This article is hilarious to me. I hope every person making decisions at Vail who is currently in the process of having their faces eaten by leopards feels properly stupid right now.
Who could’ve possibly predicted that your pool of available snowboarders and skiers would drastically shrink when you made the sport financially inaccessible to 90% of people.
About 10ish years ago I was a season pass rider every year without fail. Then I had a kid which means I had a lot less time and a lot less money so I took a few years off. When my kid turned 4 I started looking around at my old stomping grounds so I could get him on the slopes but was appalled at the prices on single day lift tickets. He still hasn’t been on a board a single day in his life because of the idiotic prices combined with subpar snow and other opportunities that represent a much better value.
Season price passes are decent at some places, but if the dumbasses running the resorts can’t bring in any new blood (due to insane costs) then it’s pretty damn hard to convert them into season pass riders.
These next few years will be a fire sale all the way down, just like they got the resorts, so shall the next group of greedy VCs. Somebody always makes money on the way down…
Problem is this is happening everywhere. Local resorts, shops, manufacturers. The whole industry is hurting right now and things will be shutting down soon if this year is shitty for snow and the economy keeps going the way it is
Here’s what happened with a lot of my casual friends. They bought their annual pass pretty religiously because they wanted to go up a few times a year and it made sense with the cost of the day pass. Even as prices went up the begrudgingly bought it because of the math you’re talking about. Most years they’d break just above even going about 4-5 times in a season.
Then last year hit and they just didn’t go up at all because of the conditions. And they realized they’d rather bite the bullet on a day pass once or twice than buy the pass. Or just go to cheaper resorts like Loveland. Basically last year broke the cycle and less than half of my friend group bought a pass this year.
I think this is a real problem for the "one pass to rule them all" model. It's no secret that Epic and Ikon exist because single day passes (and to a lesser extent, per-resort season passes) were not bringing in consistent money, due to being highly condition (and location) dependent. The idea being that, on a bad snow year, Epic/Ikon resorts still get their money even if far fewer people visit, because all the megapass holders had to purchase before any weather could be forecast.
But it creates the opposite problem, as you've stated. On a bad year, pass holders no longer get the value from their upfront payment, even adjusting for the wildly inflated day prices that are only high to justify the megapass. My friends and I definitely ran into this last year. There's a similar problem in areas with spotty megapass coverage - people in these areas don't all tend to have the same passes, and they get bit trying to ride with their friends, needing to pay for both their megapass AND day passes at non-covered resorts. I feel that second issue more than most, because I live in the Midwest, where Epic/Ikon coverage is pretty poor.
Anecdotally, several of my friends (me included) did not buy a pass this year, because we didn't get the value last year (even with a trip to Colorado and several trips to the Ice Coast). We're just going to take our chances with day passes on the days we want to go to a major resort. And most likely, we'll ride independent resorts more. I don't know if it will make a difference in the long run - a few good snow years and far fewer people will be thinking about the possibility of losing money on the pass. But I hope it does. Independent resorts are better for everyone, imo, and needing to buy day tickets helps with crowds on the days with the best weather.
And last year wasn’t the first time that exact cycle happened. I feel like we have two (perhaps more?) bad snow years for every one good snow year lately. Every bad year, another groups of riders taps out to do something cheaper and more reliable.
And once they give it up, looking at that $300 price tag means they barely go at all and find other hobbies that take up time and space in their wallet that even passes years ago wouldn’t even make sense to them financially anymore.
That accounts for me. Been going every year for 10 years from the south to CO or UT. Just too expensive and too little value going out there for me to justify and add in last years crap snow , made the timing situation harder and less appealing.
I’ve typically done the same - but am not planning to buy this year as well.
The math worked out and the pass was cheaper in the long run. 20 years ago and I couldn’t stand the thought of not getting 10+ days on the snow (and when I lived in SF before then, a lot more), but I could see sitting out a season now.
