How Do You Rank Resorts?

As I mentioned in the other thread, I had a hard time finding the skinet.com criteria for the annual ski resort ranking.  

Google is a wonderful thing — I finally found them. In the order they are listed:

Snow Quality
Grooming
Terrain Variety
Challenge
Value
Lifts
Resort Service
Weather
Access
On-Mtn Food
Lodging
Dining
Après / Nightlife
Off-Hill Activities
Family Programs
Terrain Parks
Scenery
Overall Satisfaction

And Ski Mag has this real cool tool that allows you to click on each category, to see how each of the 50 mountains, ranked in each category.

James and I were talking about this last night. For me, it's all about the experience of actually skiing. I want new snow, every day, challenging terrain, lots of trees, short lift lines. As far as off-mountain stuff, I want reasonable lodging that is close to the hill, so I can get at first tracks, ski all day and be home early to do it all over again the next day. Because we've got a youngun ... lessons are important too. I guess I care about access too - I can ski more at a resort that is 5 hours away than one that is farther.

I'd trade all the apres stuff for an additional two inches of snow each day.  But that's just me.

What categories matter to you and why?

I guess, from that list, I'd put "Challenge", Terrain Variety, and Snow Quality at the top.

After that, I guess value, access, lifts and weather would fall in there somewhere, with the rest drifting towards the bottom.

Also, I find I like mountains more when I'm with cool people showing me around to secret spots, less when I'm fighting crowds and fearing for my life the whole day.

The people i'm with make the day. Then snow and lack of crowds. If the terrain is challenging great if not that's fine too..Like Harv said, it's all about being out there doing what we love..

Challenge, snow quality, trees, and like above, the company I'm skiing with (I'm usually with my best ski bud, Hickorymartha, so all is good).  

Like they said above.

There is another quality that should be added to the list, IMHO. To me, the "vibe" of the place is very important. Every hill has its own particular vibe and some are more appealing than others. If you don't understand what I mean, spend a day at Mad River Glen, which ranks very high in my "good vibe" category. I suspect Magic Mountain is up there too, though I've never been there. If the vibe is good and skiing sucks, you will still have a great day.



A good vibe description of pretty marginal conditions at MRG

SBR hit right on the head...

+1 for the importance of vibe. I will forgive virtually anything (except unskiable conditions) if the ambiance is to my liking.

Belleayre, Bobcat, Magic, Plattekill, Burke, Sutton, Hickory, Pico, Big Tupper (haven't skied there, but it looks good): small, atmospheric, under-the-radar, with no easily defined demographic -- those are my kind of joints.

One of the problems with this particular ranking set-up is it is based on the limited view of the participants. If all you ski is Holiday Valley and you love the place, then I guess you think it should be highly ranked. On that 2010 ranking in the link (with the cool wheel of rank) Holiday Valley is 4th in the East. That is absurd. Certain things like weather and access are impossible to rank on an East coast basis. HV ranks high in weather and access. My question is for who? Do so many people ski HV that they skew with the survey? Cleveland and Buffalo (and Pittsburgh) have easy access to this place but I would think most people from WashDC to Boston would not consider HV because of access. The positive rank from Buffalo should be balanced by the lack of visitors from Wash to Boston. The place is about 5-6 hours from North Jersey. I can name at least 25 places within 6 hours that I would drive to before HV. As for weather, forget it. It is not possible to rank it.

For me terrain variety, snowmaking coverage, and lack of crowds are most important. Access is also important, but it is not something that can be ranked because of the wide spead of East Coast skier population. Lifts can be good or bad for crowd control. HV has 11 quads over about 290 acres. Three are now HSQ. There might not be lift lines, but I would imagine the slopes are crowded on weekends. By the way it seems HV is ranked 2nd for lifts on the 2010 survey. The other items in the ranking (night life, lodging, food, other activities, family  programs) are nice to have when on vacation, they rank below the skiing for my decision making.

