Do you have comments about the results of the 2008 DCSki Annual Survey? Post them here!

Very nice! I liked reading the survey this year. This is by far my favorite from the dislikes section: "too much focus on how many slopes Timberline will open "

Very informative and humorous in parts as well. Kudos to Scott for conducting this survey.

More kudos to Scott, especially for taking the time while "under the weather" to filter the inputs and prepare a thorough report.
Great Reading!!
It would be interesting to be able to better understand what drives respondents to vote as they do.
For example, what does best bargain really mean...cheapest, most snow for the buck, food, apre ski, what???? And why!
For example, it would never occur to me to list Snowshoe as the best bargain, but in many ways it is...especially if one uses the lift ticket packages available from COSTCO...$94 for 2 tickets, good anytime.
And it would be interesting to find out what specifically draws out negative opinions about an area: lift lines, ancient slow lifts, what? This info, by resort, might be of use to resort planners. Why is Canaan always the little engine that could but does not? It is always something different: not enough water, compressors, ski school director stolen away, etc.
Thanks again Scott!
The Colonel

What drives it? Personal preference, that's all. My wife and I have skied at over 30 areas and sometimes we even disagree. When we went to Tahoe she liked Northstar, I liked Squaw, we both hated Heavenly, and both liked Kirkwood. It just goes to show you, that not every ski area can make every guest happy. I tried to steer clear of local areas with my examples. This can become too heated a topic at times.

Great survey! I was really suprised about a few things:

1)populatity of snowshoe, i am one to agree that it is overpriced and over rated.. funny that it won both categories as well as best overall resort
2)people stating that they have been meaning to travel to ski Elk Mountain. Skied it earlier this year (had a race there) and it was a fantastic mountain, a real skiers' resort. Nothing too flashy about the base but the trails and conditions were amazing. Only complaint was that the lifts were slow and lines were long but the amazing skiing easialy made up for that.
3)Age of dcski readers. Who the heck has been skiing for 77 years!!?? You started skiing 58 years before I was born. I can only hope that i can say the same one day! But the average of 41 seemed really high. Also the amount of readers that have been skiing for 30+ years really shows the caliber of skier on this site.

[quote=Ullr]What drives it? Personal preference, that's all. My wife and I have skied at over 30 areas quote]

For the next survey, whenever that is, the number of resorts visited would be an intresting question to add to the list

Snowshoe is one of those love it or hate it kind of places. It tends to polarize people, which is why I no longer like to comment on that place. Either way, when someone goes there they always have a strong opinion when they return. Places like Wintergreen or Massanutten don't seem to have the same effect on people.

Growing up in that part of PA, I will agree with you on Elk. It is so out of the way that people never want to drive that far from Philly, so it is really a secrete. The place I have always wanted try, but have yet to is Whitetail. I hear many great things about it.

I agree... Or even just which resorts were visited. If a resort only had 2 or 3 voters visit, but all three voted it "best option for _____", then it may be a bit more significant than one that had 50 voters visit, but only 8 voted it "best option for ____".

I know we're starting to propose more difficult statistics, so I don't want to sound ungrateful... I like seeing the responses, I just found myself wondering why some of the places that didn't show up at all were missing. Were they that bad? Or just under-represented?


aaron

Scott -- at one time I think you had a graph showing site visitor & geographic location ... do you still keep such info?
interesting but not terribly useful info -- i admit.

The ambivalence towards Snowshoe is not surprising. Especially when it comes to apre-ski, for example. It has the best food and restaurants on one side, but then there's a deep wide chasm and it jumps to the really bad. Try Embers on one side and then the Junction on the other. Funny that the good places are all independently owned...

Paying $70 at Snowshoe is a bit absurd - but its what the market will bear - so I have a hard time calling it overpriced. To call it overpriced would be to indicate that there are a number of resorts just like it that are less expensive and that just isnt the case.

SS has 60 trails/14 lifts vs say Whitetail with 19 trails/8 lifts ($55). Unfortunately with gas prices being what they are you have to decide if its worth passing up the smaller yet cheaper resorts that are closer in favor of making a trip out of it to to to SS.

Agree, but one needs to realize that Snowshoe markets the Intrawest experience, one that is relatively upscale and with a central walking village where driving is a needless task. This is attractive to many people, so much so that they're willing to pay a premium for it. Stratton, for example, has a $78.00 ticket, but they can't keep people off the place.

For me in particular, not having to get in my car during the weekend is worth another $10.00 a day.

Here's a map showing top visitor locations from September 1, 2007 through today.



This is only a slice of the top visitors. In other words, each dot represents quite a few visitors from that location. If you zoom in further, dots start showing up all across the country. Even Montana!

Nice to see Roger's doing his civic duty and representing the central plains (both from home and work I see).

Yes Scott, but those are log in locations correct? The last time you put that map up, you showed a map of the world. Do you still have that? Specifically looking for all of the times I logged in from Puerto Rico. I should have a few from Dublin as well.