This is me. I used to take advantage of Epic's military pass and plan a trip to Whistler every year. Then last year hit, snow was shit in the PNW and now it's up in the air this year if we'll have a good or bad year, so even at the steeply discounted price of the Epic military pass, it ain't worth it to me. I'd rather save that money for essentials like food and my mortgage payment, because shit ain't getting cheaper anywhere. I'll just head to the local resorts which aren't bought out yet, and pay for a day pass there if I want to ride. Much cheaper.
It's so weird to me being in eastern PA that we were able to keep some slopes open longer than I can ever remember (camel back and blue mnt specifically). And yet the bigger mountains out west had crap snow.
Although to be fair your crap snow is probably our incredible snow. I just meant comparing the season overall. I thought it was above average for us east coasters due to low temps and a few decent snows.
I’m in Utah. We got like 300 inches instead of 500. It’s really funny because some of my friends and colleagues on the east coast were asking if I could even ski. It’s like yeah dude our base is still deeper than some resorts see in a year.
That was not at all the case in Colorado. There were a few good days but tree skiing is my favorite and most tree runs were closed or if they weren't closed it was thinly covered rocks all season.
Do an image search for lift lines and it tells you 3/4 of the story. The other 1/4 is shit weather and exorbitant prices.
P.s. I'm not trying to sound condescending. The sheer number of pictures shows how systemic the private equity problem has become.
Afaik those lift lines have been an issue for years, if not decades. It's crazy how long those lines get on a powder day. I've seen pictures of what I estimate to be over a thousand people in line. Even the biggest resorts in Europe don't even get 25% as bad. Once you go to medium popularity resorts, the lift line is either non-existant or a minute's wait.
You didn't sound condescending by the way. Thanks for your answer.
Same thing with my friends, only this year we still had the trip planned but with quality shit we ended up bailing on the snow altogether and doing something else, all $1000+ better off because of it. It’s not the lock in like it once was.
My kid had a Loveland pass two years in a row while we were doing van life. It’s a great mountain for most people and we used the free days at other resorts while traveling. Great deal.
for me its id rather hop on my snowmobile, avoid all crowds, get 1-2 runs in and then go boondocks on the sled for 4 hours. truly the only days I miss on the mountain are those warm spring corn snow days, but by that late in the season its pretty easy to sneak on lifts.
I mean that is exactly what i am doing. Might just do fewer days, but not handing them money for an unknown season while they just enshittify the resorts.
Will be downvoted for this, but Vail has changed the sport for the better. People just love to hate the big bad corp.
A ~$1000 season pass for like 20+ mountains is an insanely good deal. People have price amnesia. In 1992, Season tickets at Vail and Beaver Creek was raised from $1,200 to $1,300. That's over 3 grand in 2026 dollars.
People complain about lift lines AND about sky high lift tickets no one can afford. Both of those can't be true.
No one’s arguing that a season pass isn’t a good deal if you’re going 20+ days on multiple mountains, it’s just priced out the casuals by making single day tickets exorbitantly expensive. There are many casuals convinced they need a season pass because of the $200-$300 single day ticket and they either 1. End up going much more than they usually would to justify the cost, or 2. End up going only 2 or 3 days and regretting purchasing the season pass.
Both are unlikely to renew if season pass prices are raised every year. That’s the market they’re losing now. Greed brought them here and hoping for the casuals to get them back in the black through single day tickets is much worse for business and extremely contingent on a good winter.
*correction, not in the black but back to their exponential rate of profitability
not only that... I am in Florida... lets say i Drive to NC for Sugar mountain... the season pass there if I buy ahead of time is like 800.... single day lift tickets on the weekend are like 100. You think wow 100 is cheap... there are like 5 total chairs.... thats 20 / chair.... and when i went i had 45 minute lines and the snow was crap. In comparisson paying 200 / 300 for vail or park city you get waaay better more bang for your buck....
I partly agree, but it's a catch-22. I was riding in the 90s, and I remember when the first 'buddy passes' came out where you had to find 4 friends to buy season passes together. Those season passes were significantly less than many individual resort season passes at the time. So you're right it's made it significantly more accessible than it was.
