The 2020-2021 Ski season thread

[zeepowderhunter]

14 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

That’s my buddy Dylan, but yeah I think he’s got shifts for bindings.

Ah gotcha.  Thanks!

[LaGrangewx]

Haven’t posted in awhile but love reading this forum. I was wondering what the Vermont resorts are expecting in terms of crowds and business, considering only Vermont residents seem to be able to ski this year as of now. I would guess a vast majority of skiers for the southern Vermont resorts come from out of state. Are they expecting to take a massive hit this season? 

[Skivt2]

6 hours ago, LaGrangewx said:

Haven’t posted in awhile but love reading this forum. I was wondering what the Vermont resorts are expecting in terms of crowds and business, considering only Vermont residents seem to be able to ski this year as of now. I would guess a vast majority of skiers for the southern Vermont resorts come from out of state. Are they expecting to take a massive hit this season? 

Well, pretty much anyone that can is moving to VT for the winter.

[powderfreak]

7 hours ago, LaGrangewx said:

Haven’t posted in awhile but love reading this forum. I was wondering what the Vermont resorts are expecting in terms of crowds and business, considering only Vermont residents seem to be able to ski this year as of now. I would guess a vast majority of skiers for the southern Vermont resorts come from out of state. Are they expecting to take a massive hit this season? 

I think Stowe sold out to capacity on Wednesday and again today.  From what I saw it is not deterring many people... or if it is the more limiting factor is the capacity restriction.

Exactly how summer and fall foliage was.  The demand was still larger than the capacity allowed, even with 99.9% of the US population having to quarantine for two weeks to visit.

[PhineasC]

15 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

I think Stowe sold out to capacity on Wednesday and again today.  From what I saw it is not deterring many people... or if it is the more limiting factor is the capacity restriction.

Exactly how summer and fall foliage was.  The demand was still larger than the capacity allowed, even with 99.9% of the US population having to quarantine for two weeks to visit.

That’s good to hear.

[powderfreak]

12 hours ago, PhineasC said:

That’s good to hear.

C’mon, this is America (where we all have a dose of entitlement, myself included, like it’s baked into our DNA)... nothing will stop a lot of people from their expensive leisure vacations, lol.  First world problems on the whole.  I did have a good chat with a commercial real estate developer from Boston who said if he lost the ability to spend his money on expensive trips where he wanted to go and buying pointless consumer items along the way (his words lol), what’s the point of building wealth?  He almost honestly seemed concerned with his work ethic slacking if he couldn’t spend his money how he pleased.  Like his effort at work was directly correlated to him doing whatever he wants in his free time.

[Angus]

Let's not forget that skiing is increasingly becoming the recreational sport of the wealthy. As it has been commented many times, not a good trend for the sport. 

[PowderBeard]

57 minutes ago, Angus said:

Let's not forget that skiing is increasingly becoming the recreational sport of the wealthy. As it has been commented many times, not a good trend for the sport. 

I think skiing being expensive is a myth that really damages the sport. One of the first comments any of my friends in their 20s or 30s have about skiing when they see how much I'm on the hill is the high expense. These are early or fairly established career people making decent money and I imagine if most people are not on the mountain by the time they are in their 30s they never will be.

If you are fortunate enough to have your basics met, skiing and expense is all in how you view it and what you want to prioritize. The past 4-5 years I have been able to ski 30-40 days per year and the average cost per day (including gas, food, lift ticket, bring your own beers/flask) is ~$30-40 per day. To me that is essentially the cost of going out to dinner/takeout once per week. Luckily this decision was easy for me once we moved from Providence to Hippy Valley because good restaurants are rare. Hell, make your own coffee at home instead of hitting Dunkin daily and it equates to saving enough to purchase a Ikon or Epic pass lol. That said, this year there are few/no discounts (e.g., early season Killington bogos, half off days at Cannon, SkiVT card has gone way downhill etc.), which makes affordable skiing more difficult.  I'll be curious if those sorts of deals or gone for good or whether there are a lot more of them next year to try to get people back on the mountain.

