Ski Area Data Tables - now ready for boarding....

[awf170]

Re: meaningless

Get me the data and I'll fix it.

whiteface: 220 acres
http://www.whiteface.com/newsite/onmtn/mtnstats.php

Squaw mountain: all I could find is this quote
"Of all the 1000 ski trails and 300 ski areas I have designed, the Penobscot Trail at Big Squaw Mountain is by far the most scenic"
and I really doubt that is true, if whiteface has 220 acres there is no way squaw has over 300.

I cant find the other mountains, but I am positive that those stats are not skiable acres.


Oh yeah, and if I hadnt said anything yet. Thats awsome, nice work!

 

[billski]

Re: meaningless

Get me the data and I'll fix it.

whiteface: 220 acres
http://www.whiteface.com/newsite/onmtn/mtnstats.php

Squaw mountain: all I could find is this quote
"Of all the 1000 ski trails and 300 ski areas I have designed, the Penobscot Trail at Big Squaw Mountain is by far the most scenic"
and I really doubt that is true, if whiteface has 220 acres there is no way squaw has over 300.

I cant find the other mountains, but I am positive that those stats are not skiable acres.


Oh yeah, and if I hadnt said anything yet. Thats awsome, nice work!

Great, thanks. keep those corrections coming, I'll update the pages after the cards and letters slow down.

 

[YardSaleDad]

It seems to me that a wiki would be good for this kind of stuff.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Introduction

 

[Powdr]

Nice work. I too am a numbers/stats junkie. Some comments though:

Vertical Feet - I realize that you might not have a complete list, but what about Big Sky @ 4350', Snowmass @ 4180, Whiteface @ 3216'? Check out http://verticalfeet.com/ for more details.

Snowfall - A more accurate account can be found @ Tony Crocker's site http://members.aol.com/crockeraf/.

Acres - Some ski resorts flat out lie when reporting these values. A GIS program will show that Heavenly is only 2000 acres, Squaw is also about 2,000 acres.

Skier Density - You are calculating the maximum lift capacity vs. # of acres, but that assumes that each seat on each lift is fully utilized all the time. We all know that that is not the case, especially on slow days. Instead the best calculation would be the number of annual skier visits divided by the acreage. For instance: Park City has 750K visits and 3.3K acres for a value of 227. Deer Valley has 350K visits and 1750 acres for a value of 200, Vail has 1.5M visits and 5,300 acres for a value of 283, painting a far different (and more accurate) picture of crowding.

I like what you are doing, though. Keep up the good work.

Powdr

 

[riverc0il]

uphill capacity corolates amazingly well with lift ticket prices. wow.

i don't think kmart is claiming 200 trails any more. where is that number from?

how is it possible for all those areas to claim 100% snow making and have glades? glades can never have snow making with exception of trails that are mislabled "glades" that only have a few trees (murphys glades at bush i think is an example)?

 

[billski]

updates

uphill capacity corolates amazingly well with lift ticket prices. wow.

i don't think kmart is claiming 200 trails any more. where is that number from?

how is it possible for all those areas to claim 100% snow making and have glades? glades can never have snow making with exception of trails that are mislabled "glades" that only have a few trees (murphys glades at bush i think is an example)?

OK. Let me put my MBA hat on for a minute.

1. Lifts and snowmaking infrastructure are all "fixed" or "sunk" costs. They all have big mama bank loans (in most cases) to be paid back over time. That's a fixed, annual cost. Non-negotiable.

2. Key Operational costs are slightly variable - cost of running snowmaking, heating the lodge, electric, key employee wages - can also be thought of as a fixed cost. Can't run without them.

3. Variable costs include wages of seasonal help, food and beverage service cost of goods, rental equipment refresh, the band on Saturday night, lease payements on the new bombadier, etc. Can't run without them, but it varies based on customer demand.

1 and 2 HAVE TO be factored into your ticket costs, unless you have big momma bankrolling you, which is not too likely today. 3 is a bit more of a gamble, and you guesstimate that. Pour and stir, there's your minimium operating costs.

Then you get your marketeers to tell you what the market will bear and set your price as high as you can. Hopefully, if you're doing it all right, your market price is significantly higher than your costs and voila, profits. I know, you know all that stuff.

But here's the rub. Sunk costs that are paid off take the revenue "straight to the bottom line". That is, profits. For those new guys that just went on a capital spending spree and put a new 12-passenger chair in :dunce: well, they're making pretty big loan payments.

So you have to figure out which area is doing it just to make ends meet and which area is gouging you. It's really not that hard to figure it out; You can't hide infrastucture.

Anyways, off my MBA-box....