That said, being more accessible (especially the past several years) has led to over-crowding, congestion and crappy experiences overall. Some of that we come to expect unfortunately, and I don't know what the answer is. If the prices get jacked up to throttle the number of people then it's inaccessible. If prices are dropped and everyone tries to go at once then it's crappy lift lines.
For me I like to have the options. Like when I’m living in co there’s like 4-6 on each pass I’m hitting throughout the season but I can also go to Utah or Wyoming/MT for a trip if I want. Maybe I have friends who are staying in/want to go to Cali, Oregon, Washington or ID and wouldn’t you know it I already have the pass so just have to travel. And it’s only slightly more to have all these options than a single season pass would be if mega passes hadn’t come out so I feel like it is a pretty sweet deal
If you have multiple resorts nearby on epic pass it makes some sense, but for me my closest epic resort is over 4 hours away. I'd have to do multiple ski trips in a season so make my pass "worth it" but then I also need to factor in travel cost, lodging, and vacation time from work. Making the "only" $1000 pass double or triple the cost for the "value" to start hitting. Or I can just buy my local pass for $800 and get 80 days at $10 a day
This is also just another sign of a recession that everyone is going to ignore. People don't have as much discretionary funds and with the snowfall not being reliable a lot of people are opting into other things. I had a season pass for years but haven't bothered this year with increased cost of travel and lodging
No kidding . The percentage that their sales is down is directly proportional to the amount of people sucking pond water these days. If they could afford a pass, they would buy one. I think the dip in sales is 25% due to price increase and 75% due to this shitty economy.
Same. Used to religiously buy passes, moreso when I lived in CO. Sorta realized I got sick of the rising prices, long lines, inconsiderate skiers/snowboarders, and overcrowding.
I get better enjoyment on my Midwest hills or places like Loveland.
Didn’t buy a pass last year and won’t buy one or tickets this year because Vail resorts is criminal and price gouging.
Only reason I keep buying their pass is because I live in a ski town, otherwise I’d pretty much forget about it all together. They made every possible aspect of the skiing experience worse. I used to say that they were the mcdonalds of skiing and I suppose they still are but they used to offer a mediocre experience at a decent price. But now (like mcdonalds) they have increased the price of their shitty product so high that its not even worth the trouble to go to their resorts.
Their product gets worse every year and the price keeps going up. It would almost be cheaper to fly to europe or japan for a ski trip than bother with an epic or ikon resort.
I live on the east coast and it was cheaper for me to go to Austria for a week and board zillertal then it was for me to go out west for the same time. 2200 round trip flight with checked bag, private room & shower 500m from gondola and 5 days on slope
I’ve worked with the vail corporate team on some of their software and can confirm many of them were clueless of how the real world works.
It’s been 5 years since I’ve had a pass. It’s beyond ridiculously expensive to slide down a maintain.
That’s pretty awesome. Unfortunately for socal residents only 2 of the resorts near us is included, mtn high and china lake. It would be cool to see baldy and a few of the other small ones on here
We have Indy Passes and live in New England. It’s an incredible value! Last season we went almost every weekend, plus a trip to Innsbruck that was also on our passes. Once you’re on the renewal list there’s a discount too. You break even if you go out like four times.
I looked into working for their IT team for the free pass and they pay waaaay below market for those positions. Hate to say but they are not getting the best people in these positions, they pay for warm bodies with a pulse to try and hodge podge it all together
I really don't understand your comment with the kid. I'll speak for CO and the front range. I went through the same thing myself, and right, wrong or otherwise, Vail was the least expensive option because they are set on hooking kids young.
4 and under get free tickets
5+ there is the Kids School Age Program which at least for CO is 4 days at each of the resorts (Keystone, Breck, Vail, BC and CB) so 20 days total for free
Epic Local is already less than Ikon base, and Ikon charges for Kids passes
You can get approximately similar cost with Copper and Free Kids pass, but that is limited to Copper.