I'm curious what folks think about the newer mega-passes like Ikon or Epic. I may just be ignorant but have yet to see the benefits. Compared to the passes of 5 years ago the incentives seem to be things like paying an extra $200-300 to be able to ski non-holiday Stowe.

[mreaves]

24 minutes ago, PowderBeard said:

I think skiing being expensive is a myth that really damages the sport. One of the first comments any of my friends in their 20s or 30s have about skiing when they see how much I'm on the hill is the high expense. These are early or fairly established career people making decent money and I imagine if most people are not on the mountain by the time they are in their 30s they never will be.

If you are fortunate enough to have your basics met, skiing and expense is all in how you view it and what you want to prioritize. The past 4-5 years I have been able to ski 30-40 days per year and the average cost per day (including gas, food, lift ticket, bring your own beers/flask) is ~$30-40 per day. To me that is essentially the cost of going out to dinner/takeout once per week. Luckily this decision was easy for me once we moved from Providence to Hippy Valley because good restaurants are rare. Hell, make your own coffee at home instead of hitting Dunkin daily and it equates to saving enough to purchase a Ikon or Epic pass lol. That said, this year there are few/no discounts (e.g., early season Killington bogos, half off days at Cannon, SkiVT card has gone way downhill etc.), which makes affordable skiing more difficult.  I'll be curious if those sorts of deals or gone for good or whether there are a lot more of them next year to try to get people back on the mountain.

I'm curious what folks think about the newer mega-passes like Ikon or Epic. I may just be ignorant but have yet to see the benefits. Compared to the passes of 5 years ago the incentives seem to be things like paying an extra $200-300 to be able to ski non-holiday Stowe.

That myth surrounds a lot of recreational activities.  You can make them as expensive as you want.  I golf using irons I've had for  nearly 15 years.  I snowmobile with sleds that are 8-12 years old and I volunteer and get free trail passes.  I know a lot of otherwise retired guys who get jobs at Sugarbush in the winter for the skiing.  All of these things can be expensive if you have the latest and greatest technology or have to travel long ways to partake in things.  Like you said, there are ways to make things affordable

[PowderBeard]

51 minutes ago, mreaves said:

That myth surrounds a lot of recreational activities.  You can make them as expensive as you want.  I golf using irons I've had for  nearly 15 years.  I snowmobile with sleds that are 8-12 years old and I volunteer and get free trail passes.  I know a lot of otherwise retired guys who get jobs at Sugarbush in the winter for the skiing.  All of these things can be expensive if you have the latest and greatest technology or have to travel long ways to partake in things.  Like you said, there are ways to make things affordable

Absolutely. I spend money on safety (bindings and helmets for skiing, skates and shin pads for hockey).

Looking around for options is always fun. I am fortunate all my skis are custom homemade all wood skis - Mad Russian Ski Company was my neighbor in Providence - and they are the greatest sticks I have ever been on and 2/3 of the price if not less than anything brand new. These are my hard pack and mogul skis coming off the press. It's a Hart F17 bulked up proportionally to a 95mm waist. 

Also have my big sticks - 189 long with a 110 waist. Wife has the 169cm version with "under the sea" top graphics.

 

[ORH_wxman]

As an avid golfer and skiier myself, I would say both are pretty expensive sports. You can definitely cut corners and save money if you put in the effort to find deals and not get too picky on the equipment....but at the end of the day, you aren't going to be finding a lot of lower income people willing to pay even $25-30 for a lift ticket or greens fees. It is especially hard for these groups to find the cheaper fees on non-weekend/holidays when they aren't working.

