• What's ticked?
• Accolades
• Contact us

c o l u m n s

• Cheap Charlie
• ChrisCrossings
• Err Travel
• Leocha
• Travel Notes
• Archives

s u b s c r i b e

• Elliott's E-Mail, a free weekly newsletter, is your insider resource for moneysaving ideas.

First name

Last name

E-mail address

Subscribe
Cancel

• Like what you see? Now you can become an underwriter.

a l s o

• Ticked e-mail
• Visit Tripso
• Referring sites
• Home

s e a r c h

• Find a story.



(c) Elliott Publishing.

Ski Cheap
Cheap Charlie · December 1, 1999

I like to ski. I like to ski cheap. I just finished selling books and speaking with skiers at the Boston Ski and Snowboard Show. Though there is a bit of snow in the mountains, the weather in Boston was more spring-like than winter-like.

I am also the author of Skiing America 2000, an annually updated guidebook to North America's top destination ski resorts, as well as Ski Europe the top-selling guidebook to Europe's leading resorts.

I had the chance to have dinner with the tourism directors of two of France's largest resorts, as well opportunities to speak with marketing executives from dozens of U.S. and Canadian ski resorts.

There seemed to be a theme that was music to my ears. That tune was, "It's the price, stupid." When skiers can purchase lift tickets for reasonable prices they show up in droves. When lift ticket prices keep soaring, the numbers of skiers keeps dropping.

In fact, the American ski industry has been in a steady state of decline for years. If it weren't for the dramatic increase in Europeans coming to the United States as well as the growth of the snowboarding industry, most American resorts would have seen regular reductions in the number of people visiting their resorts.

For the past decade, resort management has lived by the mantra that skiers want high-speed detachable chairlifts, spectacular lodges and ... higher and higher prices.

Excuse me, but that just isn't the case. The facts are in and more lifts are important, but nothing makes more skiers come to the mountains as much as lower prices.

The amazing US Dollar to Canadian Dollar exchange rate has made Canada one of the most reasonable places in the world to ski. Canadian skier-day numbers have been soaring as the US Dollar falls.

The resorts are wonderful, with great trails and phenomenal food. In Europe the steady local prices with the falling US Dollar has made skiing in Europe's Alps almost as affordable as it was a decade ago, in terms of US Dollars.

Plus, with winter airfares now available for less than $400 round-trip from the Eastern portion of the US to virtually all Alpine gateways, the European ski vacation now costs less for East Coast skiers than a trip to the US Rocky Mountains.

Amazingly, if someone from California wanted to ski in Colorado, they could just about match the price with a trip to Switzerland. US prices are out of whack. Two years ago, Bogus Basin offered local skiers in the Boise, Idaho area an opportunity to purchase a highly-discounted season pass. The area registered more income during the three months of season pass sale than they had through the entire previous year.

Hello? Anybody home?

Last year, some Colorado resorts followed suit with major discounts on season passes. The results were similar, if not as spectacular.

This year, the low-cost season passes were available for the New England Booth Creek resorts of Loon Mountain, Waterville Valley and Mount Cranmore. They offered an entire season of skiing from Sunday through Friday for only $199 and currently are selling the season passes for $249.

The bargains will end soon, but the response was more than they expected. A local New England area, Wachusett Mountain, an hour and a half outside of Boston, offered another reduced season pass rate and ended up with more passes sold than ever in their history.

Time and again, good value will outscore expensive luxury for most normal folk. When you are planning a trip to Europe, a good travel agent can help. One place the Internet hasn't become very adept is the area of package tours. Someone who knows the ins and outs of skiing and travel to Europe can help.

The main tour operators for ski vacations to the Alps are Adventure on Skis, Ski Europe and Central Holiday Tours.

You can order my ski books through Amazon (just follow the hyperlink at the top). Knowing what is available makes planning your trip much easier. Or go to www.worldrec.com and simply click on either the cover of Skiing America or Ski Europe.

Charlie Leocha is the Boston-based author of Travel Rights: Know the Rules of the Road and the Air Before You Go. Cheap Charlie appears every Monday on this site. E-mail him at charlie@ticked.com or access his Web site.