VAIL SUCKS

[deadheadskier]

Vail makes us pay for seasonal children's lessons NINE months in advance.

It's like $1,600 a kid, so imagine if you had 3 or 4 kids, you're laying out thousands of dollars almost a year ahead of time. And you have no choice but to do this, because they really limit it, because Vail doesn't want to be teaching local kids in the first place, they want to be raping tourist parents at $250 an hour for kiddie lessons. For those not already in the program, it's like logging in to TicketMaster back-in-the-day at 10am for U2 or Rolling Stones tickets.

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I think this is more an industry thing than a Vail Sucks thing.

Gunstock makes us buy the kids programs in March. You can go on a no interest payment plan, but most of the Devo programs sell out right away.

It's a 9 week program, but the holiday weeks are all off. You do the weekend before Xmas as an intro and staging by ability. Then 8 weeks after the Xmas holidays excluding MLK and the two weekends around Mass vacation week. I actually like that the holidays are off so we can travel elsewhere. The reason for it though is so they can have all instructors available for the more profitable ala carte lessons. Fine by me if that factors into keeping the seasonal costs down. $650 a kid isn't so bad for 18 hours of coaching for the season.

There is likely a shortage of ski instructors in general across the industry. It's a function of cheap passes available, low wages and high housing costs near the ski areas.

Vail still sucks though

 

[thetrailboss]

Vail makes us pay for seasonal children's lessons NINE months in advance.

It's like $1,600 a kid, so imagine if you had 3 or 4 kids, you're laying out thousands of dollars almost a year ahead of time. And you have no choice but to do this, because they really limit it, because Vail doesn't want to be teaching local kids in the first place, they want to be raping tourist parents at $250 an hour for kiddie lessons. For those not already in the program, it's like logging in to TicketMaster back-in-the-day at 10am for U2 or Rolling Stones tickets.

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Snowbird does the same thing. It used to be a great value and a great program, but they lost their awesome instructors and it now sucks.

 

[thetrailboss]

I think this is more an industry thing than a Vail Sucks thing.

Gunstock makes us buy the kids programs in March. You can go on a no interest payment plan, but most of the Devo programs sell out right away.

It's a 9 week program, but the holiday weeks are all off. You do the weekend before Xmas as an intro and staging by ability. Then 8 weeks after the Xmas holidays excluding MLK and the two weekends around Mass vacation week. I actually like that the holidays are off so we can travel elsewhere. The reason for it though is so they can have all instructors available for the more profitable ala carte lessons. Fine by me if that factors into keeping the seasonal costs down. $650 a kid isn't so bad for 18 hours of coaching for the season.

There is likely a shortage of ski instructors in general across the industry. It's a function of cheap passes available, low wages and high housing costs near the ski areas.

Vail still sucks though

Yeah, I have to agree that this is now a common thing in the industry--paying so early in advanced. I am not a fan of it. When I first moved out to Utah the renewal period for Snowbird was from May until the end of September. Now it is compressed into like a one-month period between April and May.

And as much as I like Boyne, they have now become the worst offender at Brighton. We had literally a 10 day period to renew passes in early April to get a discount.

If I had to guess, Vail probably started this trend. Or at least everyone will blame them for it (as they adopt it).

 

[AdironRider]

I find most programs sell out, even at tiny mountains, so it makes little sense to have some super long registration period as it just results in pissed off customers that procrastinate and can't get in. This is really a customer service issue in the sense of preventing bad customer experience for those that wait. The net cost to the consumer is the same so that doesn't really matter. If for some reason they don't sell out, the mountain can open it up at a later date, but that is very rare IME.

Besides, if you are a season long program customer, you are pretty used to buying passes, etc and everything else associated with your ski season in the spring now anyways. I'd rather just do it all at once than have to remember to buy passes in March, then ski school at some other date.

In terms of the 10 day window to renew season passes at a significant discount, cry me a river, but seems par for this thread to complain about a business doing things to make the business stronger (hint, selling everything on sale isn't a great business model). Most mountains offer a payment plan or some version of loan program if you are that strapped (like Indy with their payment plan for example).

 

[drjeff]

It's an industry wide thing where they try and balance figuring out how many instructors/coaches they will have returning for past participants and children of staff and how many they can (hopefully) hire and how that equates to more of a public rollout in the Fall when newbies into seasonal programs tend to buy.

