Killington Blog: A New Vision for 2012-13

Not exactly new news (posted on 10/4), but I just saw this blog post by Mike Solimano of Powdr. This seems like pretty frank communication that I find to be refreshing.  I'm making an assumption that K won't mind that I posted this in it's entirety as it is something like a press release.

Looking Forward, a new vision for the 2012-13 winter season

I am truly excited to take on my new role and responsibilities at Killington Resort and Pico Mountain as President and General Manager. In an effort to improve communication with all Killington/Pico stakeholders, I wanted to share my vision through a blog and continue to write blog posts regarding the resort’s progress on that vision.  

While I am new to this position, I have been with the company for 12 years and my executive team has an average of 21 years of ski resort experience. All but one of my team members has over 15 years’ experience at Killington and Pico; we know the resorts well and understand what makes them so great.  

Powdr Corp., based in Park City, Utah, is Killington and Pico’s parent company, as well as a holding company of mountain resort and action sports companies. Powdr is a privately held, family owned business with a decentralized approach to resort management. Simply put, decisions on how to run the resort are left to the local management team and Powdr’s main influence relates to capital allocation. Therefore, I take full responsibility for any decisions made moving forward at our resorts. One of my goals is to balance the variety of priorities that are important to our guests’ experience on and off the mountain. Although it’s tough to please everyone, I hope that explaining the business reason behind the choices we make will help our guests understand our strategy and thought process.

First, I would like to review some items from the past. Last year was one of the most challenging winter seasons on record, but we were able to open on October 29 for daily operations and provide some of the best skiing and riding in the region. Tropical storm Irene hit us hard, and we have rebuilt and improved the resort. Last year, over $8 million was spent on our capital investments including the removal of the original Peak Lodge and rebuilding after Irene with the installation of the Roaring Brook Umbrella Bars and deck. Additionally, several hundred new low energy snow guns were purchased. We have invested over $25 million in the last five years in our resorts and have another $10 million in investment planned for next year, highlighted by the completion of the Peak Lodge in December of 2013.

Our resorts were built at a time when the sport was seeing significant revenue growth, which allowed us to operate the resorts profitably. Times have changed, and we operate in an extremely competitive and capital intensive business. We have spent the past few years restructuring the company and trying different strategies to make us more efficient and more profitable. This is important because our business model allows us to invest all our local profits directly into capital investment thus improving our resorts.    

With tough economic times and our focus on efficiencies, at times we lost sight of what has made Killington great. Our approach moving forward will focus on bringing back the best of Killington and truly live up to our name, “The Beast”. Killington is the biggest mountain resort with the most extensive and varied terrain, offering more snowmaking horsepower, more snowmaking coverage, and more lifts than just about anyone else in the East.  These are the superlatives that describe who we are and what we do best. We need to regain that swagger that allowed us to have bragging rights in almost every measurable category of operation. Look for us to return to the roots and essence of whom and what we are.

In that regard, I will focus on the changes we are planning as we move forward:

Season Length

We are committed to providing the longest on-snow season as possible, after all that’s The Nature of The Beast. This means we will open early and stay open late. While our focus will not be on "being the first to open," we will be more aggressive than in prior years to get open as soon as possible. Our snowmaking team is on high alert and will begin to make snow as soon as we have a good window of weather opportunity. In addition, we understand that our guests love Killington in the spring and we are committing to staying open until we can no longer provide a quality product.

Make this place fun again

In today's business climate, insurance concerns and business risks can sometimes drive businesses to make decisions that are not always guest focused. Killington has let this happen in certain circumstances and sometimes become too corporate in instituting new policies. We understand that our guests are coming to our resorts as a release from their normal lives and want to enjoy the outdoors and have a great time. One change that we hope will help move us in this new direction is to bring back the Bear Mountain Mogul Challenge (BMMC):

This was an event that made Killington famous. Over time, various rules and restrictions slowly killed this event. I bear responsibility for many of these changes as I was part of the management team that slowly instituted many new restrictions on the event.

As a part of the NOR’BEASTER, a ten-day event to kick off the spring season, we will bring back the BMMC this year. The goal is to return the festivities to the way they were in the past while being able to follow all VT Laws.  

8:30 a.m. opening on weekends

As many of you know we have decided to open on weekends and holidays at 8:30 a.m. This decision was made based on the fact that there are many operational issues with opening early and many of our competitors are moving in this direction.

We have heard different opinions on this decision from various groups of stakeholders. Even though the 2012-13 Killington Trail Guide has gone to print with the 8:30 a.m. opening, we have decided to be responsive to our guests and make a change to our morning operation time:

We will continue with the plan to open operations at 8:30 a.m. on weekends and peak days, but we will open the K-1 Express Gondola at 8:00 a.m. giving guests who want to start early, access to the main part of the mountain with the most varied skiing, while allowing us to continue to groom the rest of the mountain for the 8:30 a.m. opening.

There will still be a commitment to many other areas that have made our resorts great such as racing programs, snowboard and ski events, seeded moguls, parks and pipes and a major focus of bringing more beginners into our sport.

