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Ken_R

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I’ll still bet you that on any given weekend the lines will be longer at ABasin than Loveland.

It’s nice to have both.

No, Loveland is terrible, everyone should go to A-Basin where the Bloody Marys flow like water
 
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fatbob

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I share your thoughts. I am guessing that some on this thread are jealous of those who live in a mountain town, so they think I have to travel xyz and put up with crowds every day, so you shouldn't complain.

I unapolegtically don't like crowds. It's a catch-22, by default I have to take up space wherever I go, yet I don't like crowds. Yet people will just go on as this is self-entitled or hating tourists.

Does ANYONE like crowds anywhere? Certainly not in outdoor activities ( I can see for sports stadiums and concerts that a crowd is important to the atmosphere). It rather comes across that you are a special little flower when it's the same for us all.

Unfortunately we are a highly populated planet and if don't have an infinity glove to snap your fingers, crowding is a reality especially in desirable locations in relative proximity to large population centres. Obviously there is a solution available - move to rural Montana or Terrace BC or wherever. That you choose not to take means you are just as much a part of the problem as those you decry.

And FWIW, and I really don't have skin in the Abay game, I think they have been a bit clumsy in the way they've handled this. Perhaps making less of a song & dance about leaving Epic would have been appropriate when they already were sleeping with wife to be No 2. Though I agree there was a clear inference to be made by those that paid attention, just that not everyone obsessively researches every decision.
 
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nay

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I am usually the dumb ass in the bunch. What I don't understand is if skiers days are flat, where are all these people coming from?
Some resort somewhere must be missing a whole bunch of skiers.

It’s best thought of like locusts. Social media + social media weather forecasting + mega passes = locust swarms. The mega pass is a required ingredient.

As @SBrown noted, many of these people clearly are there purely for a picture and an Instagram post. That’s a lot of what happened as the feel of A-Basin changed.

I’ve been saying for years that Loveland is involved with the Rapture. Lots are full, nobody on the mountain. Bunch of shiny Subarus in the parking lot, too.

It’s an easy place to be a tourist and just walk on the snow and take pictures. A-Basin is suffering this, too.

I’m just glad this thread is still rolling. I’ve been traveling way too much for my new job, and that’s meant that a) I’ve had too much time on planes to write long posts on my phone and b) I’ve been grumpy like A-Basin employees on a mega pass.

But here’s the question: does anybody really believe that A-Basin didn’t sell more season passes by playing it this way?
 
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James

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But here’s the question: does anybody really believe that A-Basin didn’t sell more season passes by playing it this way?
They probably sold less. Why would you buy a pass till you know what group they’ll join? Unless you ski there more than a week.

Did anyone really believe they wouldn’t join some pass group? Except the great mass of outraged people who ski less than 7 days at Abasin, yet think they’re regulars.
How many have had an Abasin pass before? I’ve had 2-3, many spring ones, don’t live anywhere near the place, and only ski about 7 days there.
 
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jmeb

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I had an Abasin pass one year of the five I've lived within an hour of it.

I can't say whether I would for sure buy one if they weren't on a mega-pass. I can say I won't buy one in the foreseeable future while they are.
 

Blue Streak

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This really impacts the former Keystone/ABasin pass.
I know a lot of people who had that pass and must now decide what else to do.
I think the strategy lies in the expectation that many of these may end up buying ABasin passes.
 

mikel

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I’ve been saying for years that Loveland is involved with the Rapture. Lots are full, nobody on the mountain. Bunch of shiny Subarus in the parking lot, too.

But I thought you used your insider secret power and had the Subies displaced by the yota crowd. :beercheer: They seem to be assembling at Copper. They even have their own reserved Subaru parking spots. :D
 
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jimmy

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I am six pages behind but this

I bought my Double Down the day after they announced they were leaving VR in February. After talking with guest services it sounds like I'll be able to get my money back but was told I need to keep waiting for more magical benefits to appear that will hopefully change my mind.

is kind of where I am at. I have a season left on an AB Double Down and Ikon Pass. I get five or six days at AB every season. I am an Ikon Pass holder but i won't add to the crowd. Seems to me the epic crowd was really bad after everyone else closed? I think anyway you do the math Ikon better than Epic.
 

nay

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They probably sold less. Why would you buy a pass till you know what group they’ll join? Unless you ski there more than a week.

Did anyone really believe they wouldn’t join some pass group? Except the great mass of outraged people who ski less than 7 days at Abasin, yet think they’re regulars.
How many have had an Abasin pass before? I’ve had 2-3, many spring ones, don’t live anywhere near the place, and only ski about 7 days there.

Of course people believed they wouldn’t join a mega pass since they made a huge deal about much better things were going to be without it.

I went ahead and bought the pass before the price hike, not so much because $50 is a big deal even if $449 sounds like too much and $399 doesn’t, but because it’s only 4 days of window price and from a cost perspective it’s a no brainer.