The folks who run seasonal programs are on basically a year round search for coaches/instructors and often within their programs develop a "Coach in Training" type program for Highschool aged young adults who are aging out/interesting out of seasonal program participation and may have interest in learning to be a coach.

I can almost guarantee I'll hear about this when I am on a golf trip in Ireland next week where 2 of the crew I am going with are one of the head coaches of Mount Snow’s "Coach in Training" program and another in our group is one of the co heads of their seasonal Development program.. Heck they recruited (more like told ) my youngest kid that he was going to be one of the 1st 2 Highschool aged folks through the Coach in training program going on 5 years ago now, and he's now got is USSSA level 100 alpine competition coaching certification and was an assistant coach for the U12 race program this past Winter and the other in his class now has her PSIA Level 1 certification and is an assistant coach in the development program this past Winter, both of whom are finishing up their sophomore years in college at schools in the Boston area.

Seasonal programs often have a greater demand than supply of coaches and coach recruitment and retention is basically a year round endeavor for the program leaders

 

[bigbob]

Yeah, I have to agree that this is now a common thing in the industry--paying so early in advanced. I am not a fan of it. When I first moved out to Utah the renewal period for Snowbird was from May until the end of September. Now it is compressed into like a one-month period between April and May.

And as much as I like Boyne, they have now become the worst offender at Brighton. We had literally a 10 day period to renew passes in early April to get a discount.

If I had to guess, Vail probably started this trend. Or at least everyone will blame them for it (as they adopt it).

Boyne refers to it as the flash sale for the New England pass back east. Best prices for next year. I do the no interest 6 pay, why noy use someone else's money for free.

 

[Hastur]

Vail makes us pay for seasonal children's lessons NINE months in advance.

It's like $1,600 a kid, so imagine if you had 3 or 4 kids, you're laying out thousands of dollars almost a year ahead of time. And you have no choice but to do this, because they really limit it, because Vail doesn't want to be teaching local kids in the first place, they want to be raping tourist parents at $250 an hour for kiddie lessons. For those not already in the program, it's like logging in to TicketMaster back-in-the-day at 10am for U2 or Rolling Stones tickets.

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Claiming local status already.

nice.

 

[AdironRider]

He claimed it basically the day he showed up, like only the best ones do.

 

[deadheadskier]

The folks who run seasonal programs are on basically a year round search for coaches/instructors and often within their programs develop a "Coach in Training" type program for Highschool aged young adults who are aging out/interesting out of seasonal program participation and may have interest in learning to be a coach.

This is how Gunstock does it. There are 18 kids in the program my kids do and three coaches. One of the coaches is an adult, two are HS aged kids and often they were kids that participated in the programs as students themselves. I could see this being my kids first job when they age out of the program at 15.

They also have a generous season pass benefit. First year the coach gets their own pass plus one more. Each additional year you coach you get another pass up to a total of 3 additional passes. I randomly rode a chair this winter with a guy whose daughter was a HS senior and as it was her third year coaching, his entire family of 4 got free passes.

 

[drjeff]

This is how Gunstock does it. There are 18 kids in the program my kids do and three coaches. One of the coaches is an adult, two are HS aged kids and often they were kids that participated in the programs as students themselves. I could see this being my kids first job when they age out of the program at 15.

They also have a generous season pass benefit. First year the coach gets their own pass plus one more. Each additional year you coach you get another pass up to a total of 3 additional passes. I randomly rode a chair this winter with a guy whose daughter was a HS senior and as it was her third year coaching, his entire family of 4 got free passes.

Can't disagree as now me as part of the race crew (who helps both the competition and Development programs at Mount Snow) and my son as an alpine comp coach, that the benefits (and family cost savings) would be as enticing as they are, let alone the commraderie of the crews of people we work with are

 

[x10003q]

It's an industry wide thing where they try and balance figuring out how many instructors/coaches they will have returning for past participants and children of staff and how many they can (hopefully) hire and how that equates to more of a public rollout in the Fall when newbies into seasonal programs tend to buy.

The folks who run seasonal programs are on basically a year round search for coaches/instructors and often within their programs develop a "Coach in Training" type program for Highschool aged young adults who are aging out/interesting out of seasonal program participation and may have interest in learning to be a coach.

