How Ski Hills are Dealing with Warm Weather
Quinn Brownell
With all of these hot flashes across the country in the middle of February, ski hills are hitting a rough patch. Normally ski hills have thrived on cold temperatures in order to make and maintain snow bases, however, temperatures have been skyrocketing causing much of the snow to melt and running the risk of ski hills producing a net loss for the season.
On an average year, skiing and snowboarding would be breaking even right around this time of the year and relying on the season going into March and April for their profit. With the help of advancing technology, average skier days per year have risen drastically. Skier days meaning the number of days that hills are able to stay open. With the snow guns help, ski hills are able to make a deep base that can usually last until early April.
However buying this equipment to make and maintain snow costs quite a bit of money which is why the skiing business is so risky, especially on years such as this one. Costs range from the cost to operate and maintain the lifts, buying and maintaining snow groomers, operating and installing water pipes to reach snow guns, and of course the snow guns themselves and maintenance. On a good year much of last year’s profit is spent on next year’s maintenance.
The only thing that can save ski hills at this point is cold weather and snow which is looking unlikely. It needs to be under 30 degrees in order to make quality snow and most ski hills are unwilling to make snow past January since it is a large risk if temperatures warm up and melt the snow. However, a lift operator at Devil’s Head Ski Resort this past weekend said, “I have been here for 30 years and ever since we have never made snow past February 15th, if the weather is cold enough that will change.”
The warm temperatures are part of the problem, but also the amount of precipitation is causing problems. With very little precipitation, snow is scarce meaning that hills have to do everything in their power in order to stay open and make profit. Normally January and February are the best months on average for snowfall, however with a warmer climate there just isn’t as much snow as there used to be.
With a large business such as running a ski hill, it can be either a very large success or a terrible failure. With the entire business resting on the weather, it is nearly impossible to predict if it will be a good or bad season and the potential of the seasons in the future. It would be very hard to see skiing do well if this weather pattern continues as it seems to be continuing to get warmer each year leading to less snowfall. However, skiing will always be around, and most likely always be successful as long as they make good financial decisions and find ways to keep customers coming back.
Works Cited
Sellers, John. "Ski Resorts Struggling To Make Snow With Warm Temperatures." CBS Denver. CBS Denver, 24 Oct. 2016. Web. 19 Feb. 2017.
I did not know that it took until March for these ski businesses to start making profits. Hearing that really opens my eyes to the problem. And I didn't really think about all of the different factors that these skiing places have to deal with. Overall i think you did a very nice job explaining how this warm weather can really have a big negative impact on skiing this year and the charts you brought into your argument yelped with proving your point that without snow these ski parks will really be in trouble.
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting that all of this is happening at once instead of a gradual scale of increasing heat but just hot flashes is pretty weird. Also didn't know that their is such a small gap for these skiing businesses to make their profit. Global warming is happening faster and faster every year I guess it will have to affect something very big to get everyone's attention sadly.
ReplyDeleteWhile reading about the help of the snow guns I couldn't help but wonder if they'll be getting their moneys worth. Coming from someone who enjoys winter activities, as long as the weather allows us, how many people are going to have skiing on their mind as soon as the sun makes an early appearance? Of course you can always rely on those who's major sport/hobby is snowboarding or skiing but is that enough to make up for the additional people who go occasionally to enjoy the winter season? I don't know if it's worth the cost of the snow gun. If you think about ice skating, places like Eble are open year round for ice skating but once holiday season comes to an end the skating hype dies down and their income decreases. It's inevitable, once the sun comes out after a cold winter people are going to head to parks instead of ski slopes.
ReplyDeleteI had no idea it took ski hills so long to break even with all of their expenses. Seeing as I usually ski on school trips, I just assume the hills are always packed on nice snowy days. This year has been especially bad though, which isn’t hard to see with the temperatures rising to the 60’s during the day, and ski hills around us closing down in the hopes they’ll be up and running again soon. It’d be interesting to know how small the number of skier days can get without having serious long-term effects on the hills around us.
ReplyDeleteI agree that it is hard to run a ski resort out here because of the warmer temperatures that are out here compared to out west. It is easier to run a ski resort out west because you have mountains and the mountains get a lot of snow and since they are at high elevation it will be colder allowing more snow to fall and a longer skiing season. With snow guns they help but they don't make as good of snow as when it falls from the ski so it will get people not wanting to go if they snow is not really fresh. To stay in business they need to have summer activities for people to come and do to make more profit so that they can pay workers and for maintenance.
ReplyDeleteI always thought that ski hills were making tons of money with all of their overpriced food. Unfortunately, that seems to be the only thing bringing in money for those resorts as there is no snow to ski or snowboard on. I wonder how much extra the cost was to produce all of the snow for this year considering there was almost no snow. Couple that with the lack of skiers and I'm sure many hills are facing an ugly deficit. Hopefully the weather picks up, or worsens as some people might say, so that the magnificent ski hills do not need to close indefinitely.
ReplyDeleteAs the ski hills have already made their investments in equipment, I dont think it would be too much of a loss if a single year is bad. This is because a lot of people already bought a season pass, and just did not get very good use out of their passes. They are however, probably taxed relatively high and use a lot of electricity and water for snow creation and running the operation, racking up utility bills. I dont think a couple bad years will hurt these ski areas too badly, as their money has already been invested in capitol and will have more great years to come.
ReplyDeleteI am surprised how expensive ski hills actually are! Especially with the warm weather melting the ice as of late, the cost of keeping snow on the ski hills must be very costly. However with the amount of annual skiers increasing each year, it shows the interest of the masses in skiing. This annually increasing source of revenue will keep most ski hills in business, despite increasing temps. Although the price of skiing will rise to keep snow on the ground, I believe that demand will keep people coming back to ski.
ReplyDeleteSki hills make a huge investments up front and have a lot going on having a successful and cold winter. With snow guns this increase there revenue as they can both start the skiing season early and end later. With these random heat flashes, ski hills are less likely to invest in more of these guns because they will not turn a profit like they used to. With this, ski hill will most likely increase lift lift ticket and ski rental prices to compensate for their losses.
ReplyDeleteWhen I think about ski hills, I can't help but think how they make a lot of money. In places with not a lot of actual snow, especially with the warm weather we are having this year, they have to create their own snow. Like you said, this costs them loads of money, so how, when they have to make their own snow, do they make enough money to last them the summer months? The employees and the owners all must do something else during the summer to make some more money otherwise I question if they are able to solely live on the money they make during the winter months.
ReplyDeleteIt is very surprising to see how expensive ski hills are especially now with all of the random weather patterns. I can't help but think is there any profit in trying to run a ski hill with this type of weather and if not, then what else is there for the owners to do in order to make up for the opportunity cost in not working through those hot months.
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