I have no use for an Ikon or Epic pass so it was really a ski A-Basin this season or don’t ski A-Basin this season, and I knew I would end up spending $299 on a spring pass anyway.

The thing that is changing, and quickly, is the benefit of the doubt that people provided Ikon as if it could somehow be the exact same thing as Epic with the exact same outcomes.

People already know that the outcomes may even be worse, because Ikon has affected more remote places that aren’t equipped for swarms. GMs from Aspen, Big Sky, and Jackson Hole all publicly pleaded with locals to be nice to Ikonics in the first season, so that’s all going to get (a lot) worse.

A-Basin was already hammered by this, and so there is a bitterness that it won’t be saved that probably goes way beyond A-Basin itself.
 

dbostedo

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GMs from Aspen, Big Sky, and Jackson Hole all publicly pleaded with locals to be nice to Ikonics in the first season, so that’s all going to get (a lot) worse.
Why would it get a lot worse? Do you know if Ikon pass sales are up and if they're not stealing from resort pass and ticket sales? And do you know if this snow year will be as good as last year and what effect that may have? I think there are too many variables to be so negative.
 
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Snowflake2420

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I was a former Epic holder that went to A Basin about 15 times per season because of the long season and I'd rather go there than Breck or Key. I purchased an A Basin pass after the VR announcement to support A Basin making this change with the hopes they wouldn't go Ikon. While my SO will miss Beav, Vail, and CB on Epic, those # of days did not make sense for the price tag. I'll miss CB for sure. If I had known A Basin would join Ikon, would my decision have changed? Maybe. But I still really like the place and I ski enough it makes sense.

It would have been amazing for A Basin to go full independent, but it's a business and we'll see how Ikon pans out. Really hard for me to believe it will be on par with Epic hordes.

I think the people who bought A Basin/Keystone mostly got them to frequent Keystone, so I bet a lot of those will stick with the Keystone offering.
 

nay

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Why would it get a lot worse? Do you know if Ikon pass sales are up and if they're not streaming from resort pass and ticket sales? And do you know if this snow year will be as good as last year and what effect that may have? I think there are too many variables to be so negative.

I’m not being negative. It’s just math. I have these conversations all the time at home - money is just math with a $ symbol. They don’t believe me, as if subtraction is optional.

Or in this case, multiplication.

Pick a really low number, like out of over 250,000 Ikon pass sales somehow the number one market of Colorado was only 50,000, and then multiply by 5. That’s 250,000 days, or about a thousand a day for the season, or pretty much every parking space at A-Basin on weekends since that’s when most people ski.

Now be realistic and use a number for the coming season that is quite a bit bigger than 50,000 and redo the math.

I’m not sure people understand that the goal of Alterra isn’t parity with Vail, it’s to be bigger and, given the investment pool, more profitable. Even though they aren’t corporate and whatnot.

All of that aside, here is a snapshot of Loveland’s season pass benefits:

2181FDC3-6506-4B83-B7F3-3207AB9AB690.jpeg

Something like this would have been super grin worthy for A-Basin season passholders, but want Loveland days, too, so **** them).

Problem is that once you are on the golden teat, you get a lot smaller once you are cut off unless you can feed yourself.

Again, not negativity - it’s the reality that none of these collective places can afford to pass up the revenue. The only way to keep adding resorts to the pass list without major price increases is to add passholders. Otherwise, it’s just diluting the pool or reducing margins.
 

Philpug

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I’m not being negative. It’s just math. I have these conversations all the time at home - money is just math with a $ symbol. They don’t believe me, as if subtraction is optional.

Or in this case, multiplication.

Pick a really low number, like out of over 250,000 Ikon pass sales somehow the number one market of Colorado was only 50,000, and then multiply by 5. That’s 250,000 days, or about a thousand a day for the season, or pretty much every parking space at A-Basin on weekends since that’s when most people ski.

Now be realistic and use a number for the coming season that is quite a bit bigger than 50,000 and redo the math.

I’m not sure people understand that the goal of Alterra isn’t parity with Vail, it’s to be bigger and, given the investment pool, more profitable. Even though they aren’t corporate and whatnot.

All of that aside, here is a snapshot of Loveland’s season pass benefits:

View attachment 78652

Something like this would have been super grin worthy for A-Basin season passholders, but want Loveland days, too, so **** them).

Problem is that once you are on the golden teat, you get a lot smaller once you are cut off unless you can feed yourself.