Easy answer.     Take all the criteria listed, move "scenery" up the list before "on mountain food" .  Let readers score, then REVERSE weight the items.  Example:    If there were 12 items, criteria 1 would be worth 12x that of criteria 12 which whose score would only be multipled by 1.      

Take the poll and multiply then add.      


I would be happy with this, because I am a skier.   However, if I "liked to ski" and wanted to take a ski vacation with my family who never skied...I would likey want the inverse of the above.  


So that said.....with the data out there and computers....a smart person with time on their hands would create an APPLE APP....call it  "ski vacation"    The user ranks his/her criteria in order then the computer reviews the reader's data, accounts for weighting as above, and suggests the top 5 resorts for that individual.   Only one thing to add...skier ability, Green, Blue, Blue/Black, Black, Trees, Park---the App would also account for this and it too could be weighted.    

Example, Harv picks 1) new snow, 2) trees, 3) childrens learning center-----App spits out Breck.      He filters for East Coast and gets  Gore   :)

Harv, if you create it, I want 10%.

Less people, more powder, less people, more powder.


Trees.

The intangible "feel" of an area often is one of the most important criteria. The best example I can think of is Sugarbush. Great area, great terrain, good trees and snow, lots of ungroomed. Lots of the things I look for in my favorite areas. But if I were to rank my ten favorite ski areas, Sugarbush would not make the short list for consideration, let alone the cut. That said, I will forgive any intangible if the snow and terrain is right (e.g. Stowe). Minus those two examples of intangibles I don't care for, I tend to find the areas with the intangibles I like often have the best snow and/or best terrain. Go figure.

I agree with much of what has been said here.  After the first five or six categories on the list, I just don't care.  I am not looking for apres ski, family programs, or resort amenities.  We almost always bring our own lunch.  We took our family out to Winter Park two winters ago.  My kids went from pajamas to long johns right back to pajamas.  We skied bell to bell and spent our evenings in the condo resting and getting ready for the next day.  They put on street clothes once to go out and pick up a few stickers for souvenirs.  I think vibe is huge and it is hard to quantify, but I know it when I feel it.  

Goreskimom wrote

 I think vibe is huge and it is hard to quantify, but I know it when I feel it.  

Snicker Snicker.....

But yea, I agree with what she said!......

I:)skiing wrote

Easy answer.     Take all the criteria listed, move "scenery" up the list before "on mountain food" .  Let readers score, then REVERSE weight the items.  Example:    If there were 12 items, criteria 1 would be worth 12x that of criteria 12 which whose score would only be multipled by 1.      

Take the poll and multiply then add.  

This is along the lines of what I suggested that SKI Magazine do in creating their resort rankings.  They ask the readers to grade the importance of each criterion so I know they have the information to weight by importance grade to get more credible rankings.  Nonetheless they rate all the criteria equally, thus "cooking" the results in favor of resorts with luxury amenities.

I'm with the first poster. It's all about snow, terrain variety and challenge.

riverc0il wrote

The intangible "feel" of an area often is one of the most important criteria. The best example I can think of is Sugarbush. Great area, great terrain, good trees and snow, lots of ungroomed. Lots of the things I look for in my favorite areas. But if I were to rank my ten favorite ski areas, Sugarbush would not make the short list for consideration, let alone the cut. That said, I will forgive any intangible if the snow and terrain is right (e.g. Stowe). Minus those two examples of intangibles I don't care for, I tend to find the areas with the intangibles I like often have the best snow and/or best terrain. Go figure.

Not to get all Sugarbushy, but I'm not sure I follow.  Are you saying that the vibe at SB is so lousy that it outweighs the physical attributes of the hill?

Tin Woodsman wrote

riverc0il wrote

Sugarbush would not make the short list for consideration, let alone the cut.

Not to get all Sugarbushy, but I'm not sure I follow.  Are you saying that the vibe at SB is so lousy that it outweighs the physical attributes of the hill?

Hah, reminds me of a discussion on First Tracks Online where rivercOil scolded me for claiming that the then-new Clay Brook complex had a "classic Vermont" (in the eyes of tourists) exterior look. He felt that they should have made it look more like Morrisville.