aspen-ed up than it already is.
I just booked an expensive room at The Lodge at Vail in October. I'm going to add to their non-biking demographic stats by not bringing the bike (work retreat so I'll have stuff until noon and probably should help shepherd the kids when not busy). Take that, 'woo. 
If anything, maybe Vail wants to learn from Whistler, which is the only resort I've ever been to that seems to have its Summer, family-fun adventures game totally dialed and profitable (while also having the best bike park obvs).
I don't care at all about quad tours, beerz and blooze fests, zip lines or waterparks, but at Whistler that shit looks like it's actually working, rather than some dying-on-the-vine marketing failure that won't be happening in 2 years.
I'm no expert on the Rockies or Euro, but as far as East Coast and California.. I don't understand how skipark resorts are even profitable during the summer.
Mammoth is probably an outlier, being the high sierra backcountry hub that it is.
I don't care at all about quad tours, beerz and blooze fests, zip lines or waterparks, but at Whistler that shit looks like it's actually working, rather than some dying-on-the-vine marketing failure that won't be happening in 2 years.
I'm no expert on the Rockies or Euro, but as far as East Coast and California.. I don't understand how skipark resorts are even profitable during the summer.
Mammoth is probably an outlier, being the high sierra backcountry hub that it is.
I just booked an expensive room at The Lodge at Vail in October. I'm going to add to their non-biking demographic stats by not bringing the bike (work retreat so I'll have stuff until noon and probably should help shepherd the kids when not busy). Take that, 'woo.
Do you log onto tennis forums and brag about all the not tennis you play?
The point is that I'm now part of the demographic that fills their rooms. My days of sleeping in the back of the car in ski lot parking lots are over, and that's when I would have been most excited about DH.
And this somehow discounts the thousands upon thousands of people who do fill rooms for riding dh at a place with better infrastructure like whistler?
People stay at whistler just to go ride the peak to peak terror box. That doesn't mean that downhill bike people don't.
You and I are close to the same age I think but I and tons of people just like me still very much ride bike parks regularly, and spend money at the places to do it. It happens at northstar here and it happens at vail too. All I've ever said is that it would happen much more at those places if they put forth the effort in trail infrastructure that would draw them.
I'm really not sure what you're point is, other than "I don't ride dh any more". That's fine but that doesn't mean that there aren't tons of people who do, and who do fill rooms at these places. I live in a resort town with multiple ski areas/golf courses and a big pretty lake. I'm aware of the not bike things that happen in places like this. The bike thing is just a perfect component for a mountain with a lift system so I think it should be treated as the resource it is, because it CAN pay off. Especially with crappier winters on the horizon.
When's the last time you've even been to whistler? Just because it's not in your face domestically doesn't mean that big bike smashing isn't very alive and well. Because it is.
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Resorts in Colorado are kept alive by conferences in summer. If it wasn't for those, the resorts wouldn't even be open during the summer.
+1
What I dont get is why both cant exist together? Every trail dosent need to be paved so the 7 year old, Sam Hill and 75 year old gramps can get down every single trail while holding hands.
Whistler is primarily by bikers for bikes to my understanding, there seem to be about an equal share of rugged gnarly trails as the easier flow trails.
Here in Sweden the Are bike park was when I first got there primarily a downhillers bike park, it had less flow paved stuff then hardcore. Since then the hardcore either gets wiped out to become hiking trails or dumbed down.
Not a single krona gets invested in something new that is not a paved (badly built) jump trail. The gnarly trails get a little upkeep but thats it.
On top of this they continuosly make hiking trails and transportation routes cross fast sections of gnarly trails, just begging for bad accidents.
You think that's true for winter park? Honest question, I've only driven by it in the summer on the way to sol vista but I know that's what everyone in CO with a trail bike talks about. I just ask because it's the one mountain that seems to consistently stay involved with their park.
Again though: until you have a place that has actually put the work in for bike infrastructure, you can't really use the fact that existing bike parks don't draw the crowds yet as some kind of proof of concept failure. Like I said at the very beginning......half ass the park, get the lukewarm result you deserve. Hire lifty holdovers because they're cheap and they 'have a mountain bike' and you're going to get the trails you pay for.
I'm noticing the only people with this argument as some kind of proof are ones that likely haven't been anywhere but US bike parks lately. So of course this seems like some crazy concept. You haven't seen the opposite in motion anywhere. I have.......for the last 13 years.
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No. I don't think Winter Park has any conferences...
I think Winter Park is just a tax write-off for the City of Denver.
I think Winter Park is just a tax write-off for the City of Denver.
So what's the full story with that place? Intrawest runs the mountain or just base operations? What does Denver have to do with it? Is that city property, not a USFS lease?
City owns it, it's a FS lease, and Intrawest operates it. I'd imagine most of the base areas are actually city-owned land.
Denver has owned it since the beginning, IIRC.
Denver has owned it since the beginning, IIRC.
They seem to have forgotten biking in the list of things to do there...
https://sgbonline.com/inside-vails-strategy-to-acquire-whistler-blackcomb/
https://sgbonline.com/inside-vails-strategy-to-acquire-whistler-blackcomb/
the WP base area is part of the moffat tunnel water easement for the city of denver
I think that this part is something that NONE of us can argue about:
"grow the company’s reach, increase synergies, make more money."
https://open.spotify.com/track/6qtiyGOzgHIfIX4wJmit2g
Does this mean Whistler will start allowing hard tails?
they had frisbee golf at that one spot in PA. I'm assuming they are raking it in.
Pedal up resorts are where it is at.
THE INDUSTRY DOESN'T LIKE THAT
The valuation of this sale are insanely low as well...
$1.5B value
2million skier visits per year
Vail only needs to see $75/skier visit to recoup costs within 10 years.
Interwest must have been at the point of defaulting on something major for their crown jewel to get sold so cheaply...
$1.5B value
2million skier visits per year
Vail only needs to see $75/skier visit to recoup costs within 10 years.
Interwest must have been at the point of defaulting on something major for their crown jewel to get sold so cheaply...
looks poopy. i'm out.