Jay Peak Partners with Disney

From Boston.com:

The crates began arriving at Jay Peak in Vermont Monday, huge crates bearing huge things. They were statues, 1,500 pounds and more, of Buzz Lightyear, Jessie, some toy soldiers. At first, no one at the resort quite knew where to put stuff that big, but in an hour, space was found, and in came the first characters from the “Toy Story” movies.

It marked the beginning of one of the most unusual partnerships in New England snow country, and the arrival of a major new player in the world of winter sports, the Disney Corporation.

By mid-January, according to spokesmen at Jay Peak, 5 acres of terrain called the Playtime Burton Riglet Park will open to prospective new snowboarders ages 3 to 12, dedicated to creating new young enthusiasts of the sport.

Under the licensing deal with Disney, the statues of familiar “Toy Story” characters will appear in the park, along with features aimed at enticing newcomers.

“Our whole approach is to let the kids play and have fun,” said Jeff Boliba, Burton’s vice president for Global Resorts who brokered the deal with Jay, Burton, and Disney. “his is not about learning technical turns or trying to get them to the blue runs. Our goal is clear and simple: Let the kids play and let them have fun, and the rest will follow.”

The new park comes just a year after Jay opened its 50,000-square-foot Pump House Waterpark, with its many features and rides intended to take the winter vacation into new dimensions. Jay also features a full ice arena. , again an alternative to standard snow-ori ented vacation fare.

http://www.boston.com/sports/other-sports/skiing/2012/11/29/disney-partners-with-jay-peak-lure-young-snowboarders/miIPcWb34pM1iFdcaNhM4L/story.html

I was under the impression that Jay and Disney had partnered a long time ago ......hasn't Jay been using Disney's "Imagineering" dept. for snow reports?!?!



TD

What's next? Disney buys the Star Wars franchise?

Oh...

Oh dear. I may have to take back my promise to only blog about skiing this season.

Sigh.  I thought I was a capitalist. I really did.

I think I'm going to have to start fantasizing about Smuggs.

River... pull up a log... and tell me a story, about deep snow, and great trees .... at Smuggs.

Harv, you seem shocked (shocked!) by this development.

On one level, this story is shocking and ridiculous: damn the capitalist pigs!!! One another level, step back and say, "whatever..." It's a small chunk of the area and solely intended to make snow sliding more fun for kids. What's so bad about that? And Disney or not, those sculptures are chainsaw carvings, which is pretty cool. I sure hope they let little skiers into that park. Harv, ask yourself: what would your daughter think about this?

To follow up, I think they should take it to the next level and partner with Peter Jackson and the LOTR franchise. Imagine a life-sized Gandalf guarding the entrance to Valhalla, with a motion activated audio player: "you shall not pass!" Galadriel could live in Andre's Paradise, the Orc army would be scattered through Kitz Woods and the terrain park would be made to look like Hobbiton in the winter.  It would be an all-mountain Middle Earth experience.

On one hand, complaints of "this place is totally becoming Disney World" will be completely valid. On the other hand, if this is what it looks like there (yesterday):



Then they can really do whatever they want with the kid's section of the mountain.

I never really got the "Disney World" put down, anyway. Don't a lot of people really like that place?

mattchuck2 wrote

I never really got the "Disney World" put down, anyway. Don't a lot of people really like that place?

Nope. Bor-ing. But, hey, if Universal Studios could team up with some mountain and do a simulated avalanche ride, like the Earthquake ride I went on some time ago down there, even old benny would sign up for that. woohoo!

Benny Profane wrote

Nope. Bor-ing. But, hey, if Universal Studios could team up with some mountain and do a simulated avalanche ride, like the Earthquake ride I went on some time ago down there, even old benny would sign up for that. woohoo!

Definitely true. Universal owns Disney when it comes to rides. But kids like Disney - no reason not to cash in on that fact.

I'm not shocked, at all. And (unfortunately) it doesn't really affect me much.

Matt's right a ton of people love disney. The evidence is overwhelming: people deal with an incredible amount of logistics to spend a few days there.  Money, airtravel, lines, traffic.  The only thing worth that much hassle to me is the kind of skiing you get at Jay.

And SBR is right Neve is into it, we focus grouped it last night.  But the water park is already enough - she wants to go to Jay to hit the pumphouse.

