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Killington Officially Announces Sale of Resort, New Superstar 6 Pack, New Skyeship Cabins, $30 Million of Investments

Tonyr

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My point was more in reference to his claim that an interconnect and new base village wouldn't change the character of Pico because it didn't at Alpine. The Spruce Village and Over Easy very much changed the character of Stowe and I think the interconnect would also do so at Pico. I bet a huge portion of skiers coming from the Rutland side would now start their day on the Pico side to save 15 minutes on the commute.

And while Stowe wasn't in danger of closing like Pico might be as a stand alone entity, the mountain was hurting. The GM at the time, Hank Lunde (ironically the former Killington GM) sold the idea as necessary to compete. The mountain was losing money and had lost 50% of it's skier visits over the prior two decades. His claim, and it was probably true, was that it was due to superior snowmaking and slope side lodging build up at southern competitors. He told the community that without these "improvements" he'd be forced to cut operations significantly and run more like Smuggs with less snowmaking and a shorter season. He claimed he couldn't get AIG to pay for the expensive snowmaking pipeline and needed the real estate sales to fund it.

It went through and Stowe was changed forever and IMO, not in a good way. People seem to forget that prior to the Spruce development, Stowe was pretty rough around the edges compared to Killington, Okemo, Stratton etc. Yes, there was alway wealthy second homeowners and guests staying at places like Top Notch or Trapps, but it was by no means the most luxurious ski area in the East like today. The vibe and character back then is kinda like how Sugarloaf is today. It was not dominated by the Bogner crowd or anywhere near as busy.

My wish for Pico to remain unchanged is certainly for selfish reasons, not business ones. I prefer ski "areas" to ski "resorts." I liked Stowe much better the way it used to be. Jay would be another. I like Pico just how it is now.
To each their own, I like the over easy Gondola and Spruce Peak village. I'd also love to see Stowe and Smuggs connected but it appears that is not likely to ever happen.
 

skiur

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The only time I have skied at both mountains in one day is when K was mobbed and I then went to pico to escape the crowds.
 

deadheadskier

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What is the skier visit break even number to make this investment even worth it? Everything I've heard is that this is not going to be a Slidebrook scenario, but rather the goal is additional terrain and 2 or 3 lifts. What's that going to cost to develop? $30M minimal? What's it going to cost each year to make the snow, groom the trails, run those lifts and patrol the terrain?

How does it impact snowmaking and lift operations on existing terrain if the expansion doesn't generate the additional skier visits and revenue to make that terrain self sustaining? Does South Ridge become a natural snow only pod that doesn't open much of the year and the lift goes weekend only?

The whole thing just doesn't make much sense to me from a business perspective.
 

xlr8r

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If when Ramshead Quad gets replaced, it is brought back to the summit of Ramshead, then only one additional lift is needed to make it to Pico. The original Les Otten plan required two lifts, but one of those lifts was just to restore summit access to Ramshead. It would have been in roughly the same alignment as the current KMS Poma on Ramshead, just longer extending up to the summit.

Me personally, I love Pico the way it is. But Pico will need to see some lift replacements eventually, whether it makes financial sense to replace lifts at Pico without the interconnect is the question
 
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In the last couple of years I have seen most of them out here for $2,000+ apiece. As soon as it is announced that it is an auction style then the costs skyrocket.
Yeah, seems like resorts feel their chairlifts are stacked with gold lately. i get it, old chairlifts are cool to have, i wouldnt mind having one, but i dont have a great place for it, and picking them up can be an event in itself. Blue Mt in PA was selling off the old Burma/Main street chairs, they were in decent shape, doubles, maybe even stainless, they werent 10 coats deep into paint if i remember correctly. they were selling them for $1200, and quantities were "limited". They did not sell well. They were never going to come out and say this, but they kept putting photos on FB of the new construction, with all of the chairs still sitting there in the corner of photos by accident. they were also there when the season started. im not sure what they did with them, but they didnt try to sell them any more. Of course, it would have created a shit storm if they did try to sell the remaining ones deeply discounted after some people did pay $1200 for one.

i dont really like Vail, but when they auctioned the chairs from BB/JF they donated the proceeds to some kind of charity, or at least thats what they said they were doing. They sold all of their chairs. most were like $200. there is something to be said for having your scrap picked up for you, rather than move it around a bunch of times before you get rid of them. Most of the people i know that did buy those, 1) it was a big to-do, because i think most were triples, if not quads. 2) one guy put some Christmas lights on his thats just sitting in his yard, and thats pretty much the extent of what has been done with those......lol.
 

skiur

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Does South Ridge become a natural snow only pod that doesn't open much of the year and the lift goes weekend only?

