ASC Financial situation

Let me weight in on a couple of points. First and foremost, for ASC and all the players in the industry, it’s just about money. Snow quantity and quality, length of season, lifts, etc. matter only if they do, which they increasingly don’t because these corporations have and are in the process of monopolizing the business. Fortunately this is being recognized by some resorts (for example, Mad River Glen) and they’re maintaining their independence, and thus their ability to operate their resorts in the only manner that will preserve what we have come to love about them. Running ski resorts from Wall Street may be a doomed concept, because, unlike everything else that has been taken down the corporate road, skiing has a major wild card that even the most brilliant executives can’t control—the weather. That fact coupled with the huge discretionary aspect of skiing, which is amplified during recessionary times, and it may just be that the skiing industry can’t be canned like Walmart.

Second, even independent ownership of a ski resort is perilous when real estate sales (condominiums) take center stage. Back in the 1980s Sugarloaf, then under sole ownership, when bankrupt when they invested too heavily in condominiums.

Finally, isn’t Les Otten waiting in the wings to buy ASC when it falters or fails?