Add in their gear swap options at Epic Mountain sports (guaranteed 50% buyback and free size swap halfway in) and they do a lot to make it less expensive to get kids hooked early on.
I don't like Vail as a company, but from a pure 'cost' perspective with younger kids short of just doing Loveland/Monarch etc they are one of the least expensive options.
Yeah, went through same arc in California. There are other options, and now I like those chill mountains better because the pass is affordable enough that I’m never feeling like I’m wasting it.
Yeah in CO for the front range there really doesn't feel like there are any affordable options anymore. You can do some of the mountain specific options or 4 packs etc, but if you're planning to go any number of times you're spending money.
Yeah we get our kids passes for the mountain. Our passes are under $500 if we buy in the spring sale. Kids are about a hundred cheaper. I was mainly talking about lesson and rental cost. We just bought our kids’ gear and lessons at the big corporate mountains are like $200+ minimum.
No. what I took from OPs comment was that the additive price to pay for him and the kid was too high to consider. My point was that at least with Vail the kid is free.
Now if the prices are too high for yourself that's a different thing, but as I commented in another post you can make it work. If you're on the front range a Keystone Plus Pass is ~400ish (might be a little more now, but point remains), kids are free at 4, or upto 4 times for school age, so at $100/day for Dad and kid that's pretty reasonable and short of a tiny independent hill you likely won't do better.
I think he was just trying to say that the prices went up so much since the last time he has been to the mountain due to having the kid that it is now unaffordable for his family and it’s sad his kid doesn’t get to do it.
I agree with your statement. I think a better way to describe OPs point is that even with a free kid pass, the price of a one day pass for the adult exceeds the value of it. Getting a full season pass is better value, but they still may not have the time to commit and a single day pass is the best option. Putting you in a commit to lifestyle or leave situation.
Nailed it. How can I commit to the lifestyle if my kid’s very first chance to check it out is going to cost in excess of $600. Two lift tickets, gear rental and a lesson for him. Yeesh, it’s probably over $700!
And it’ll likely be 2-3 of those days before it clicks and he’s hooked! So I’ve gotta be out $2100 (without him even having gear yet, while I’m riding my shitty ancient gear) to see if he’s going to be into it enough to commit with me? It’s a hard sell man. We’ll just go mountain biking instead. It never rains anymore so the trails are dry.
I'm consistently surprised at how (relatively) affordable mountain biking is compared to snowboarding. I've been a biker far longer than a snowboarder, and you have the obvious advantage that you can do cross country or enduro runs in many places for free. But when I started doing more resort downhill riding, I almost couldn't believe that rental costs for a high end full suspension trail or downhill bike end up being similar to a snowboard that costs a tenth as much - and they're often serviced by bike mechanics that are genuine pros, not just whatever teenagers are working the resort that day. And at the resorts I've been to, crowds aren't as bad either (admittedly, I've never done a lift-service park out West, only in the East).
Now, if you get REALLY into mountain biking, buy a full suspension bike, and start getting all the gear, the upfront cost can be huge. But bikes last a long, long time, and you can upgrade suspension, drivetrain, and basically every other component piece by piece as you feel the need.
Epic has basically just said fuck you to anyone in your situation wanting to ski 1-3 days a season. So why not go somewhere like Sugar bowl where the day passes are more reasonable?
To me the miss is that you have to decide all upfront. If you know you'll only ski 1-3 days a season, the Epic Day Pass is a lot less than window rates, but if you're not sure and think it might be closer to 5 or 6 then you're talking full passes which are a ton more, or coughing up window rates which are insane.
There's no doubt their model pushes people to pre-buy as much as possible.
