A late start for everybody, an early finish east of the Rockies and a Millennium hangover in between added up to an extremely short, but great-while-it-lasted, 1999-2000 ski season. With the exception of the Far West—blessed with another terrific snow year and what looks like a second straight record season — the rest of the country struggled to hit last year’s numbers, which weren’t exceptional to begin with.
East
“Marketing the early season next year is going to present a real challenge after two straight poor early seasons,” said Molly Kerr, marketing director at Vermont Ski Areas Association.
The pre-Christmas season was pretty much a no-show for the entire east coast, and even Christmas was a challenge. (Vermont had less than 50 percent of its terrain open for the big holiday week). But once the season finally got going, around mid-January, and for the next six weeks, it was “as good as it gets,” said Steve Showalter, general manager of Massanutten, Va., and president of the Southeast Ski Areas Association.
“I don’t think anybody had a bad season in the Southeast. It wasn’t excellent, but it left a good taste in our mouths.”
For northern New England, more heavily dependent on the shoulder seasons, the middle six-week period was not enough to help many resorts beat last year’s numbers.
“The really bad news is that last year was not a great year,” said Greg Sweetser, executive director of Ski Maine. Behind the disappointing season-long numbers, however, were many bright spots.
“We saw a lot more families and never-evers this year,” Showalter said. “Instructors had 30 to 40 people some days who had never seen snow before. We’ve always had those people, but this year there seemed to be more than ever”
The President’s Day holiday week, a blockbuster all across the country, set several individual marks.
“Resorts set records for most kids, most lessons, most tubing visits, most rentals and most snowboard rentals,” said Alice Pearce, director of Ski New Hampshire. “It was a fabulous week.”
At least three areas in New Hampshire were on record pace for the entire season. Through early March, Mt. Sunapee was up 22 percent over last year, Bretton Woods up 19 percent and Cranmore up 29 percent. In Maine, the smaller community hills were setting the records. Seacoast Snow Park, which specializes in tubing, snowboarding and ski boarding, had its best-ever Christmas week. New Hermon Mountain, just outside Bangor, was having its best season ever, as was Lost Valley in Auburn and Mt. Abram in Locke Mills. The Maine fifth grade passport program, which allows fifth graders to ski 45 times at different mountains, had 4,000 participants (24 percent of all fifth graders) and “brought a lot of lapsed skiing families back into the sport,” Sweetser said. “It’s been a bright spot.”
The Midwest also started late and finished early, but a strong January and February left almost everyone happy overall.
“When we were open, business was terrific,” said Chris Stoddard, president of the Midwest Ski Areas Association. “For almost everybody in our region visits were up over last year.”
West
“The whole Millennium holiday thing fell into space,” said Kip Pitou, president of Ski Utah.
The Millennium bust left both Utah (15 percent down after the Christmas holidays) and Colorado (17 percent down) playing catchup for the rest of the season. Although Utah expected to come close to last year’s record season, “there isn’t much smiling going on here,” Pitou said. “Resorts budget pretty aggressively here and most won’t make their projections.”
In Colorado, Lisa Bremner, communications director at Colorado Ski Country USA, expected to finish the season down for the second straight season.
“Mother Nature was tardy in California,” said Bob Roberts, executive director of the California Ski Industry Association. “But she certainly made up for it and our core domestic market responded brilliantly.”
The season won’t top last year’s record 7.4 million visits, but will end with well over six million visitors, Roberts predicted. “It was a solid season. The last three months revitalized us and turned it into a long five-month season.”
Like California, Washington and Oregon were blessed with their second straight outstanding snow year. And, unlike last year when the record snowfall closed roads and kept skiers from reaching the slopes, the snow this year caused little disruption. Stevens, Wash., closed its parking lot by 10 a.m. six times, not because of avalanche danger but because it couldn’t hold any more cars. Business was off about 3 percent from last year’s record at the end of December, but up 15 percent in January and nearly 20 percent in February.
“If it continues, we’re looking at our second straight record season,” said Doug Campbell, executive director of the Pacific Northwest Ski Areas Association.
Canada
Winter came later than usual in Canada, as well, but soon made up for lost time, particularly in the western provinces. Alberta was on its way to topping or at least equalling last year’s record 8.3 million skier visits.
“The international marketing we’ve been heavily involved in for the last two years continues to pay off,” said Jimmie Spencer, president/CEO of Canada West Ski Areas Association. “We’re getting really good numbers from overseas.”
Colin Chedore, president of the Canadian Ski Council, estimated that Ontario would be even or down a bit from last year because of an early ending, while Quebec, despite a late start, was running even with last year’s 5.8 million skier visits (which was an increase of 4 percent over the 1997-98 season). The eastern townships also had an excellent season, said Claude Peloquin, executive director of the Quebec Ski Areas Association.