I'm definitely out of the mainstream on disney (and lets face it a lot of things).  Yea kids love disney, but do they need it?  If Neve doesn't "do disney" will she grow up to be an unhappy adult?

Like I said I'm sure that won't be a popular opinion.

Neve had this (locally) famous rockstar kindergarden teacher who had 18 special days when the parents were expected to skip out of work come and whatever. Japan Day, Pirate Day, I can't even remember them all. It was ridiculous IMO. The kids got hyper. Now in first grade, they are learning reading and math. Home work is now simple and productive.

Back on topic - Jay is a business. They have investors who expect action.  They'd die if they catered to me. Let me park at (crappy old) stateside, pee in a stinky bathroom, ride a crappy slow, cold lift and ski the dip.

I think this is a great idea. I would bet that this would make a lot of families with young children consider Jay vs somewhere with a much shorter ride. I'm not a big fan of Disney World as a vacation, but even my college age kids would go back in a heartbeat.

tom

This is an brilliant idea, actually, and makes me wonder why it hasn't been done before. Not marketing to me, but, will pull the families in, for sure. Just imagine how some stupid Disney character could be the fork in the road where some little kid forgets about the discomfort of the snow and cold and boots and stuff and smiles and starts to like skiing for the rest of his or her life. And, at the same time, Dad and Mom can escape to a pretty damn good ski hill for the day while junior hangs with Goofy.

Having skied Jay only five days in my life, I'm nothing more than a spectator watching from seven hours away; however, I wonder at what point Jay regulars are pushed over the edge and can't reach for the "hey, as long as it keeps the ski area profitable and open, they can do anything they want" talking point.

I can't imagine why anyone would object to the Disney park (actually they don't even include "Disney" in the name, it's the "Playtime Burton Riglet Park ").  It's 5 acres of terrain, what is that 1% of Jay's terrain?  Let 'em spray paint the snow there pink and green and orange, who cares?  More power to Jay for coming up with a way to engage kids in the sport.  Admittedly I haven't been to Jay since they added the Water Park, but compared to that development the Disney park does little to change the character of the resort or imapct Jay regulars.  After all, they're not going to have Disney characters all over the whole mountain... or are they?

Whiteface is also going to have a Burton Riglette Park this year but I have not heard anything about a promotional tie in.  That must be something Jay did independent of Burton.

Northstar at Tahoe has a Burton Park with a Star Wars Theme:

http://www.skilaketahoe.com/blog/random/sierra-tahoe-resort-introduces-burton-star-wars-experience

What should Whiteface's Theme be? I say Muppets. We already have people on this board who have been auditioning for Statler and Waldorf for years:

mattchuck2 wrote

Northstar at Tahoe has a Burton Park with a Star Wars Theme:

http://www.skilaketahoe.com/blog/random/sierra-tahoe-resort-introduces-burton-star-wars-experience

What should Whiteface's Theme be? I say Muppets. We already have people on this board who have been auditioning for Statler and Waldorf for years:

 Rolling on floor laughing

Maybe all the Riglet parks have themed tie ins but they didn't tell the staff about that when they introduced the concept in our fall training day

Jamesdeluxe wrote

Having skied Jay only five days in my life, I'm nothing more than a spectator watching from seven hours away; however, I wonder at what point Jay regulars are pushed over the edge and can't reach for the "hey, as long as it keeps the ski area profitable and open, they can do anything they want" talking point.

I doubt it will ever get to that point. I was going to make a snide remark in my previous post along the lines of "this is great! The more Jay die hards that leave Jay for becoming more like Disneyworld, the more untracked powder I can ski!" I deleted the line before I posted because who am I kidding, Jay has us by the balls. Where else are we going to go? Stowe? For twice the cost? No thanks. Smuggs? If only the liftlines were not long on the weekends. South of 89? I love MRG but Jay gets significantly more snow. We'll keep coming back even if we gotta kiss an f'ing mouse to get onto the lift.

Harvey44 wrote

River... pull up a log... and tell me a story, about deep snow, and great trees .... at Smuggs.

Here ya go, Harv:
http://www.thesnowway.com/category/trip-reports/reports-by-area/vermont/smugglers-notch

GREAT skiing AND family friendly AND a resort and STILL old school, just the way I like it.