[J.Spin]

41 minutes ago, mreaves said:

That myth surrounds a lot of recreational activities.  You can make them as expensive as you want.  I golf using irons I've had for  nearly 15 years.  I snowmobile with sleds that are 8-12 years old and I volunteer and get free trail passes.  I know a lot of otherwise retired guys who get jobs at Sugarbush in the winter for the skiing.  All of these things can be expensive if you have the latest and greatest technology or have to travel long ways to partake in things.  Like you said, there are ways to make things affordable

When it comes to skiing, I find that it’s generally the skiers who only go out occasionally, or folks that just aren’t that familiar with the sport/industry that believe the “myths” about it being a sport for the wealthy.  I guess it’s not necessarily a “myth” insofar as it’s just the obvious part of skiing that they see.  If the idea of skiing to someone is owning a place in Aspen that you visit one week a year to ski, then sure, that’s an expensive activity.  Or, if you live somewhere in the eastern U.S. megalopolis and take a week trip, or weekend trips where you drive to the resorts, pay for gas, pay for lodging, pay for tickets, pay to rent gear, pay to hit the local restaurants for food, etc., well that probably seems like an expensive activity as well.

It’s just that some folks aren’t aware that there are people who live entirely different lifestyles and ski 50, 100, even 150 days a season, for next to nothing.  Think about folks who live around here in NNE and work/volunteer at the resorts.  Look at what they actually have to deal with from that list of expenses above - they’re essentially paying nothing to ski for an entire season.

And it’s not as if you have to work/volunteer in the ski industry – if you don’t want to volunteer or don’t have some connection to the resorts, you can just buy a season’s pass and use it all year for no further expense.  OK, so there is an initial up front expense there, but it’s pretty small potatoes if you ski a lot.  Or, just backcountry ski, or Nordic ski, or skin up at resorts that don’t require a pass for skinning. 

Sure, the prototypical “ski trip” is a relatively expensive endeavor, but that idea feels like a myth to those of us who know there are just so many other ways to engage in skiing with so little expense.

[powderfreak]

2 hours ago, PowderBeard said:

 

I'm curious what folks think about the newer mega-passes like Ikon or Epic. I may just be ignorant but have yet to see the benefits. Compared to the passes of 5 years ago the incentives seem to be things like paying an extra $200-300 to be able to ski non-holiday Stowe.

What?  Someone is paying $200-300 more per day to ski now?  Stowe pre-Vail was the most expensive ticket in the East Coast and the adult season pass was $2200.  The Stowe day tickets have not risen appreciably since VR took over and the pass dropped by like 60%.

We see a LOT more first timers and beginners than we ever did before.  I'd say it's getting a lot more people into the sport here at least that never skied Stowe before.  Again, even 5 years ago a day ticket here was like $120 I think and we have never done cheaper non-holiday or mid-week tickets.  It's always been the same rate be it a random Tuesday or a holiday Saturday once it switched out of early season rates.

[powderfreak]

So here's the historical data... day ticket prices are up $23 from pre-Epic Pass and the season pass is cheaper by $1,324.

Okemo is the same... day ticket up by about $20 and season pass cheaper by $1,000.

The last year of AIG ownership... 

Stowe lift ticket $124 with a season pass of $2313.

Last year... $147.34 vs. $989.00 for season pass.  

[powderfreak]

46 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

As an avid golfer and skiier myself, I would say both are pretty expensive sports. You can definitely cut corners and save money if you put in the effort to find deals and not get too picky on the equipment....but at the end of the day, you aren't going to be finding a lot of lower income people willing to pay even $25-30 for a lift ticket or greens fees. It is especially hard for these groups to find the cheaper fees on non-weekend/holidays when they aren't working.

Yeah I agree.  I get what J.Spin is saying and there are ways to make it "cheap" but on the whole as a family it's certainly an upscale activity compared to the US population as a whole.  Maybe upscale isn't the word to use... but it's for financially comfortable families if that makes sense.  You can do it cheaper and there are plenty of ski bums who ski 100+ days a year making $22,000 a year at an entry level job... but I think it's still expensive on the whole when compared with a lower income lifestyle (compared to what they might normally spend on leisure activities, if any at all).

