Last year was a perfect storm, great snow, a good economy and the novelty of a new all-inclusive pass. Take one or two of those out of the equation, I think we will be having a complete different conversation. We had days at Mt. Rose that we actually drove in and turned around because even at 9:00AM there was a huge lift line, was that Ikon or Epic's fault? No.Winter 2017-18 start was terrible
Winter 2018-19 was an amazing snow year
I think last year crowding was in part due to many being *hungry* to ski and get after it while it was good. Make hay while the sun is shining and all that.
The ski industry needs volume of skiers. With the lower pass prices, we are going to get more people to the mountains. More people skiing, means more food and drinks consumed. More people traveling to ski and renting condos/houses/hotel rooms. More gear being purchased. Hopefully, more people on Pugski.com. Simply, more money funding the sport that we all love doing. Sorry, if we want to keep skiing and sharing the sport with our kids, we need the "people who ski" to fund us, "the skiers".