What the heck is going on at Magic?

[magicsales]

Thank you for the positive feedback! Anyone that has questions, please feel free to ask away and I will try my best to get an answer for you from the appropriate manager or the GM. We really are trying to give you the customer a better skiing product and once we open we hope to see everyone on the slopes. Think more snow!

 

[Tin]

Hey everyone, this is Shane, Director of Marketing for Magic. I wanted to get in here and clear the air as I do religiously read this thread and those on other sites to see what the general skiing public is thinking. It's a great way to see both the good and bad. Unfortunately, like many other Vermont mountains, Magic has had a tough start to the season. On Sunday night a transformer blew out and that cost us our first good snowmaking window of the season. It was not our pump that went. Green Mountain Power has since come out and made the necessary repairs to resolve the problem. Our snowmakers plan to get out later this week and into the weekend and get the guns going. The Red Chair is just about ready to go and will be certified very, very soon, we need to raise the counterweight and that requires a crane to come in, which has been scheduled. Black will be ready a couple weeks after the final touches are completed. The delay on Black is a result of having all hands on deck to complete the Red Chair in time for opening day. Speaking of opening day, based on my last conversation with our top snowmakers we hope to open January 9th. I apologize for all the confusion and frustration that surrounds the mountain and we are working to make things much smoother for our customers.

Yesterday it was "a pump issue" which was then redacted and changed to an electrical issue. Green Mountain Power listed no outages or issues in Londonderry, so who is wrong there?

How long has the counterweight been an issue for? The initial opening day claims were December 19th, then 26th; would the chairs have been ready to go then? Why bother claiming you would be open if things were still so far away and no lifts were ready?

No more brown bags up stairs? People go to Magic to avoid this type of resort stuff. Why the change?

Why not just be open and say X.Y,Z needs to be fixed on Red prior to opening instead of stringing customers along with "planned" opening dates? Look at Tenney's FB page and the following they have received from the honest, and up front, communication.

Why does asking a simple question in a respectful manner (such as lift certification, opening, etc.) on Facebook once amount to a banning from the FB page? I've witnessed this several times now with some of Magic's most faithful.

 

[magicsales]

Yesterday it was "a pump issue" which was then redacted and changed to an electrical issue. Green Mountain Power listed no outages or issues in Londonderry, so who is wrong there?

How long has the counterweight been an issue for? The initial opening day claims were December 19th, then 26th; would the chairs have been ready to go then? Why bother claiming you would be open if things were still so far away and no lifts were ready?

No more brown bags up stairs? People go to Magic to avoid this type of resort stuff. Why the change?

Why not just be open and say X.Y,Z needs to be fixed on Red prior to opening instead of stringing customers along with "planned" opening dates? Look at Tenney's FB page and the following they have received from the honest, and up front, communication.

The transformer that blew feeds our pumps here at the mountain. To be honest I'm not sure if they would have listed the problem on their site as it was very isolated. Good news here is that they did send a team out to get us back up and running.

As to the lifts, had mother nature been kinder to us and brought today's weather a month ago we would have been ready to go. When it became clear we would not be able to open our teams were put on a bunch of other projects. If it were a situation were the snow was on the hill I assure you at the very least the Red Chair would be spinning. Black needs a new bumper guard on the base station and a summit bullwheel alignment in addition to some line work.

As to "brown bags" upstairs policy, we are restricting brown bags from the Black Line Tavern only, not the entire floor. This is in an effort to decongest the immediate area around the bar and free up some space for people at the bar.

We are working towards a more open line of communication, this is actually the start of it. What the team at Tenney has been able to do on such a short timetable is really incredible and we hope to follow their lead in many ways.

 

[Tin]

As to the lifts, had mother nature been kinder to us and brought today's weather a month ago we would have been ready to go. When it became clear we would not be able to open our teams were put on a bunch of other projects. If it were a situation were the snow was on the hill I assure you at the very least the Red Chair would be spinning. Black needs a new bumper guard on the base station and a summit bullwheel alignment in addition to some line work.