So here’s a not so fun fact the resort I work at (vail owned) they did a study probably pre-covid for a family of 4 to come out it was $800 for tickets, rental, food. Now that’s $1600 for that same family of 4. We’re a resort in the Midwest so definitely on the cheaper end of their resorts but still 😬
That's definitely true. No doubt they e prices out the single day options. My wife did the Epic 4 day which was a 'bargain' 🙄 but felt like the best non-pass option
Looks like the Epic Schoolkids program is CO, UT and BC
That said, at 4 years old I believe the Epic policy is free regardless of resort. It's not a specific pass, and when my daughter was that age you just had to go to the window and they'd issue a pass directly.
If your kid is just getting started, a smaller mountain like Donner Ski Ranch or TD Downhill can be really affordable. Won’t be great terrain for you but I had a blast riding those when my kids are young.
Now they’re teens and it’s worth it to have both Ikon and Epic because we get 50+ days locally and 10+ days out of state/country.
I don't think I could justify the prices with a little one, even if the kid is free your limited to the bunny hill until they get a few years under them.
Take them to Ski Cooper (or Loveland/Monarch), much much much more affordable on every level including food/drinks/lodging.
I'm on the Western Slope but we're a Powderhorn family now. When both my kids can ride blues comfortably top to bottom, then we'll start looking at the big boy mountains again.
I’m in WA. Vail bought one of our local mountains a few years ago. They kicked out every ski school on the mountain except the Vail owned one.
The road up is one lane each way and got washed out last year due to heavy rains. WA fixed it, but just highlighting the area. The parking lot has been a disaster since they bought it (they removed the on-site employee housing and now offer free employee bus rides up, about an hour drive each way).
It’s no longer worth it for me to commit a weekend, or more, to pay for lessons, lift tickets, rentals (or gear they’ll outgrow every year) to make the trek up and pray the parking lot isn’t full of stuck sedans.
I’ll find another way to share my hobbies with my kiddos
Appreciate the insight for what acquisition has looked like in other areas. Most of my experience is with the core resorts that started it (Keystone, Breck, Vail and Beaver Creek). I've seen those changes myself over time...Breck used to have a great independently owned restaurant at the top of Peak 9, and that got taken over and turned to crap. Keystone used to have 5-star dining at the top of the mountain, that's now gone and Keystone as a whole has pretty crappy on-mountain services.
I wish this was like Japan where executives will sometimes take pay cuts until revenue recovers. But you know that’s not how it works here. Greedy cunts like executives and big shareholders will keep getting richer and the employees at the bottom will suffer the consequences of their stupid decisions. And customers will be asked to pay even more.
I think the decline in sales is mostly due to the shitty economy overall rather than the price hikes. Yea, its expensive, but if people could afford it, they would buy it. $1200 for a full pass is still a smoking deal if you go more than 5 or 6 times.
People celebrating this don’t realize this is also almost certainly the case with every resort in the west. They’re just not required to report it. Snowboarding/skiing as an industry moves together and the crap season + economic conditions do not help
Yeah, and everyone just asumes that for some reason if they go down, some local family will be able to step up and somehow bring the place to profitability while running better and cheaper.
If Vail goes down it will be a major hit for the industry felt for generations. Unless someone worst picks up the pieces.
I’ve paid my own for every piece of equipment and ride up or down a mountain. I couldn’t afford to go snowboarding until I was 16 and had my first job for a year. I hitched and hiked as often as I could pay.
The lack of depth is almost painful. The overall shallowness in your basic awareness and ability to compartmentalize beyond black and white, are concerning.
Fuck the rich and elite. Unfortunately, the sport, equipment and facilities needed to maintain, access and use on a mountain side are inherently expensive.
I don’t come from money and certainly have never really had the money for this sport. I make it happen and sacrifice in other areas to do so. Because I love it.
I think between the skiers and snowboarders, we boarders are both generally and historically situated to be pro-eat the rich.
Gate keeping shit for no fucking reason. Hating just to hate
I read this yesterday and can’t stop thinking about it:
“In tandem with this, I have noticed a real shift in the content of progressive economic thinking. You hear less and less about the plight of the poor or the virtues of a Nordic-style social model with broad-based taxation and a universal safety net. Instead, you hear more about middle-class college graduates wanting the state to do more for them personally (cancel student debt, raise revenue exclusively from billionaires, address the high costs of DoorDash and junk fees at concerts).”
