Resort lays out plans for ski season

With the temperatures scraping 80 degrees this week, it’s early for most people to start dreaming of snowflakes that stay on one’s nose and eyelashes, but for some, the timing is perfect — for businesses biting their nails for a whitewash, the earlier the planning, the better.

Stowe Mountain Resort usually holds these informational sessions in October, but this year they wanted to get ahead of the game, meeting at the Green Mountain Inn Thursday.

Shawn Owens, sales director for the resort, started by looking back at the resort’s summer activities, like zip line tours, treetop adventures and indoor rock-climbing.

Owens said the resort’s new Adventure Center — the 108,000 square-foot showcase building that opened this summer and provides a launch pad to all those activities — has “blown away any expectations that we had,” Owens said.

Trips up and down the gondola and the Toll Road have consistently done well, Owens said, and this year so far has been no exception. Gondola ride sales are up 4.5 percent so far and toll road transactions are up 7 percent. Food services, including new market The Pantry and new coffee shop The Beanery, are also doing well, Owens said.

The resort also hosted its first big summer event on July 3 when Rusty Dewees brought a variety show with fireworks and food.

“It was a great atmosphere,” Owens said. “We’re proud of the event and we hope to do more.”

But Stowe Area Association members were there to hear about what they could expect this coming winter.

New this winter

Even if the weather doesn’t cooperate by Nov. 21 to usher in the powder sorely missed last year, Stowe Mountain Resort has another ace up its sleeve. It’s fixed its snowmaking system on Hayride Trail — it was broken last year — and will be pursuing a different tactic.

Rather than burying Mansfield in as much snow as they can, as early as possible, resort snowmakers will start with a relatively shallow coating and build it up as the season goes on.

Regular day passes are more expensive than ever: $124 per adult and $104 per child at the ticket window. It’s the highest the resort has charged, and it’s counting on Stowe Area Association lodging members to help them sell.

For the third year, Stowe Mountain Resort has single-day direct-to-lift tickets that lodgers can offer their guests. These tickets allow holders to bypass lift lines. Lodging members often factor the prices of the direct-to-lift tickets into packages and use them as incentives. Direct-to-lift tickets, which the resort buys in bulk, are being sold to lodging members at $85 each.

Season passes went on sale Aug. 6, Owens said, and they’ve been selling well, especially since resort officials extended the age range of “young adult” passes to include 19- to 34-year-olds (“We just redefined what it means to be young,” the resort’s website boasts).

The County Pass, which offers discount rates for residents of Lamoille and Washington Counties, has been extended to Orleans County residents, too. The resort is also allowing second-homeowners in those counties to get the discounted rate, something they’ve have been clamoring for.

“I really think that will help sell passes,” Owens said.

The resort is offering year-round child care at the village’s Cubs Child Care facility at Spruce Peak Base. It’s moved the carpet lift from West Slope to the adventure center to let intrepid adventurers ski all the way down.

This is the first year in a long time there won’t be construction during the winter season, Owens said, although they are planning to construct a new building to house the ski patrol and the race program.

In response to state concerns about aerial drones at ski resorts, Stowe Mountain Resort says they’re allowed, provided pilots go through marketing staff first to get approval so they can shut down lifts and the gondola ahead of time. Without prior approval, drone use at Stowe Mountain Resort is prohibited.

Resort staff has also been making trips to ski shows near and far — think Toronto, Ottawa, Boston and New Jersey — to promote Stowe’s slopes.

Despite the drop in the Canadian dollar, Canadians, especially those from Montreal, are still coming to Stowe to ski.

“We’re out there with every ski resort to promote everyone here,” Owens said. “It’s four days of us selling fun.”

Getting ahead of winter

Patti Clark, innkeeper at Green Mountain Inn and chair of the Stowe Area Association’s strategic marketing committee, was grateful to the resort for preparing its their presentation a month earlier than prior years.

“They’ve worked with us so cooperatively,” Clark said. “We have a head start this year. It’s a great opportunity to sell. We’ll be marketing to target the holidays.”

Rachel van den Berg, owner of Sun and Ski Resort on Mountain Road, said people are already starting to book for Christmas.

The early meeting with Stowe Mountain Resort helps lodging members “get on top of winter,” van den Berg said. “The whole town is rallying to be prepared” after last year’s dismal snow showing, she said.

In conversations with other ski resorts, Owens has learned “their area associations strive to be what Stowe’s is.”

“These resorts would like to have Stowe Area Association,” he said. “They work for everyone, and they do a good job at it. They’re out there full-force.”