Lifts ready to go? But the lifts have yet to be certified even as of today. Could they have been certified weeks ago even with the counterweight issue or no? When was this problem found, recently or months ago? Was manpower put elsewhere because of the weather?

 

[MEtoVTSkier]

Not trying to insult you MagicSales, but if the lifts weren't completely finished and inspected, then you don't pull the crews off to do "other work" until they were. It may be the truth, but it shows that IF we had ski-able conditions earlier in the season, then the lifts wouldn't have been ready then either.

Too bad they waited until the last minute to fire up and test the snow-making system, or the problem may have been found earlier.

Anyhow, I'm sure we all wish you luck and hope everything comes together for a successful remainder of the season. Improved communications will definitely prove to make people happier, and quiet the rumor mill down a few notches.

 

[PearlJam09]

I do religiously read this thread and those on other sites to see what the general skiing public is thinking. It's a great way to see both the good and bad.

The Red Chair is just about ready to go and will be certified very, very soon, we need to raise the counterweight and that requires a crane to come in, which has been scheduled. Black will be ready a couple weeks after the final touches are completed.

Knowing that the Black Chair was SCHEDULED to be open on December 19th when the mountain was supposed to open, and the SHED DECK was also SCHEDULED to open on December 19th, and the new website was SCHEDULED to be released on December 23rd, and NONE of those things happened, please tell us exactly when the crane is SCHEDULED to come in and complete the raising of the counterweight.

If you really want to know what we're thinking, how about you SCHEDULE a town hall meeting so that people can ask you questions in person. See if you can get Tom to show up as well...

 

[magicsales]

The Red would have been ready to go had we been able to open sooner with better weather. Of course we have had one of the warmest December in history here in Vermont, which has not helped us get to that point.

Out on The Shed Deck we are waiting for a visit from The Shed's marketing team to fully outfit both levels of the deck outside Black Line Tavern. The new window bar inside was part of these upgrades and has been completed. We are excited to welcome in the brewery's team after the new year and I know they can't wait to get going.

Our new website has been delayed while the telephone system is being upgraded, which was desperately needed. We were able to launch our new online store in time for the holidays, unfortunately orders have been delayed and we do apologize for that.

I'll see if I can get the exact day the crane will be visiting Magic and get back to you guys.

 

[The Sneak]

You know what?

I very much appreciate this guy coming on here and providing answers, whether we like the answers or not.

Let's hope all of the above happens and it snows.




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[PearlJam09]

The Red would have been ready to go had we been able to open sooner with better weather. Of course we have had one of the warmest December in history here in Vermont, which has not helped us get to that point.

Out on The Shed Deck we are waiting for a visit from The Shed's marketing team to fully outfit both levels of the deck outside Black Line Tavern. The new window bar inside was part of these upgrades and has been completed. We are excited to welcome in the brewery's team after the new year and I know they can't wait to get going.

Our new website has been delayed while the telephone system is being upgraded, which was desperately needed. We were able to launch our new online store in time for the holidays, unfortunately orders have been delayed and we do apologize for that.

I'll see if I can get the exact day the crane will be visiting Magic and get back to you guys.

I'm not really all that knowledgable about mountain operations, but please explain to me what the weather has to do with repairs and inspection on a chairlift. I could understand if you blamed not being able to blow snow on the weather, and up until recently, you have been able to. Now its bullshit about a transformer.

In the alpine update on December 13th, you said that the warm weather would allow the IT department to get the new website finished, but now that you're past the deadline, you are blaming the fact that it isn't done on a telephone system upgrade. Which is it? The weather or the phones?

The fact that the mountain has not delivered on anything so far this year is troubling. Is this whole thing a charade? They had enough money to afford Rangers in October (which got me banned from posting on Facebook), but even then, knowing that you would need $1500-2000 to bring in a crane to raise the counterweight on the Red chair, you couldn't do it. Is this poor planning, ineptitude, or a malicious plan to deceive the customers and walk away with a bunch of money?