I think the barometer is where do you draw the line between "upscale" and "low income" and what's the gray area between that.  This isn't like a sport like tennis or where you buy a $60 racket at Dicks sporting goods that lasts years and can use municipal tennis courts to play.

I mean if you are willing to earn your turns, skiing can be pretty cheap with a ski swap set-up and the right bindings... you could ski all winter for like $200 but that's now what most people think of when they think of skiing.

[bwt3650]

1 hour ago, mreaves said:

That myth surrounds a lot of recreational activities.  You can make them as expensive as you want.  I golf using irons I've had for  nearly 15 years.  I snowmobile with sleds that are 8-12 years old and I volunteer and get free trail passes.  I know a lot of otherwise retired guys who get jobs at Sugarbush in the winter for the skiing.  All of these things can be expensive if you have the latest and greatest technology or have to travel long ways to partake in things.  Like you said, there are ways to make things affordable

Exactly..Very few recreational activities that don't involve some sort of expense...Fishing, hunting, playing hockey.  The initial expenditure to get into the activity is always going to be high and after that, you can make it as expensive as you want.  I think the skiing myth is due to the twice a year, megalopolis family.  If you have three kids who don't ski regularly, and you are doing two weekends a year with no passes, yes, it is extremely expensive.  5 lift tix, 5 rentals, lessons for the kids, food, gas etc.  Easily over a thousand dollars.  But if you are a regular skier, who buys a pass and uses the hell out of it, you have your own equipment, your kids don't need lessons and you skip the five $8 lattes on the way up and the $12 order of chicken fingers in the lodge, its no more expensive than any other activity.  Living nearby a ski resort, there is very little additional expense once you buy the pass.  I think the social aspect of it is where you can rack up the dollars.

[ORH_wxman]

9 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

Yeah I agree.  I get what J.Spin is saying and there are ways to make it "cheap" but on the whole as a family it's certainly an upscale activity compared to the US population as a whole.  Maybe upscale isn't the word to use... but it's for financially comfortable families if that makes sense.  You can do it cheaper and there are plenty of ski bums who ski 100+ days a year making $22,000 a year at an entry level job... but I think it's still expensive on the whole when compared with a lower income lifestyle (compared to what they might normally spend on leisure activities, if any at all).

I think the barometer is where do you draw the line between "upscale" and "low income" and what's the gray area between that.  This isn't like a sport like tennis or where you buy a $60 racket at Dicks sporting goods that lasts years and can use municipal tennis courts to play.

I mean if you are willing to earn your turns, skiing can be pretty cheap with a ski swap set-up and the right bindings... you could ski all winter for like $200 but that's now what most people think of when they think of skiing.

Yeah, to really make it affordable for a lower income person...you typically have to be in these bins:

1. Single or at least no family to support...pretty hard for a middle-low or lower income person to pony up the up-front cash for a season pass otherwise.

2. Live close enough to a ski hill to have a season pass.

3. Relatively flexible job where you can get out and ski some mornings or afternoons during the weekdays.

 

A lot of people in their 20s up there fit all these requirements so they can ski for pretty cheap.

[HoarfrostHubb]

I've worked it out so I have not paid to ski my local hill in several years...lol

[PowderBeard]

52 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

What?  Not sure I follow that.  Stowe pre-Vail was the most expensive ticket in the East Coast and the adult season pass was $1800.  The Stowe day tickets have not risen appreciably since VR took over and the pass dropped by like 60%.

I should have proof read and expanded that thought, my bad. It's an amazing incentive for some and there are also many people who could not care less about it and just see a higher season pass price. For example we have family friends in the UK with a place at Attitash, they come to the U.S. from November - April to stay at their condo and ski Attitash and Wildcat. Those are the only places they ski. They went from paying ~$550 for an unlimited Peak Resort Pass to spending more on the Epic Pass that has incentives they will never use, meanwhile they have one of the slowest and most unreliable summit lifts in existence. 