South ridge already is a natural snow only pod (outside of pipe dream) and the lift only runs weekends and not even all of them and it running Sundays is hit or miss.
 

x10003q

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Yup...count me in that category. One of my best days of the season was at Pico last year. Absolute blast and virtually ski on all day even after substantial natural snowfall that week.
We are also in the Ikon/Pico category. We usually do 1 or 2 day midweek days at Pico because the snow is usually in great shape and there are no crowds. We hit Pico last Mar 22 ( a Friday) and had packed powder for most of the day and it was easy to find fresh tracks. It had snowed during the week. Killington would have been a skied off mess due to the higher volume of everyday traffic vs Pico. With Pico not open on Tue/Wed, any new snow is still there on Thurs/Friday.
 

thebigo

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The latest version required either four or five lift rides to get from pico to KBL. I suspect after the novelty wore off, few would bother. There was another version that showed terrain down towards pico pond from the LBO days, long blue cruisers if i recollect. It was hanging in the long trail inn early 2000s, wish I had a picture.
Screenshot_20241004_133907_Chrome.jpg

 

AdironRider

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What is the skier visit break even number to make this investment even worth it? Everything I've heard is that this is not going to be a Slidebrook scenario, but rather the goal is additional terrain and 2 or 3 lifts. What's that going to cost to develop? $30M minimal? What's it going to cost each year to make the snow, groom the trails, run those lifts and patrol the terrain?

How does it impact snowmaking and lift operations on existing terrain if the expansion doesn't generate the additional skier visits and revenue to make that terrain self sustaining? Does South Ridge become a natural snow only pod that doesn't open much of the year and the lift goes weekend only?

The whole thing just doesn't make much sense to me from a business perspective.

This is my take as well. Why would they do this? The rest of the mountain needs serious work first and there is no real benefit to it.
 

thetrailboss

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The bigger question for me has to do with Pico itself.

While we have seen a lot of press about what is going on at Killington, what improvements are in store for Pico, if any? IMHO it is an underused asset.
 

kbroderick

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This is my take as well. Why would they do this? The rest of the mountain needs serious work first and there is no real benefit to it.
Connecting the Pico parking lots to the Killington lift/trail system is a non-trivial benefit for Killington (but would be very annoying for Pico skiers and riders). I doubt it would be worth the cost of development on that basis alone, but I also don't know how plausible it would be to expand parking at Pico vs at any of the Killington base areas.
 

urungus

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The latest version required either four or five lift rides to get from pico to KBL.

Huh ? You can currently ski from Pico to KBL using only 1 lift ride (3 if you include the two lifts needed to get to the top of Pico).
Pico Summit Glade -> interconnect work road -> Easy Street -> Ramshead lift > Caper -> Great Northern -> KBL
 
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thebigo

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Huh ? You can currently ski from Pico to KBL using only 1 lift ride (3 if you include the two lifts needed to get to the top of Pico).
Pico Summit Glade -> interconnect work road -> Easy Street -> Ramshead lift > Caper -> Great Northern -> KBL
The number of people willing to ski the work road is minimal. Take a look at the map above and imagine you have someone in your group who only skis groomers. From pico base to KBL: golden, summit, pico backside, ramshead summit, rams head. Then you have to get back at the end of the day. Of course they could configure the lifts better but it is still a haul.
 

gittist

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You have to buy the lift tickets online, even for the ‘day of’. Once you’re in Jan the prices say 28% off. For example, Jan 22 says “$143.28, save 28%.

Does anyone know what you’d pay if you waited until Jan 22 to buy a ticket? If it’s $143 the 28% is simply deceptive advertisement. On the other hand if it costs $198…

Does Killington use dynamic pricing? Does the price change as the date gets closer?
 

skiur

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The walk up price for a lift ticket mid season on a Saturday is over $200.
 

ss20

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A minute from the Alta exit off the I-15!
Love this! I would like to see some more snowmaking pipe getting replaced, but 1,000 new guns is still fantastic! New cabins on the Skyeship and hopefully some mechanical refurbishment will also go a long way.

I can go either way with the interconnect. I think it would be cool to have a western-sized ski area in Vermont. I also think it's cool to leave Pico alone and keep that "vibe" that they have.

I said this in another thread... if new management can get Killington operating reliably, I will gladly take a week off and fly East and ski K/P in the next 3-5 years. I love the place. So happy that the new owners have already committed a bunch of capital.
 

Newpylong

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Keep in mind management is not new. The new owners have gone on record saying they do not intend to butt into day to day management because they do not know how to operate a ski area. So if there was something happening prior that turned people off it very well could continue. However it is very likely that Killington is going to have a larger budget so some of the decisions could be different simply due to that.

The one other important thing in my mind other than the capital investment is the move away from the Woodward brand and relationship. They seem very passionate about getting their parks back under local control and more in line with the goals of the resort in general. I can appreciate the importance of the parks but some of the decisions that have occured under that name have been quite assinine.
 

Zand

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I'm not a park person at all so I have no idea about anything that may have happened in the past 5ish years with the Woodward branding, but what did they do to draw the ire of so many? You're not the first to say good riddance.

It's always good to see local management so I'm sure K running the parks themselves will be better than being run from Colorado, but I'm genuinely curious as to what they did (or didn't do that they should have) to get this kind of reaction.
 

mister moose

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.. if new management can get Killington operating reliably, I will gladly take a week off and fly East and ski K/P in the next 3-5 years. I love the place. So happy that the new owners have already committed a bunch of capital.

Why base it on improved reliability? Not that it would be a bad thing... but come out when we're in a 6 week stretch of powder days. If you catch that, especially midweek, it is immeasurably better than reliable porcelain.
 
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