It's $62 now for a 4-hour flex on a weekend. Was it that much last year? It's pretty much forcing you to buy a advantage card.

If I recall last years rates properly, the 4hr session rate went up $4/ticket, but it also appears the 8hr rate may have gone down $2/ticket.

My biggest issue with the Snowtime resorts is the cost of Junior tickets.

Junior weekend rate for a 4hr flex pass for Juniors is $51 plus $44 for rentals. $95 for a 4hr session ($23.75/hr) for a 6-12yr old is ridiculous. Midweek rates aren't any better: $44 plus $44 for rentals or $88 per 4hr session ($22/hr). A 4hr session for a family of four who needs rentals is $402. This isn't a good way to attract new customers/families to the skiing and boarding industry.

This is why I always drive past WT on my way to WISP.

Wisp Resort 2012/2013 rates:

Junior weekend rate for a 12hr session is $65 ($8.13/hr) $40 plus $25 for rentals.
Junior midweek rate for a 12hr session is $54 ($6.75/hr) $29 plus $25 for rentals.

Adult rates at the Snowtime resorts aren't any better.

Timberline hasn't posted their 2012/2013 rates but their rates are very similiar to WISP's.

The $ I save on lift tickets alone by going to WISP, I could take your family of four for free.

That does seem a lot for Whitetail, but then they are one of the only two places you can go if you want to ski with less than a 2 hour drive from DC.

I will say I was happy I got the advantage card last year and made all my money back and started saving some after my 5th trip. In the past they've had a deal on the Advantage cards that if you buy it at one of the ski swaps or big sales events at the local ski shops they give you an extra 5 dollars off the early purchase price.

While I prefer Timberline, Blue Knob as and Wisp as ski areas over Whitetail and Liberty, it is so much easier for me to quick run up to Whitetail and Liberty with my schedule for a few hours of skiing. Meaning, while I think they are expensive for what they offer, I'll still pay it to get my skiing in.

Wow. Adults $62 for 4 hours on the weekend. $67 for the day. I guess if they're still selling tickets at that price, good for them. I can't see it being worth it.

I've only been there a couple times anyway since I'd prefer to head a little further north or west and make a weekend out of it.

Someone still goes to WT /without/ an advantage card?

Of course, if you're going less than it would take to break even on them.

@curih, apparently the humor fell flat? The (unserious) premise of the joke being that there's so many of us cardholders that we're guaranteed to fill the place up.


Yes, they're obviously steering the purchaser towards towards an 8-hour ticket. I'm not bothered.

From DC, Wisp is 90 miles further away, for a round trip extra commute of 180 miles. With a 25mpg vehicle that's 7 extra gallons of fuel, or just short of $27.

For singles, or couples who like vertical more than driving, it simply isn't worth going to Wisp.

Taking all the above into account, the thread title might as well be "Could I Please Have A Family Ticket Pricing Program At WT?". IMO the thread would be more effective that way.

But wait! The Family Advantage card also happens to apply to spouses and dependents. So for a family with 2 kids the Family Advantage card ($199) pays off in less than 3 4-hour visits ($94 savings each visit!).

So, maybe I should have meant that in full seriousness: Who'd want to visit /any/ of the Snowtime resorts without an Advantage card?

To answer the OP, yes, that's exactly what it's doing.

EDIT to respond to SCWVA:

First timers (including families) shoot themselves in the proverbial foot if they don't get a Mountain Passport. $45 per person gets that new-to-the-sport family /free/ group lessons for the rest of the season and Advantage-type pricing on /both/ rentals and lift tickets.

My total cost last season, to introduce an adult to the sport and give them free group lessons for the rest of the season, was $91 + $45 = $136. Cheaper than buying that person an advantage card.

on paper is seems better to go to WT, BUT, what you can't measure is QUALITY which put Wisp or Seven Springs well above any snotime hill especially whitetail which has a very tough time maintaining good snow due to its southerly face. I did the 'quantity over quality' thing for years and its not worth it.

While I'd rank Wisp higher as a ski area than Whitetail, it isn't better enough in my book to rate driving past Whitetail and giving up 3 to 4 hours of skiing time to ski there over Whitetail. Maybe if I could go out there every weekend, but I don't have that time.