Once people have a "home hill"  maybe they are just comfortable. Everyone at Magic was super excited with the Indy Pass the first year, since we all had free days to ski Bolton, Jay, Platty, etc. I don't know one person there who skied them and they were free. And most of them drove right by Plattekill to get to/from Magic. 

Seeing your latest post PF about first time visitors and beginners, I would agree this group and weekend trippers benefit most. 

 

 

 

[MarkO]

At least the Stowe season pass is now very reasonable. 

I remember back just out of college the Sugarbush season pass was about $1500 and that was back in the mid-late 90's. We bought a laminator, printed up college id's. Even when they started requiring a letter from your registrar, we printed those up too and got a phone line with a recording. It was all worth it when a college pass was about $350 and usually included other mountains like Stowe, Jay or MRG. 

Now that my kids are teens, you really don't get much of a break on a season pass for them, so I only get one for myself (but I get in 40-50 days so it's justified). Our community gets discount passes for WV. I think it's around $50 for a kids day pass and maybe $70 for an adult, but even then my wife and daughter take two or 3 runs and call it a day.

It's tough up here though. Even though there may be a lot of jobs, and they're having trouble filling them, the pay is pretty low. Income inequality is nuts. I've put my time in working in restaurants and what not, and even as an entry level civil engineer, I was making crap. But it's a different story when you're self employed. I mean, I don't charge what I could. The rates for a plumber, HVAC, even mechanic are in the $100-150/hr range, sometimes higher. But I'm sure they're probably only bringing home between 1/3 and 1/4 of that. Up north it's probably 1/2 it is in the Boston area.

[powderfreak]

4 minutes ago, bwt3650 said:

Exactly..Very few recreational activities that don't involve some sort of expense...Fishing, hunting, playing hockey.  The initial expenditure to get into the activity is always going to be high and after that, you can make it as expensive as you want.  I think the skiing myth is due to the twice a year, megalopolis family.  If you have three kids who don't ski regularly, and you are doing two weekends a year with no passes, yes, it is extremely expensive.  5 lift tix, 5 rentals, lessons for the kids, food, gas etc.  Easily over a thousand dollars.  But if you are a regular skier, who buys a pass and uses the hell out of it, you have your own equipment, your kids don't need lessons and you skip the five $8 lattes on the way up and the $12 order of chicken fingers in the lodge, its no more expensive than any other activity.  Living nearby a ski resort, there is very little additional expense once you buy the pass.  I think the social aspect of it is where you can rack up the dollars.

You hit it and Will was sort of on the same page.

I think it’s two different comparisons.  It CAN be cheaper and relatively cheaper for what are known as the “core” group of skiers... the users who go a lot and rack up days, find the shortcuts, know what to do and not do.

It is an expensive sport for a very large segment of the skiing public who average 3-5 days on slopes per year.

Skiing gets cheaper with usage on a per day basis.  You get more use out of the equipment, you find frequent customer benefits (ie. passes), you learn not to buy lunch, etc.  

[Baroclinic Zone]

59 minutes ago, ORH_wxman said:

As an avid golfer and skiier myself, I would say both are pretty expensive sports. You can definitely cut corners and save money if you put in the effort to find deals and not get too picky on the equipment....but at the end of the day, you aren't going to be finding a lot of lower income people willing to pay even $25-30 for a lift ticket or greens fees. It is especially hard for these groups to find the cheaper fees on non-weekend/holidays when they aren't working.

As someone who hadn't skied in over a decade, I was shocked to see how expensive it had gotten.  I was used to paying $40-50 for a day ticket at Sunday River back in the 90s.  It was under $40 to ski Shawnee Peak too.

[HoarfrostHubb]

3 minutes ago, powderfreak said:

You hit it and Will was sort of on the same page.

I think it’s two different comparisons.  It CAN be cheaper and relatively cheaper for what are known as the “core” group of skiers... the users who go a lot and rack up days, find the shortcuts, know what to do and not do.