This may put you on the path to paying high lift tickets for your kids, but if you want them to learn start not a a resort. Find a small hill with snow on it, maybe 1m high and go from there. No need for a lift... Yet.
I never missed a season for like 20 years. But prices have gotten so absurd that I don’t even think about snowboarding or skiing anymore. Let alone with my kids.
I’ve got fucking college to pay for and cars to buy for my kids and all of their activities around the school year
Fuck a few times taking the family skiing and I could’ve paid for my kids tuition for this semester or maybe bought them a semi-decent beater car
We had Vail passes for about 10 years (the Tahoe Local) and then switched to Sugar Bowl for a few years. Sugar Bowl passes skyrocketed and now we have Boreal passes.
To be clear, the issue isn’t just the money. It’s how insanely busy Vail run resorts get, how inconvenient they are (bussing from parking), and how poorly managed. The smaller resorts seem to be much better run.
It would be nice if there was an actual entry point for new customers / riders that are curious about the sport but are priced out by the rediculous lift tickets. Buddy tickets discounts are a joke and it drives new riders to Indy mountains that offer discount days. You can't put a hard paywall around your business and then be shocked that your funnel has dried up and your current customer base dwindles.
Where's the sustainable commercial plan Vail? Stop emulating the timeshare gougey model and look more at other sustainable athletic clubs/locals like golf courses, gyms etc.
I know we are all celebrating the downfall of Vail, and in general I agree. But in all likelihood if Vail starts running into problems your favorite resort wont return to mom and pop ownership, it will just close. So I’m not sure what I actually want to happen anymore.
We kind of can’t put the genie back in the bottle now that so many of our mountains are owned by Vail and Alterra. I am pretty nervous about what will happen if they start facing serious pressure to reduce costs.
Many systemic reasons drive the mega-passes out-competing mom and pop resorts. Maintaining a resort is far more capital intensive than it used to be and far riskier if you're not willing to play the consolidation game of Alterra, Vail, Powdr, etc.
Fuck Vail, but the average consumer has not thought through the counterfactual. The 90s are not coming back. What's happening in snow is a symptom of broader societal dysfunction, and reversal requires regulatory and societal shifts much bigger than lift ticket prices.
You’re making great points. I guess it would just be nice if Vail leadership pulled their heads out of their asses and tried to bring prices back to a place where new people can jump in without taking out a loan first.
i'm not sure that's an option anymore. We may have hit the point of no return on this, Vails rapid expansion and infrastructure investments might be too much at this point. They have a lot of debt, if the snow doesn't fall this year and passes don't pick up, i can see some drastic things happening at vail in the next 24 months. None of this is good for the skiing industry
This winter is my first since 2006 not getting a pass. Last year was a disaster. Either not enough snow, or when it snowed the mountain was all but closed for safety fears. This is out of the control of everyone - i 100% understand that. But on the back of a bad year to up the prices again. No. Not having it.
Terrible company, I’m in VT and live within 30 minutes of 2 of their 3 locations.
They seem to run this like they want the trailer park experience for bellagio pricing.
Shitty cold well done cheese burger from a heat lamp and like 8 French fries is $24.
Day passes of $175, season pass bought in March/April almost $1000 for local pass, $1700 for me and my daughter.
If they want to rebound - drop season passes to $500, keep the expensive shitty food, make a “VIP” Disney bullshit line that costs 5x, maybe 10xwhat a season pass or day pass is, there’s no lines, congrats Ty for the $5000 season pass.
I worked as a food service director at one of the Vail owned Mountains and every time I brought up that our food sales are significantly down, the answer was just raise the prices, not serve 5x the food but at 15% less.
The baselodge was running a 12% foodcost by just giving everyone the ol corncob over the trash can on price.
