Sunday River vs. Killington...early season program

[deadheadskier]

You're pure capitalistic opinion....which strategy is better?

Sunday River is charging $25 both Saturday and Sunday, but will close for the midweek and open the following weekend if conditions allow

Killington is charging $65 from 10AM on, on Sunday and will continue to operate at that price point through the week as conditions allow them to be open.

who's effort have you been more impressed with?

SR opening up the afternoon 10/30 with a complete surprise

or

or K keeping the 'truth' close guarded and announcing today they'll open on Sunday


The two philosophies are so polarizing to me. For the record, I feel skiers are more welcome / wanted at SR, I'm just blown away by how different the two operating strategies are for what is pretty much certain to be an equal product.

...such is business I guess

 

[GrilledSteezeSandwich]

Well Killington is 3 hours closer to me so it's a no brainer..but I'm more impressed with SR being open the entire weekend..

 

[drjeff]

You're pure capitalistic opinion....which strategy is better?

Sunday River is charging $25 both Saturday and Sunday, but will close for the midweek and open the following weekend if conditions allow

Killington is charging $65 from 10AM on, on Sunday and will continue to operate at that price point through the week as conditions allow them to be open.

who's effort have you been more impressed with?

SR opening up the afternoon 10/30 with a complete surprise

or

or K keeping the 'truth' close guarded and announcing today they'll open on Sunday


The two philosophies are so polarizing to me. For the record, I feel skiers are more welcome / wanted at SR, I'm just blown away by how different the two operating strategies are for what is pretty much certain to be an equal product.

...such is business I guess

I think that SR version, especially of their anticipated midweek schedule is much more realistic and honest. Think about it, since K isn't open Saturday, its more than likely that the reason is they COULDN'T make enough snow (yet) to do so. Aviation weather forcasts for the K area have snowmaking temps returning to K late afternoon Saturday, with a short window of very favorable temps (below 25 degrees) NOT arriving until about 6AM Sunday morning and only being present for about 12 hours, before marginal temps arrive and leave early Monday.

The point I'm trying to make is that if they already need more guntime to get open, and then they just have a short window of decent time to make the product BEFORE they groom it out, can they realistically expect it take make it through the week, top to bottom given next weeks mixed temps???

 

[danny p]

KillingtonBlog.com:

I received a call early this morning from Tom Horrocks, Communications Manager for the resort, informing me that Killington will open for top to bottom skiing and riding at 10:00 AM this Sunday, barring any last minute unexpected change in the weather. The mountain plan is to continue to be open through the week, with lifts turning Monday thru Friday starting at 9:00 AM. The Killington Resort will stay open for early season operations as long as they can provide a quality on snow experience for their early season guests.

The current operating plan is to run 2 lifts, the K1 Gondola and the North Ridge Triple. While snow has been made top to bottom on Great Northern, aided by Mother Nature, from what I understand, I would recommend that people focus their turns on the upper reaches of the mountain, taking laps off the triple. I was told that on Rime and Reason and the upper trails of the mountain, the snow making team has laid down a base of about 6 feet. As conditions were less favorable on the lower mountain, the surface conditions running back to the K1 Gondola are on a thinner base. As temperatures allow, the Resort will continue to make snow on all of the trails they can to continue to improve snow surfaces.

Sounds like at least Rime and Reason will hold up to the warm temps, 6 foot base is no joke, especially for only a couple days with the guns on. Hopefully the lower mountain will hold out.

 

[Geoff]

This is really an apples vs oranges thing. They're both white ribbon of death but Sunday River has a fixed-grip chair with a midstation. When Killington had the Killington double chair, October skiing was a given since you could run one lift and offer skiing on upper Cascade with a 24 hour snowmaking window. ASC ripped out the Killington double and Killington can't possibly get a top-to-bottom run going since the north-facing terrain at Killington is far too steep so they have to blow east-facing lower Bunny Buster. Sunday River is always going to win the early opening contest until Killington upgrades their lift infrastructure to enable downloading after skiing laps on the Glades triple. Given the other priorities at the resort.... a wrecking ball to all the base lodges; adding enough intermediate terrain to get back their lost market share; fixing the mess of trail intersections on Snowdon and upgrading the lifts there; building a base village after the financial markets recover. If Killington does this over the next decade or so, it's far more important than opening a few days earlier in the fall.

I was out there looking at it yesterday. Killington could easily have opened for Halloween but they opted to get in the Saturday evening blow in excellent snowmaking conditions. I would have liked to be skiing but a couple of days isn't going to kill me. That first run on Sunday is likely to be talcum powder rather than iffy wet hardpack. Regardless.... This is way better than last year when Killington clung to their scheduled opening date like Teddy Kennedy holding on to his Chivas bottle.

 

[andyzee]

Killington clung to their scheduled opening date like Teddy Kennedy holding on to his Chivas bottle.

Nice touch! :lol:

 

[ga2ski]

Gotta love the faith of the Killington faithful. No surprise I'm opting for Sunday River. The fiancial aspect of waiting to open until Sunday and charging $65 (are you kidding me???) makes no sense. Then staying open all week makes no sense at this time of the year. Sounds like a week of major money lose to me.

The snow was great yesterday. Not a ribbon of snow either. T2 had snow from edge to edge

 

[millerm277]

And, at least in the PR picture, the snow looks pretty good too.

 

[Geoff]

Gotta love the faith of the Killington faithful. No surprise I'm opting for Sunday River. The fiancial aspect of waiting to open until Sunday and charging $65 (are you kidding me???) makes no sense. Then staying open all week makes no sense at this time of the year. Sounds like a week of major money lose to me.

The snow was great yesterday. Not a ribbon of snow either. T2 had snow from edge to edge

That shot sure looks like White Ribbon of Death to me.