This appears to be the only continuing study of the cross country market that, over the years, has asked comparable questions and used a consistent sample of respondents. As a result, one can look at significant trends in this sport over an eight-year period.
The average age of the cross country skier in our study has grown steadily older. The average of the 1982 respondent is 32.4 years. This compares with 30.6 only two years ago and with an average age of around 28 in 1975 when we conducted our first study.
Eighty percent of our respondents are male which is roughly comparable to previous studies. I should point out that in broader studies or censuses of the ski market—such as Nielsen or the U.S. Forest Service study—cross country skiing is more nearly a 50-50 participant sport with as many female as male cross country skiers.
The average family or household income of our respondents in 1982 was $33,858, a very sharp increase over the comparable figure of $24,200 in 1980. This could be either a result of inflation or of increasing affluence in the cross country market.
About one-third of our sample was from the New England and middle Atlantic states and another third from the East and West North Central states. Another 20% of the sample was from the Mountain and Pacific Coast states. And approximately 3-½ people read each copy of Cross Country Ski Magazine.
Our typical respondent has been cross country skiing for 3.8 years. With each consecutive study we have conducted, the experience of our respondents has increased. For example, in 1975 when we asked, “How many years have you been cross country skiing?” The average response was one-and-a-half years. In 1978, the experience had grown to two years and in our last study in 1980 it had become three years. Today, it is 3.8. One favorable interpretation of this statistic is that people are taking up the sport of cross country skiing and sticking with it.
Then, you would expect that the number of years skied in a sample such as ours would continue to grow. This appears to be what is happening. By contrast, in alpine skiing some studies have shown no increase in the number of years people skied, and it was reasonable to conclude that there was a lot of churn or dropout. Hopefully this may not be happening in cross country skiing, but we may not be altogether sure. There is some evidence that many people may briefly take up cross country skiing and abandon it because of an unsatisfactory initial experience. Such people would be less likely to be included in a sample of respondents such as we have obtained with Cross Country Ski Magazine.
The Northeastern cross country skier appears to have participated longer than in other areas of the country, with 4.3 years of skiing vs. the national average of 3.8 years. Our male respondents have skied 4.1 years vs. 2.9 years for female respondents. People who say they “used to be an alpine skier” have cross-country-skied 4.9 years.
| Number | Percent | |
|---|---|---|
| I am now an alpine skier | 161 | 23.3 |
| I used to be an alpine skier | 144 | 20.9 |
| I intended to take up alpine skiing | 104 | 15.1 |
| I have no interest in alpine skiing | 264 | 38.2 |
| No Answer | 17 | 2.5 |
Touring Center Interest
Operators of cross country touring centers, will be pleased with the very sharp increase in preference for commercial touring centers that appears in our 1982 survey. While our respondents, in many cases, checked off two or three places where they most frequently cross country ski, no less than 60% of the respondents indicated that they frequently cross country ski at commercial touring centers. This compares with a figure of 28.3% in our 1975 survey.
Looking at these figures in another way, 22% of all the responses that we got to the question, “Where do you most frequently cross country ski?” checked off commercial cross country ski touring centers (not at alpine-lift areas). This compares with a figure of 14.8% in our survey two years ago. You can see there has been a sharp improvement in public use and awareness of the touring center.
This awareness is greater in the northeastern part of the U.S. than in any other region. Seventy-five percent of respondents in the Northeast list touring centers as the place they most frequently ski—far ahead of parks, golf courses and other locations. In contrast, touring centers need to make more progress in the Midwest where less than 50% of the respondents indicated they most frequently ski at touring centers.
Touring centers are more favored by women than men. 71.5% of our female respondents indicate that they ski most frequently at commercial touring centers, compared with a 58% male response. Our study also indicated that just because a respondent has been cross country skiing longer does not necessarily mean he or she prefers a touring center.
There also appears to have been an increase in public awareness and desire to use prepared tracks. In 1980 when we asked if they prefered a prepared track or off-track, 21% of our respondents indicated that they prefer a prepared track. In our latest study this number has increased to 29%. Preference for off-track skiing has declined slightly as has the incidence of people who indicate that they like both prepared and off-track skiing.