I love being on skis and I can leave work an hour or two early and hit Whitetail or Liberty at night for several good hours of skiing. They are the only two places in the area I can do that with.

If I had the luxury of doing overnight trips for most of my skiing, I would be hitting Timberline, Wisp or Blue Knob. Right now, I hit those places when I can and ski at Whitetail and Liberty when I can't

I guess I get the best of both worlds, quantity and quality. Quality when I have the time, and quantity by filling in with some good skiing at the Snow Time areas.

@Finsout, it's a personal decision, to be sure.

I enjoy 7Springs for their natural snow and for their open space. I enjoy T-Line/CV for their natural snow and their old timey feel. I agree that Whitetail can't possibly keep their natural snow 'good' for any meaningful length of time on an open run.

But this all washes out. I bought gear that works great on 'not good' snow. I'm a decentish skier on 'not good' snow. I'm a great tuner for 'not good' snow. To the point that 'not good' snow doesn't change my fun quotient at all. And having that level of fun 4 or 5 sessions a week is just awesome.

agreed djop. more than anything the quality at the snowtime places has gone down in recent years which is the big reason why I am looking elsewhere. it seems the new focus is on doing just enough to keep people coming out. making snow whenever possible and taking a little extra time for grooming/park maintenance are things that are lacking but make or break the experience but all I've been seeing (mostly at roundtop) is cutting corners with a healthy dose of excuses. that is not worth the cost IMO.

Yeh, I thought you might be rather well familiar with RT.

I hear you on the disappointment when cost cutting is apparent. I'm still liver-squeezed over WT's getting rid of NASTAR.

TBH, I should say that I've been amazed at the size of the glaciers Snowtime have been able to build up in bad snow years.

WHAATT?! are you kidding me? what was the rationale?

I would agree with the glaciers comment except for last year. I couldn't believe the wasted opportunities to blow. We had 3 straight nights of around 25 WITH low humidity and they didn't make a single flake/pellet. The reasoning 'we had east winds and the hydrants are on the west side of the slopes". guess what geniuses, the fife park and minuteman both have hydrants on the east sides as well!! it was right then and there that i realized that the new regime there abandoned any concept of providing quality conditions. you should have seen the joke coverage they had the b@lls to charge full price for later in the season!

Roundtop has been it for NASTAR for a couple of seasons now.

I'm sorry, I can't write about rationales in any way that doesn't sound extremely put out.

I'm surprised Rusty hasn't shared his "insider info" on this topic.

Insider info for snowtime is very simple. Squeeze as much as you can from the customer because you are a monopoly. Everything else is just lame excuses for poor performance.

Interesting. Massanutten started NASTAR last season. They widened the bottom of Diamond Jim so that there was still enough room when the course is set up on weekends. Also means the ski team gets to practice more off Lift 6.

Only realized last season that Mnut has more vert than any place in PA. They pushed the point in the materials put out for celebrating their 40th anniversary.

Yeah, but it is called "Mass of Nothing/Nuttin."

...call me an optimist, but it might be a good thing they raised their prices...maybe now they can afford to stay open during powder days...

Raised prices don't surprise me too much, my visit to Whitetail the last two seasons was not the best. The crowds will still come right? Last year I think I saw Brice from Aspen Extreme get out of a limo at Whitetail- you dont see that up here at Blue Knob I always want to go WT or SS halfway through the season because I get tired of the slower lifts and think Ill get in a bunch of runs. At least over the past couple years this has been a mistake. The crowds were HUGE and the terrain just OK.

Seven Springs cost has got to be similar to WT. WISP (no verticle so why?) may not be as bad on a weekday but at MLK day year before last I remember an 80 lift ticket and still had to deal with slow lifts. Havent been to HV in a while.

I think CV and Timberline offer good deals for the skiing.

But its BLUE KNOB that seems to get overlooked cost wise. Its just as close (closer by 15-20 min) to DC then Wisp. They have not raised prices this year. $30, 5 hour weekday flex $48 Weekend Holiday 5 hr flex, inexpensive rentals. Blue Knob Season Passes are reasonable but they did go up last year $25 to $325 for a pass.