I can almost guarantee I'll hear about this when I am on a golf trip in Ireland next week where 2 of the crew I am going with are one of the head coaches of Mount Snow’s "Coach in Training" program and another in our group is one of the co heads of their seasonal Development program.. Heck they recruited (more like told ) my youngest kid that he was going to be one of the 1st 2 Highschool aged folks through the Coach in training program going on 5 years ago now, and he's now got is USSSA level 100 alpine competition coaching certification and was an assistant coach for the U12 race program this past Winter and the other in his class now has her PSIA Level 1 certification and is an assistant coach in the development program this past Winter, both of whom are finishing up their sophomore years in college at schools in the Boston area.

Seasonal programs often have a greater demand than supply of coaches and coach recruitment and retention is basically a year round endeavor for the program leaders

My niece was in a seasonal program (Synergy for Int and Adv skiers) at Stratton for a few years and they recruited her to be an instructor ( along with a lot of others). Her first year was spent with little kids on the carpets with occasional classes where she was the tailgunner with a class skiing on green trails. She did earn her level 1 and progressed to leading the kids on the green trails in her second year. It was a lot of work for not a lot of pay. She is in college now and not instructing. I do know of a number of kids who are going to college within driving distance of Stratton who are still instructing and coaching.

FYI - the Synergy program at Stratton last season cost $3000.

 

[BenedictGomez]

Claiming local status already.

nice.

It is literally named the "Local Youth" program.

But sure, douche away.....

 

[BenedictGomez]

It's an industry wide thing where they try and balance figuring out how many instructors/coaches they will have returning for past participants and children of staff and how many they can (hopefully) hire and how that equates to more of a public rollout in the Fall when newbies into seasonal programs tend to buy.

Maybe that's the case as you and others have said that this is now the norm, but it's definitely not for determining demand at least not for the Park City local kids program, because they governor it far below what they could. Each year many kids that want to be in the program get shut out and have to go to Deer Valley or Sundance or someplace else instead. Vail could probably double it if they wanted to, but as I said, the individual day lessons for the kids of vacationers are drastically more profitable.

 

[ctdubl07]

We bought at MS under Peaks. Had 4 kids in season long programs for basiclly 10 years. With 6 passes and 4 program registrations, it was an investment but completely worth it. They moved in and out of various programs over those years....Cub Camp, Snow Camp, Mtn Camp, Devo and Comp. Not all in same together but some variation. It was immensely worth it. The skiers and mtn citizens they evolved into is incredibly gratifying.

When Vail took over, the program dynamics changed greatly. I get it, they own/run a biz and can alter as they see fit but the change to the Snow/Mtn camp was immense. These are purely ski/snowboard with no competition angle. They are age and ability delineated. Under Peaks, they were truly Full season programs....7 days a week and all holidays. As the camper aged and developed, the Mtn was a true playground. Meals were wherever the coach ended up and the food was not menu limited. It was a home run investment. Under Vail, it became far more controlled. Wknds and non holidays Only, food became limited. Program enrollment shrunk as you can imagine. I think they'd prefer the dailies at a higher rate.

Intro work age also moved to 16 (vs 14). You now have to be 18 to lead a group anywhere outside of the learning area. My daughter was targeted early to join the staff, like at age 12. She started working in Snow Camp at 16, last year at 17 achieved PSIA1 plus young child certificate. She was 18 and a HS senior this season just ending. She worked as much as she wanted being considered one of their best assets. She loved her managers and coworkers. She lifeguards in summer and works at a surf camp. Shes a gamer.

Her siblings are now 16 and dont want to work on the Mtn because they'd essentially be limited to learner/in building childcare. While most of us had crappy entry jobs, I dont blame them for being disenthused...they have an impression of what camp used to be like when they were 10, the fun of their instructors and mtn is your playground experience. They will work at 17/18 which is a family requirement, but I think Vail is missing developing their bench strength by the changes to the season program. Put aside cost, making it more transactional and time limited, your missing out on a certain subset of local kids who would have garnered an interest in transitioning into workers....they seem to shirk the invest more early, pay less long term philosophy of human capital development.

 

[BenedictGomez]

Program enrollment shrunk as you can imagine. I think they'd prefer the dailies at a higher rate.

So it sounds like this was a company-wide change, because it's the same at Park City. Thankfully at least last year they changed it so that once your kid is in, they're in, you don't have to fight the "10am TicketMaster battle" every year to get a spot.