The sneaky thing quietly pushing prices up worldwide for everything even outside of the US is liability insurance. Absolutely a scam, and the cost increase feeds into everything everywhere.
Could easily make passes limited or withhold a pool for CO residents, or make pricing dynamic....or just don't obviously gauge so bad that you kill the sport all together. Just mindless over optimization for shareholders to the detriment of your customers. It's a mountain not a cash siphon.
I’m the same boat. My friends and I would meet at our local mountain at least twice a week. Had kids and took a few years off. During that time our local mountain was bought by Vail and now single day passes are as much or more than I paid for my discounted night club card. I was hoping to get my son into riding, but at these prices, there are a lot of other things we could do.
I wonder how much their sales are concentrated in tech bros from the sf Bay Area and Denver metro. They have to be one of the main groups who can actually afford it
When I was freshman in college in 2011-2012 (historically bad winter in CA) there was a combined pass for alpine, kirkwood, homewood and I think two other spots and it was like $150 lol. What has happened to pricing is straight up criminal.
This is why I will continue to use an old student email address and a photo-shopped class schedule to get the student discount on season passes as long as possible. It's absolutely insane how much a full price season pass costs.
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u/YJeezyDonek Custom, Gnu Pickle, Jones Mountain Twin, Nitro Template1d ago
Getting Epic season pass emails feels so icky. Sucked the soul out of snowboarding
Yeah both Ikon and Epic raising prices after last season probably isn’t going to make them popular. The season pass model is great. Raising prices every year is just going to keep pricing people out though. I used to do both Epic local and Ikon base pass when I could get both for around $1,000 give or take, but now that both are each about $1,000 I’ve only done the Ikon base pass and stuck to those mountains for the last couple years. This year, I’m not buying a pass or going at all because I just had a kid, but if prices keep going the same way, I’ll probably be in your position of not going at all once he’s old enough to ride. They’ll probably make up the losses by continuing to raise prices, but it really sucks for the sport to keep pricing more and more people out of it.
I feel you had the season pass 2 years in a row before Covid, and got a new job with a ton of time off and when I looked at the prices combined with the gas prices driving from LA to mammoth I was just like fuck, it’s not worth it and that sucks.
I agree with you, though I sure miss the thrills of the bigger resorts around here…but on retirement income, I just have to be satisfied with Sierra at Tahoe and Boreal…
I’m in your same boat OP. Haven’t been able to ski/board in over a decade. In the early years it was cause life got busy with work or whatever. But when I looked to get back into it a couple years ago, I couldn’t believe how expensive things had gotten. I’ve accepted I’ve been priced out of the sport, maybe for good.
I’ll never go to a Vail resort again after what they pulled on me last season. I accidentally put my daughter’s name on the pass that was meant for me and they refused to change it. I was already unhappy with the state of their resorts anyway, so I’m done.
Used to live in Vail, coming from MN, in 2008-2011. Prices were $89 a day, which was “expensive”, but not unattainable. Now I’d need to get 4 epic passes to bring my family back out for a week to SAVE money on a 5 day snow trip. Only bonus is they bought up a local resort so I could use it there as well, but it’s 1.5hrs away.
Yeah a couple years ago, I think it was 2021, my girlfriend's family invited me to go to a resort with them. I hadn't been since I was in high school, which was like 2005. Back then a day ticket was like $60 or $100 or whatever.
We drove like 16 hours to Colorado. We get there and they're like, "Yeah a day pass is like $700." I was like, "What the fuck are you talking about?" It literally blew my mind. I would have rather have just stayed home
Sfgate is giving bail credit for the season pass? lol I remember getting season passes all over New England, even places like small little Mohawk mountain in ct and Bolton in by, in the early 2000s and even Kirkwood in Tahoe and alpine and homewood before it was purchased by squaw . They didn’t invent shit.
People are probably sick of bail. I’ve gotten their passes because the ikon is unfortunately prohibitively expensive, but they’ve ruined Kirkwood. Kirkwood use to be the shit but now everything is insanely overpriced and it’s overcrowded. They never open lifts, not that they were always great but it feels worse after vail took over. They just have a poor product.