In the West, however, the preference for prepared-track skiing is far lower than in other regions of the country, just as the preference for off-track skiing is higher. Which is what you might expect. But, contrary to what one might expect, experienced skiers don’t seem to favor prepared tracks any more than novices in our survey.
If it were possible to go skiing with 2-½ people, that would be the preferred amount of company desired by our typical respondent. In any event it appears from our study that no one cares to ski alone. Less than 1% indicated they go skiing with no one, and this buttresses the well-known notion that cross country skiing is a highly sociable sport.
The typical distance traveled to cross country skiing sites is 31.9 miles, but in the Midwest the typical distance is only 21 miles, while southerners indicated they would travel 84 miles to go cross country skiing. Sixty-seven percent of the respondents under 18 years of age indicated that they travel less than 10 miles for a day of cross country skiing.
Vacation Increase
Ever since we first began our studies of the cross country market, we have been keeping close track of people’s preferences for a ski vacation involving cross country. We again asked readers “Have you taken a cross country ski vacation of more than three days in the past 12 months?” 36.5% of our respondents said they had taken such a vacation. This compares with 28.2% in our last study in 1980 and 27.2% in 1975. So you can see in just a couple of years there has been a sharp increase in people wanting to take a cross country ski vacation. Incidentally, 46% of the respondents with family incomes of $50,000 or more took a cross country ski vacation, 10 percentage points higher than the average of all the respondents.
The notion of a cross country ski vacation is stronger in the Northeast than it is in the Midwest where 70% of the respondents said they did not take across country ski vacation.
A key factor in whether or not people take a ski vacation appears to be the amount of time they’ve been involved in the sport. The longer people have skied, the more likely they are to opt for a cross country vacation. Thus, out of our total sample of 690 people, 252 indicated they had taken a cross country vacation, and of these, 200 had been cross country skiing three or more years.
For those who are marketing and promoting cross country ski vacations, the experienced skier is obviously the one to target. And the leading states selected by our readers for their cross country ski vacations were Vermont, New York, Wisconsin, Michigan and Colorado.
We asked our readers, “How many lessons have you taken on cross country skiing?” First of all, a distressingly high percentage—58.6%—of our sample did not respond to this question. Presumably they have never taken a cross country ski lesson. And, people who have not alpine skied are less likely to have taken a lesson—even though they are more likely to need cross country instruction than someone who already has alpine-skied.
Among those respondents who have taken lessons, the average number of lessons taken was 2.7. Midwesterners buy more lessons than Northeasterners, by about two-to-one.
It was obvious from the responses that the 1979-80 season was the poorest in its proportion of skiers who did not do any cross country skiing at all. Participation in the sport that year and also in 80-81, was substantially below the level of this past season. For 1982, our typical respondent indicted that he or she had skied 19.1 days during the winter. Of those people who have been cross country skiing for less than a year, the number of days spent skiing this past winter was 9.3, compared with 22.6 days for people who have been skiing three years or more.
Preceptions and Attractions
We asked a number of questions about cross country skiers and their perceptions and participation at organized touring centers.
For example, we asked, “If you usually cross country ski at a commercial cross country ski touring center, how many different centers have you visited in the past 12 months?” The typical respondent in our survey skied at three different touring centers this past winter. The greatest variety of touring center skiing is done in the Northeast. The number of years the respondent has skied is a key factor. People who have skied less than one year had visited 1.7 touring centers vs. 3.5 touring centers for skiers with three or more years’ experience in the sport.