I'm not saying this is all on you, since I know you're not the decision maker, but as the "Director of Marketing" you are the one who is going to need to be answering questions, and based on the people who I've spoken to, you will be getting a lot of them.

How about setting up that Town Hall meeting? You wanna know what we think, you wanna pretend to be the face of the mountain, put in some face time, let people know who you are. If you've got nothing to hide, then this should be a no-brainer for you.

 

[VTKilarney]

I don't have an iron in this fire, but I can tell you that if I had a necessary chairlift that was not ready to operate, I would be putting in every resource I had to get the chairlift operational. Everything else would be a secondary priority. There is absolutely no way that I would cut it this close because I counted on the weather staying warm.

But I applaud the marketing person for coming on here and answering questions. As a Burke skier, I feel your pain. I also know how important it is to have an open line of communication.

 

[PearlJam09]

But I applaud the marketing person for coming on here and answering questions. As a Burke skier, I feel your pain. I also know how important it is to have an open line of communication.

How do you feel about posts being censored on Facebook?

 

[VTKilarney]

How do you feel about posts being censored on Facebook?

It depends on the post. If it's abusive, I have no problem censoring the post. But if you can't handle genuine dialog you shouldn't be on Facebook.

 

[magicsales]

I completely agree with and understand that not having the lifts already certified is not ideal. The best I can offer for right now is the truth about the counterweight and that the Red Chair will be ready to go for Opening Day, January 9th. I'll note that the crane is not a financial problem at all and that the Red Chair is in great shape otherwise.

In November we certainly had hoped we could open December 19th and be in a very different situation than we are today. The great team I work with here in the office is doing everything they can to be prepared for opening day and I know the Ops Crew is doing the same.

I'll bring up your Town Hall idea at the next managers meeting.

 

[PearlJam09]

I'll bring up your Town Hall idea at the next managers meeting.

If it isn't a financial problem, then what is holding it up?

There's like one person in each "department." You can drop the Director and managers meeting crap. If you really think you're managing anything or the director of anything except bullshit, you're lying to yourself.

 

[MadMadWorld]

Wow guys let's try to keep the guy around for at least a day....

 

[deadheadskier]

Wow guys let's try to keep the guy around for at least a day....

+1

Seriously

 

[cdskier]

+1

Seriously

+2! I have no stake in Magic at all here and am a complete outsider that has kept reading this thread out of pure interest. That said, people asked for communication, now someone from magic comes here and starts providing information and people jump all over the poor guy. Give him a chance. I tend to agree that the chair should have been 100% done already, but as long as it is ready for opening day, does it really matter that much? As for the snowmaking, shit happens. A transformer blowing that is GMP's responsibility to fix isn't really something that could have been prevented or controlled. Even if they had fired up the system a few days or weeks earlier, the transformer might have been fine at the time and still only blown now.

As for jumping on the guy about his title...come on. He said he would bring the suggestion about the town hall up at the next manager's meeting. I would think he is referring to a meeting with managers from a variety of departments (not just marketing). Just because he is the Director of Marketing doesn't mean he has unilateral decision making on items like that. Again, give the poor guy a chance before scaring him away.

 

[mtl1076]

If it wasn't financial then why didn't you bring the equipment in to raise the counterweight and get the lift certified earlier. The whole thing makes no sense.

 

[rocks860]

I feel real bad for this guy

 

[mtl1076]

lesson#1: don't come on to a ski forum with passionate users and continue the lies that have been getting you in trouble on facebook and caused you to think you have to ban people from commenting. Pretty simple really, he sat on his pulpit and rained down the ban hammer whenever he saw fit with his facebook page. Is it any surprise that his welcome would be less that glowing on a forum that allows actual, not censored feedback?