Colorado Ski Resorts Shift Marketing Strategies DENVER, CO (KUNC) - In another week, the American Eagle Lift will be loading skiers instead of just employees at the Copper Mountain Resort. It's a prospect that makes David Roth beam from ear to ear.

"The snow's coming, nice big fat flakes," he says.

Roth is the resort's marketing manager. He's hoping all the snow this fall in Colorado will get people thinking about skiing.

"We realize that it's not the best climate in the country right now," says Roth.

So Copper Mountain is trying to entice destination skiers to book their vacations early. But Roth says the resort expects to rely less on the once-lucrative national and international market and more on Colorado skiers this year.

"It's always been a big part of our business, and especially so in the recession," he says.

Industry Trend

What's happening at Copper Mountain is happening across Colorado and North America, as ski resorts look to radically shift their marketing strategies to ride out the recession. Some places are offering free lift tickets with hotel stays, others like Copper have free lodging deals.

"What the ski industry is doing is reflective on what the greater tourism industry is doing as well," says Jennifer Rudolph of the industry group, Colorado Ski Country USA.

Like last year, she says early season bookings are sluggish among Coloradans and everyone else. This makes it hard for businesses to know how much staff to hire or keep on.

Still, there are some positive trends over last year. For instance, season pass sales have been strong. Many resorts have frozen pass prices. Notoriously posh Aspen even lowered some of them. Vail is offering some of its season passes to out of state residents, and pass sales there are up fifteen percent over last year.

All of this is an easy sell for skiers. Neil McKutchin signed up his three year old son Kaden for a pass to Keystone and Breckenridge recently at the Denver REI Flagship store.

It has been a tough year for everybody, and everybody has cut down on a lot of things," McKutchin says. "But this is one thing that we did not decide to cut back on."

This is no doubt welcome news for resorts, and the broader, tourism economy here. Skiing is one of Colorado's lead industries, each year pumping in more than two and a half billion dollars to the state's economy.

"We're not worried, because by nature, anyone who works in the ski industry tends to be an optimist," says Jennifer Rudolph of Colorado Ski Country.

Ski Industry Awakening

Others aren't as optimistic as Rudolph.

"Last year was, you know the end of the world, this year we're seeing a more positive economic outlook," says Toon van Beeck, who tracks the industry as a senior analyst with the firm IBIS World Research.

"However you've got rising unemployment," he notes.

van Beeck says lift ticket and pass sales are important. They account for about forty percent of resorts' revenue. But the destination crowd is much more lucrative, and he says that market isn't what it once was.

"I think it's a big awakening for the skiing industry," van Beeck says.

Skiing has shifted toward the high end market in recent years. But that market has basically crashed, along with the real estate sales that helped pay for the slick amenities and fast chairlifts.

Back at Copper Mountain, David Roth is waiting to see whether the ski industry will return to its populist roots. But for now, he says, his resort is trying to cater to a range of income brackets.

"From what I've heard, the economy has turned around, or at least on the up and up," Roth says. "We're just trying to ride this out and really position ourselves to be successful coming out of the recession."


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