Source as noted on page 1 http://www.iabsi.com/public/ski/ is skitown.com and inter-ski's White Book.

This is precisely why I state that I am dealing with "public information". Everyone knows damn well that the marketing spins happen. We need to define what our words mean. It could be a full time job to sort all that out, time I simply don't have to spare. You guyz keep up the scrutiny and feeding me updates and it will get fixed, at least on our "Honest-Abe" list. :beer:

 

[riverc0il]

ah, i jumped right over that first page to skip to the data. my bad! i doubt skitowns's info is up to date, but you would be hard pressed to visit every ski area's web page to obtain up to date facts. skimaps.com used to be a wonderful reference, but alas it is no more. again, i must add that is a fantastic research job and certainly will help folks put various ski areas in perspective! a knowledgable consumer is a VERY good thing.

 

[billski]

uphill capacity corolates amazingly well with lift ticket prices. wow.

i don't think kmart is claiming 200 trails any more. where is that number from?

how is it possible for all those areas to claim 100% snow making and have glades? glades can never have snow making with exception of trails that are mislabled "glades" that only have a few trees (murphys glades at bush i think is an example)?

They are not expecting anyone to critically evaluate these claims like you are. For Joe and Josephine skier what ya gonna do, go out there and measure coverage? Besides, a lot of these glades are a new "fad" for most people and was grafted onto the marketing program after the fact. You don't really expect the resort to go back and recalculate downwards do you? Not when your competitors are not.

So you open up glages and recalc and coverage goes dow to 70%. Doesn't look too good when Mt. Avalance down the road is still showing 95% coverage. Of course you know that. that's what makes scrutinzing these lists so much fun! We could spend the whole day filling in margin notes!

Thanks for the quality comments.

 

[billski]

ah, i jumped right over that first page to skip to the data. my bad! i doubt skitowns's info is up to date, but you would be hard pressed to visit every ski area's web page to obtain up to date facts. skimaps.com used to be a wonderful reference, but alas it is no more. again, i must add that is a fantastic research job and certainly will help folks put various ski areas in perspective! a knowledgable consumer is a VERY good thing.

I DID go to every resort (and have the links in my sheets) and got the actual prices. The other stats I left to destiny. Stats are buried in resort webs, unlike lift tix prices which suprisingly are usually right on top. That's the funny thing about this biz, they advertise their prices right up front. only one click away. unlike anyother biz. i guess, they don't want a consumer driving 2-3 hrs. and findingout they're about to be robbed :angry:

 

[hammer]

how is it possible for all those areas to claim 100% snow making and have glades? glades can never have snow making with exception of trails that are mislabled "glades" that only have a few trees (murphys glades at bush i think is an example)?

I was going to ask the same thing but I thought I was going to get the response "of course glades aren't included".

Only one place that I know of, Pats Peak, makes snow in their glades. Are there any others?

 

[billski]

psst., hey buddy....

uphill capacity corolates amazingly well with lift ticket prices. wow.

i don't think kmart is claiming 200 trails any more. where is that number from?

how is it possible for all those areas to claim 100% snow making and have glades? glades can never have snow making with exception of trails that are mislabled "glades" that only have a few trees (murphys glades at bush i think is an example)?

Psst. (((((I'll let you in on a little secret. Close the door, turn the monitor sideways, please!))))))

http://web.archive.org is a wonderful way to resurrect long lost web pages, defunct or just plain updated.
I can find all the old data for skimaps.com there. Not all links work, but what you want for nuttin? Rubber biscuit?

 

[riverc0il]

yes, i am familiar with achive.org. a great site though depending on the time of the last scan, could be outdated or else i would have mentioned that. rubber biscuit? MMmmmm, that sounds appetizing. would you except payment by wooden nickels if you are selling?

 

[Zand]

One small mixup you have, you have Ski Ward as recieving 80" of snow a year and Wachusett as 45". It's the other way around (and I think Ward is probably closer to 60").

Good job! :beer:

 

[billski]

yes, i am familiar with achive.org. a great site though depending on the time of the last scan, could be outdated or else i would have mentioned that. rubber biscuit? MMmmmm, that sounds appetizing. would you except payment by wooden nickels if you are selling?

actually, skimaps.com was up and running a few mins ago...
later

 

[riverc0il]

whoa, welcome back skimaps.com for the second time!

 

[RuffusCorncobb]

Great tool

Thanks for posting your work, you did a great job. While playing with sorting the data I noticed that the vertical for Big Squaw mountain in Maine was listed as 1750 it should be 750 acording to the Big Squaw Mountain web site also Im not sure what the correct skiable acres number should be some where around 200 I would guess but no where near 1200.

Keep up the good works.. and thanks again for your efforts.