Again, not negativity - it’s the reality that none of these collective places can afford to pass up the revenue. The only way to keep adding resorts to the pass list without major price increases is to add passholders. Otherwise, it’s just diluting the pool or reducing margins.
But...there were 750,000 Epic Passes. Even if you add in the 150,000 MCP, we are still about 1/2 of Epic. Now take into consideration that those are global numbers only a percentage were in the Colorado Front Range. I would also venture to say the amount of Epic passes in the Front Range verses the amount if Ikon passes is a higher percentage compared to the global amount. I would also say the MCP is significantly lower because many of those are travelers. Do I think that someone will drive and get there at 10:00 and park in the front row on any given powder day? No, of course not. But I also don't think the bad days will be as bad as they were on Epic...but there will be bad days...just like any other resort.
 

nay

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Really hard for me to believe it will be on par with Epic hordes.

If you can go to a buffet and get unlimited or you can go and get 5-7 servings, but within a standard deviation no more than 5 servings is consumed, then so long as the number of eaters is equal, total consumption is more or less the same and “unlimited” just made you more likely to buy.

Now looking at the mountains on each pass, Epic and Ikon in Colorado probably won’t quite get to parity, but not far off either.

And so the food left at the buffet for stupid ass full paying customers like me as well as the length of the line to get to the buffet will more or less be the same in the unlimited vs. the 5-7 cap models, it just sounds different.

Problem is if you don’t have the 5-7 free coupon, buying four servings is the same price as unlimited, and that’s stupid, too, if you plan to eat there.

Marketing is really effective until people call bullshit and make their decision consciously.
 
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Wasatchman

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If you can go to a buffet and get unlimited or you can go and get 5-7 servings, but within a standard deviation no more than 5 servings is consumed, then so long as the number of eaters is equal, total consumption is more or less the same and “unlimited” just made you more likely to buy.

Now looking at the mountains on each pass, Epic and Ikon in Colorado probably won’t quite get to parity, but not far off either.

And so the food left at the buffet for stupid ass full paying customers like me as well as the length of the line to get to the buffet will more or less be the same in the unlimited vs. the 5-7 cap models, it just sounds different.

Problem is if you don’t have the 5-7 free coupon, buying four servings is the same price as unlimited, and that’s stupid, too, if you plan to eat there.

Marketing is really effective until people call bullshit and make their decision consciously.
@nay I side with your line of thinking but you need to do yourself a favor and just stop.

Trust me, you might as well push shit uphill, man. No matter how well an argument you present, even getting a concession that there is even a possibility you could be right from most of the Ikon / megapass fanboys isn't going to happen.

And even if you are right, nobody is going to later say a year from now, damn you were right about the relative crowding. They'll be too busy slapping each other on the back about their stats of skiing xxx number of different ski resorts on their megapass equaling $1.50/day. And don't even think about saying but yeah, the experience is degraded with more crowding.

Trust me, shoveling shit uphill is more rewarding than continuing to provide any counterpoints. Do yourself a favor and just stop.
 
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jmeb

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I would also venture to say the amount of Epic passes in the Front Range verses the amount if Ikon passes is a higher percentage compared to the global amount.

In the past -- perhaps. But the Ikon pass has only existed for one year. And it oversold its projections while Epic undersold theirs significantly. And now it has a much better line up of mountains for the Front Range skier. Especially for those skiers that don't have long-term commitments to any area -- aka most the new arrivals to the Front Range over the past 5-10 years.

While everyone is talking about unlimited vs 5-7 days -- no one is talking about a key metric that matters. Pass utilization -- i.e. how many skier days actually get used on each pass. The people I know who have Ikon passes tend to ski a good number more days than the people with Epic passes. And they tend to be the kind of skiers that are stoked on a places like Abasin. Of course there is no publicly available data on this.

It doesn't take a lot to tip the scales....Ikon sells another 40k passes in the Front Range, Epic sells 30K less. Ikon skiers ski an average of 12 days to the Epics 8. All of a sudden, numbers look way more even when you're talking total skier days on a mountain.

I'll give Alterra this -- they know what they are doing.

The real story in all this is we should develop more skiing in the Front Range. Not just ski resorts, ski areas. Simpler amenities, more skier focused. There is a market for it as suggested by Silverton, Loveland, Monarch, and even Ski Cooper all doing quite well for themselves. Backcountry skiers (like myself) will whine, but we will get over it as new lifts open up more remote backcountry.
 
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fatbob

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Anyone who is on a ski website in August is an outlier and therefore their personal needs for more than 5 or 7 days don't come into it. I was talking to someone from VR once on a chair and they said you'd be surprised at the number of epic passes they sell that are only used a handful of days or in April or whatever, often like gym memberships ambition exceeding reality. So if that's possible it's more than possible that a significant number of Ikon or MCP passholders will be around every spring weekend, unconstrained by their limited days. I'm sure the Epic data if you had it could be sliced and diced into die hards (30+ days), hardcore (say 15+ days) then early/ laters, spring bunnies, late season beachbums etc, the long tail fitting comfortably in the 5/7 days.
 

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