And as I said in my first post, it is all a matter of personal preference. My wife and I would pay an extra $10 a day to not ski there. The whole car thing does not fascinate us at all.

Hey look, you're right, it IS picking up my clicks from home as well as the office. Unless there's another DCSki-aspora out here.

Hey, there's a reason why I haven't introduced my boss's boss (a skier) to DCSki. Gotta keep tha Google Analytics off ma back.

Thanks for doing this Scott...especially while you were not feeling all that well.

Someone asked a question about # of resorts visited. I think that is a good question. Personally, I did not think I had visited enough resorts to know, so I did not answer the questions that seemed to be comparing resorts to each other.

Wow! cool map. All those hits from airports along the way paid off.

Survey Issues -

Maybe we need a new topic in the forum for just TR's? Or have TR's pulled to the front page. I enjoy TR but some times they get buried in the forum.

Thanks, Scott for a great format for the survey. I'll be pointing it out to the owners of a certain WV ski area with the most potential and worst food and customer service. I know they have made real efforts and some improvements in the latter two areas. However, they need to look at what the perception of the the DC Ski folks is and ask why. It should be obvious, but sometimes we use sight of where we are due to the business at hand which is what has happened there. It's a great opportunity for them if they seize it.

Yes, Scott this survey is revealing Thank You for your Time. DC Ski is not only a great way for skiers to find out about resorts but it is also a great way for resorts to find out about their customers.

To me personally it is no doubt that Timberline and the valley have the best skiing around and one of the best overall experiences, that is one of the reasons why I moved to Canaan Valley after working at several of the Mid-Atlantic resorts. That and the fact that the Canaan Valley area is one of the most unique truly outdoor areas that I have come across with endless year round outdoor activities and wonderfully friendly people.

However, having worked at Timberline full time four six years(I no longer do) it is no surprise that they have ranked most potential and worst customer service and food. There are departments that are excellent at Timberline and in my opinion are some of the best around ....some include but are not limited to Ski School and Ski Patrol.

However customer service, food, infrastructure, rental equipment, and other things need to improve to the caliber of these other departments as the survey relfects. BUt what is amazing is despite these things people love to visit timberline for it's fantastic terrain, wonderful people and true winter climate. And if I have the choice in the mid-atlantic I will always ride timberline because I go somewhere for the skiing and these places have the best lift service around and the most true mountain feel.

Kwillgoski is right on. Owners of Timberline this is a perfect opportunity to look at this survey and make improvements.

While I worked at Timberline I endlessly tried to convince the "Timberline and powers that be" to make improvements in product, cutomer service, etc. I apparently couldn't make a difference as an employee. Now I am asking as a local who's lively hood depends on other business's in the area to live up to there potential:


To the Owners of Timberline, Please visit other resorts(outside of the valley)and see what kind and caliber of customer services other mountains are offering. Please stay for a couple days at a resort and rent the equipment and ride the lifts and eat the food and pay attention to the customer service other resorts are offering. Please listen to some of your talented and knowledgeable employees...you have employees that actually ski and know the ski industry and know what skiers want and even have decades of industry experience(ski school and ski patrol). If you would actually listen to your customers and employees, let your employees do their jobs and quit micro-managing and begin to utilize the great terrain you have you can live up to your potential.

edit to my post: worked there full time during ski season not year round...

Last spring I polled DCSkiers to find out which resorts had received visits from DCSkiers during last winter. I have copied the results to ths post.
The Colonel

"And where did DC Skiers ski this winter?"
You may choose many (138 total votes)
Snowshoe
21 09%
Timberline
28 12%
Canaan Valley
14 06%
White Grass
5 02%
Wisp
13 6%
Wintergreen
12 05%
Massanutten
10 04%
Other VA
4 2%
Seven Springs
12 05%
Blue Knob
11 5%
Whitetail
25 11%
Roundtop
9 4%
Liberty
13 6%
Hidden Valley
0 0%
Other PA
5 02%
New England
15 7%
Europe
0 0%
North Carolina
1 00%
Utah
12 05%
Colorado
9 4%
Other Outside Mid-Atlantic
7 03%
Did Not Ski
2 1%

I think Canaan has more potential for slope improvement..TL Just has to polish a few things at the lodge & GET A HIGH SPEED LIFT!!!..I Sh!t & Get down TL & the heart is racing & I feel great & then I fall asleep heading back up...I dream of the day Canaan area is redone properly & TL spruces up their Joint..The Alpine scenery that goes with the Valley area is free of charge..time for the humans to step up to the plate!..Did I Mention that after 5 to 6 inches of Snow for the weekend they got another few last nite & today...& another couple on the way for tomorrow?...the ski areas there are blessed with mother nature but have abused this Blessing...I would love to Ski off into my Sunset there....Any news on MPC???!...Now that would be the sweetest Dream!