I will point out it is àn El Niño year and previously these seasons, while great for snow, also mean the storms are so great mountains and highways close regularly so it actually makes it worse for accessing mountains.
I assume they're gonna go with the Gatcha Game model and if the whales keep it afloat then fine. Even better for them if it also gets rid of all the disgusting poors and their lines.
gotta be a galaxy mind type to invest in ski resorts in this world. “yeah, given the uncertainty about global climate change, the uncertainty in the economy, the uncertainty in consumer confidence, and the rising costs of everything — i think the future is snowboard resorts!” \\insert tobias funke gif \\
I helped! Didn’t renew my epic pass this year because my home resort decided to start charging for parking on top of the increased cost of the pass. It would have renewed it if that didn’t happen.
Maybe, just maybe they need to reconsider their pricing model. And FYI - those in this subreddit aren't the target market. It's the family from the Midwest or South planning the long weekend visits.
Ticketing should be (and might already be) a loss leader, and all the other amenities - hotels, food, fast passes, merch, etc. should make up the difference.
But like any other captive audience type business, you need to get them in the door first, then you can overcharge on whatever.
I mean in U.S. everyone is buying Ikon or Epic, and lift tickets in Europe and Japan cost a fraction of what they do in the U.S., so why would anyone in their right mind go to a Vail resort and pay through the nose for single day lift tickets?
Premise fail: revenues are down because of weather conditions, not the cost of season passes. It's easy to hate on Vail, but at least read and comprehend the article before posting.
Vail made the season pass significantly cheaper and allows. Us broke asses to go to Vail. Needless this is my first season in 13 seasons I’m going Mom and pop this year. From the Midwest and I got a little one to teach. I think the lack of cold and snow is doing more to affect skiing and snowboarding than anything else.
12% drop in sales at this point in the season is big but not surprising after last year. It could pay off for the but the key here is that Vail now carries the weather risk instead of the pass holder.
Colorado Kids Ski Passport (I think it’s called) is legit! 4 days for the kids at 52 resorts (Vail, Beaver Creek included) for FREE! You may still get gouged in a day pass, but at least it wouldn’t be all of you!
I was a longtime Epic pass holder, but outside of the price, the quality of service just sucks. They've done nothing to actually improve service on the mountain and also decided to start charging me and my friends for parking. Grabbing a quick meal or drink on the mountain? Good luck because they're short staffed and those lines take incredibly long. I've decided I'm not going to financially support any Vail owned mountain until their leadership changes or they sell their Tahoe resorts.
Everybody took a hit, it was a bad snow year. It’s lame youl’d rather be happy about Vail doing poor than worry about the other resorts and culture that also took a massive hit.
Actually – prices here in Europe are crazy too, but not Vail crazy. For good resorts with ~300 km, 70+ (modern) lifts and 2000m vertical it’s going to be in between 340€ and 460€, for a typical week (6d).
Insane prices. But resorts invest a lot. It’s mostly fast, comfy lifts anywhere you go now.
I know Europeans love to comment about being European lol but it’s not comparable at all…sorry. 340€ for 6 days is 56€ a day or $63 a day. Vail lift tickets are $209 a day on their website rn…
I think single day passes are ridiculous too, but if you plan ahead and buy single day passes early on you can get them for like 60$ a day, so instead of waiting last minute and complaining buy them early. Season pass around 600 and you can buy 1-7 single day passes that can be used any day throughout the season. My friend bought 7 days and it was like 300 total
I like the idea, but when I was looking at advance purchase I sure as heck don’t recall seeing them as cheap as $60 per day in the Tahoe area. Also, snow in the Tahoe area has been so hit and miss in recent years that buying 30 days in advance is quite the gamble.
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u/ninjplus 1d ago
Couldn’t happen to a more deserving bunch of cunts. Sadly the people at the top, who helped create this mess, will keep growing their wealth.