I love Blue Knob, but it's just too far away from me to be a regular run up for 4 or 5 hours of skiing on a busy weekend. However, I do hope to hit Blue Knob sometime this upcoming season.

The one thing Wisp has over Blue Knob and Timberline is there snow making. They often are the first to open in the area with any real terrain and their season goes a bit longer with better conditions than other local area resorts. That's why I tend to hit Wisp at the beginning and end of the season, but don't ski it at all during the middle. Once it has snowed a bit and been cold for a long period of time, I feel there is better skiing to be had at Timberline and Blue Knob if I feel like going further out than one of the Snow Time areas.

Totally fair! Anything more then an hour away only gets the occasional visit. With BK only 40 min away its certainly the home hill. I agree Timberline and Blue Knob got it on terrain. I also agree about Wisp and the snow. It's just colder in Garrett County! My wife worked at Garrett College and would always come back with snow on her car when there was none here in Centerville PA.

Where's that ears burning smiley?

I'm not working as a marketing rep for Snowtime any more. So I'm not plugged into the current early season info any more. However, in all my seasons at Whitetail since Snowtime became the owner, most ticket prices have been raised every season. There have been some price lowerings (e.g. for season passes, $10 lessons early season). I can't reveal specific pricing strategies, but my observation is that the computer game "Ski Resort Tycoon" has a realistic implementation of how this works.

In ski resort tycoon, if you don't raise prices, you lose the game. If you raise prices too much you lose the game. If you raise prices just right, the skiers that stop coming are offset by the skiers who grumble but keep coming and the skiers who just don't care. Then if you plow the extra profit you get back into infrastructure improvements, you can attract more customers and grow the customer base. Then the cycle repeats.

In general, ski resorts operate by using the profit from the previous season to fund off season investments. For really good seasons (e.g. snowmageddon), you peel a little off into the rainy day fund. For really poor seasons (like last year), you dip into the rainy day fund for the things that have to be done. At Whitetail, some investments have been easy to spot (e.g. new trails like sidewinder and ledgewood, new carpet on Northern Lights, new double chair for the terrain park), some investments have been subtle (e.g. the yellow fan guns cost 3X more than the old blue ones), but put out much more and higher quality snow at a lower cost (there were some mornings when the difference between Fanciful and Snow Dancer was night and day) and some investments you just can't see but do make a difference (e.g. the patio heating system to keep the decks clear), and some investments you'll just never see (e.g. replacing a burned out lift motor or a [cough] tired snowcat).

There's an old saying about how to make a small fortune in the ski business: start with a large one. That's what happened to the original owners of Whitetail. They rasied prices too and they looked like they were making bus loads of cash. But they still went bankrupt. It's easy to complain about high prices and obscene profits, but if you've seen how things really work you know that this stuff is hard to do. As a skier, resorts will listen to your complaints and try to make some accomodations. If you're price sensitive, there are deals to be had. You're just going to have to either travel farther or work harder to get them. Just be thankful that ski pricing isn't as complicated as airline pricing. Yet.

...it's just a crowded ice skating rink...

...so it behooves us to get good at skating.

Just don't practice your downhill cross-overs at Whitetail.

Hehe. Funny you mention that.

Remember that chat we had aeons ago about OLR vs. ILE vs. retraction? Remember how I told you I didn't even own an OLR transition?

I spent the rest of that season @ Stowe and WT working on OLR.

I think most of those brain cells were lost.

Run teh ILE by me again? (As I'm typing this, I'm getting a flashback of an extension/retraction critique that Bob Barnes made two years ago.)

ILE starts at the apex of the previous turn (presumably in the fall line)- the short leg is deliberately pushed downwards by muscle action until it's even with the long leg at transition. The trick is that the downpush is purely muscular, without changing the steering direction of the inside ski. Weight transfer happens at the same time as with OLR.

IOW, it's just like lunge turns/double push on skates.

How about some definitions for the rest of us. I am guessing, inside leg extension and outside leg retraction. Do you teach?

That's the one.