We asked respondents, “which of the following considerations are most important to you when choosing a cross country ski touring center?” Aesthetics are by far the most important factor in selecting a touring center. The first and third leading factors in determining choice of a touring center were “scenery” and “country setting and location.” The second most important factor was driving time or distance from home. And finally the next most important factors were that there be either properly groomed trails or that the wilderness trails be adequately marked.
| Number | Percent | |
|---|---|---|
| Scenery | 341 | 82.0 |
| Driving Time/Distance from Home/Starting Point | 322 | 77.4 |
| Country Setting and Location | 260 | 62.5 |
| Groomed Trails (by snowmobile only) | 233 | 56.0 |
| Marked Wilderness Trails | 210 | 50.5 |
| Trail Fee/Cost of Rental Equipment | 120 | 28.8 |
| Staff Attitude | 117 | 28.1 |
| Quality and Convenience of Lodging | 111 | 26.7 |
| Adequacy of Parking | 75 | 18.0 |
| Ski Patrols | 47 | 11.3 |
| Instruction | 38 | 9.1 |
| Suburban Location | 29 | 7.0 |
| Night Entertainment | 23 | 5.5 |
| Availability of Liquor | 18 | 4.3 |
| Urban Location | 11 | 2.6 |
| Availability of Day Care Services for Children | 2 | 0.5 |
| No Answer | 19 | 4.6 |
We asked the respondents, “how do you usually learn about cross country ski touring centers?” “Advertising/promotion in print” was the leading response to this question, followed by word-of-mouth and articles and listings in print media as well as brochures. So clearly print must occupy an important part of the touring center operator’s thinking and strategy.
| Number | Percent | |
|---|---|---|
| Advertising/Promotion in Print | 287 | 69.0 |
| Word of Mouth | 261 | 62.7 |
| Articles and Listings in Print Media | 233 | 56.0 |
| Brochures in Public Places | 193 | 46.4 |
| Ski or Sport Shop Personnel | 163 | 39.2 |
| Ski Maps | 120 | 28.8 |
| Snow Reports | 54 | 13.0 |
| Radio and Television | 39 | 9.4 |
| Other | 35 | 8.4 |
| No Answer | 17 | 4.1 |
Again, in our restricted sample of people who say they usually cross-country-ski at a commercial touring center, we asked how they felt about some features of touring centers. Groomed and marked trails are the most important consideration for people at a touring center. Interestingly, the availability of motels and inns on the premises is not given a very high priority by the respondents.
Again, the Northeast led all other regions in awareness of facilities at touring centers. Forty-one percent of the respondents in the Northeast indicate that they strongly agree with the statement, “groomed trails are the main reason for going to a touring center.” This compares to a national average of 33.7%. Male skiers—38.2% of them—also strongly agree with the statement about the need for grooming trails, compared to only 20% of female respondents.
People who have alpine-skied, reasonably enough, tend to agree more than non-alpine skiers with the statement, “I would pay an increased trail fee to help cover an area’s investment in snowmaking.” Significantly, as many people disagree with this statement as agree with it.
Alpine Participants
23.9% of our respondents are now alpine skiing, a figure that has changed little from our first survey in 1975 when the response was 22%. The largest percentage of our respondents have no interest in alpine skiing. Moreover, the lack of interest in alpine skiing seems to increase with age: The older the respondents, the more likely they are to be interested in cross country skiing only.
Significantly, almost half of our respondents who have skied less than one year say they have no interest in alpine skiing, which tells you something about the mental set of new people coming into the sport. This lack of interest in alpine skiing, however, appears to decrease as respondents have spent more time cross country skiing.
We asked respondents the extend to which they have participated in special kinds of cross country ski activities in the last 12 months, such as seeing a ski film, going to a waxing clinic, participating in a citizen’s race, going on a moonlight tour and so on. Significantly, over 40% of the respondents gave no answer to this question, so one assumes that they participated in none of these activities.
The experienced skier has done more of all of these things than anybody else, but even here the number of skiers who have been cross country skiing more than three years and who didn’t participate in any of these activities is disappointingly high—almost 40%. The only significant age group to have participated in racing clinics were respondents under the age of 18.
We asked our readers what other sports they are active in, and backpacking and camping lead the list, along with bicycling and jogging or running. It is notable that more than half of our readers are active joggers and runners. Since the number of runners in the U.S. is probably 10 times the number of cross country skiers, there is obviously an enormous market that can be converted. For instance, if you could also say that half of the runners were cross country skiers then you would have a cross country ski market of 15 million or more people. That has yet to happen obviously, but the potential clearly is there, at least in all of the large population, Northern-tier states.