It is an expensive sport for a very large segment of the skiing public who average 3-5 days on slopes per year.

Skiing gets cheaper with usage on a per day basis.  You get more use out of the equipment, you find frequent customer benefits (ie. passes), you learn not to buy lunch, etc.  

About 10 years ago, I tried to get it down to $5 per trip to Wachusett for myself.  I think the pass was $200 and I got on the hill for about 43 days or so... I don't recall.  I am Mr. Cheap regarding skiing...    I try to get deals and go to the smaller mountains more than the larger ones.    

We did get $69 Loon tickets last year at the Ski Expo including the bus ride... but prob won't do that again

[ORH_wxman]

1 minute ago, Baroclinic Zone said:

As someone who hadn't skied in over a decade, I was shocked to see how expensive it had gotten.  I was used to paying $40-50 for a day ticket at Sunday River back in the 90s.  It was under $40 to ski Shawnee Peak too.

Killington always had the deal (I think it's still there amazingly) where each kid 12 and under skis for free with the purchase of a 5 day adult lift ticket. That's prob one reason we went there a lot. Several resorts still have young kids ski for free any time (usually 6 and under or 5 and under) or reduced prices for older kids.

I got some sticker shock on the day passes too a few years ago when I started skiing more again...but I actually did the math in my head and realized that it was pretty much in line with inflation since the 1990s.

[bch2014]

Biggest expense for me with skiing this year is gas/depreciation on car... The closest places worth skiing from where I live are ~125-135 miles driving one way. In my Jeep Grand Cherokee, that's $25-30 in gas per visit which exceeds my cost/day on the Epic Pass assuming I ski 25-30 days.

[bwt3650]

4 minutes ago, HoarfrostHubb said:

About 10 years ago, I tried to get it down to $5 per trip to Wachusett for myself.  I think the pass was $200 and I got on the hill for about 43 days or so... I don't recall.  I am Mr. Cheap regarding skiing...    I try to get deals and go to the smaller mountains more than the larger ones.    

We did get $69 Loon tickets last year at the Ski Expo including the bus ride... but prob won't do that again

Indy pass gets people to some legit mountains for a reasonable price if you have the ability and desire to drive to different resorts.  If you just do the two days each at Cannon, Jay, and Magic, you are down to $33 a day with some other smaller hills left.  And thats $33 a day skiing real deal vertical and terrain.  

[HoarfrostHubb]

Just now, bwt3650 said:

Indy pass gets people to some legit mountains for a reasonable price if you have the ability and desire to drive to different resorts.  If you just do the two days each at Cannon, Jay, and Magic, you are down to $33 a day with some other smaller hills left.  And thats $33 a day skiing real deal vertical and terrain.  

Yeah... it packs a decent value punch   I can't really travel more than to 1  2 hour+ mountain per year...  just don't have the time

[PhineasC]

Good ski day today. 

[ORH_wxman]

9 minutes ago, PhineasC said:

Good ski day today. 

Funny thing is I learned to ski in the 1990-1991 and 1991-1992 winters. Those were horrendous winters but I didn't know any better other than "it normally is a bit snowier than this" adults would tell me.

But your post reminds me of my first trip to Killington in that 1990-1991 winter. The 1st two days were actually pretty wintry and there had been recent snow. But then the 3rd day was like this. Pouring rain and temps in the 40s. Funny this is it happened again the next time we went a year later. I thought it was normal to get pouring rain and 40s with bare spots on the steepest trails roped off.

Only after skiing all the years after that did I realize in retrospect how pathetic it was.

[PowderBeard]

28 minutes ago, HoarfrostHubb said:

Yeah... it packs a decent value punch   I can't really travel more than to 1  2 hour+ mountain per year...  just don't have the time

Plan a flight out west for 4 days where there are two resorts close by (e.g., Idaho) and it REALLY makes it worth it. My plan next year.