For those with local ties, look for us to roll out plans that describe how we intend to drive these initiatives of growth in more detail in meetings and presentations that my team will be doing this fall. This includes home owner association, Chamber and other civic organizations meetings.

We are excited for the upcoming season, and we hope you are too.

Mike

Nice to see that this isn't a real estate company, and they are re-investing capital into important things.
Weird how they are suddenly bringing back the mogul challenge. Must have gotten a ton of nasty responses from the long time customer base, of course. One wonders how many season pass holders they lost to other mountains. Very clumsy and unnecessary move. I've always wondered if this family run company from Utah has Mormon roots, and just couldn't stand the thought of a bunch of yankees having fun in the parking lot. We'll see how the new guy fixes that mess. If they bring back the Vermont State police, he may as well not bother.
One thing he seems to be doubling down on is that "Beast" thing. Dear lord, please please make that go away. I like Killington, but, it is pretty low on the cool place to ski list, and that stupid marketing name does not help at all. And now I am going to be subjected to promotions for the Spring NOR’BEASTER. Oh, the pain.

I find KMART drama boring.  But I did always get a laugh out of that poster dude Humpty.  He was a hoot!  

ScottyJack wrote

I find KMART drama boring.  But I did always get a laugh out of that poster dude Humpty.  He was a hoot!

OMG, I forgot about Humpty----he was a hoot--bring back Humpty!!!

dude was Larry off the charts!  

Blog about this:

http://www.boston.com/travel/explorene/specials/ski/blog/2012/10/cow_manure_to_p.html

CONTENTS DELETED

hate is such a strong word....

Nice work by Killington. If they can get some of the old juice back the people will return.

70s Gore Kid- Mike Pratt has spoken to this blog many times over the past few years. How quickly we forget.

70s Gore Kid wrote

Personally I hate the tight lipped nature of the GM's of Gore-Whiteface-Belle.  I have never heard any quote from a Whiteface GM.

And it seems like it takes an act of God, a lunar eclipse, a 2 foot snowfall, and Harv accidently sharing a chairlift ride with Mike Pratt for Mike to say anthing about Gore.

I gotta disagree with you 100% on that Gore Kid.  I've personally found Mike Pratt to be very open and responsive on many occassions.  Ditto with Bruce up at Whiteface and Jon Lundin, ORDA's PR Coordinator.

Spongeworthy wrote

Blog about this:

http://www.boston.com/travel/explorene/specials/ski/blog/2012/10/cow_manure_to_p.html

That is almost Onion material.

It's just not realistic to think that Mike, Bruce (Aaron) and the player to be named later at Bell, would be as forthcoming as employees of private companies.  Those "state" employees have so much more to lose.

Take a look at the pile of crap Mike got when he was straightforward about his goals for improvements at Gore Mountain.  No private mountain would get that kind of grief in advance.  (BTW if anyone is wondering, that kind of response makes it that much tougher to deliver scoop on the blog.  Why should Mike bother?)

Tony Lanza was funny. He'd tell you ALL KINDS of things. Incredible stuff.  Then as he was walking out the door, he'd say "oh by the way that's all off the record."

Harvey44 wrote

Not exactly new news (posted on 10/4), but I just saw this blog post by Mike Solimano of Powdr.

btw, Linky no worky.

Thanks Benny, fixed it.

Thanx, Mr. Harv. The comment section, as always, is revealing.

Benny Profane wrote

Thanx, Mr. Harv. The comment section, as always, is revealing.

Based on your comment Benny, I read the comments.  People are tough. Killington still has an amazing long season, and they are trying to run a business.

The one guy wants his lifetime pass back and asked Mike to do it for good will.  Let me ski for life for free so I won't be cranky.  The way I understand it that was a commitment made by previous owners right?

I admit I don't know the history. Somebody tell all.

I learned a valuable lesson once. Gave an employee a big raise her first year. Very big percentage.  Following years were lower in percentage and she complained every year.  In reality getting big raises early means you make more over your lifetime.

Question - if Kmart was never the beast to begin with and just ran the place like say Sugarbush or some normal mountain, would they be getting so much crap?

Funny that, after I wrote that, I realized that the comments only spanned two days. There's a lot more lurking on some server.

The lifetime pass was a nice bonus that the original Ski corp. (the original Killington company) shareholders received for their investment. It was transferable once, and they could also be sold once. I remember seeing adds in the Mountain Times for one every now and then, so, even though the original shareholders are probably too old to care, their children or the poor people who spent ten grand or more for one got screwed when Powdr scoffed them off. ASC, (the owners in between Ski corp and Powdr) honored the lifetime pass, so, that's why some are whining about Powdr.

I'm not sure what your question is, but, it wasn't the Beast until these guys decided to push it. Tell them to stop, please.

I remember back in 1997, Killington was known as the "Beast of the East."

I know, but, they kept it minimal. Now, it's everywhere.

Benny Profane wrote

I'm not sure what your question is, but, it wasn't the Beast until these guys decided to push it.

When I said...

"...if Kmart was never the beast to begin with and just ran the place like say Sugarbush or some normal mountain, would they be getting so much crap?"

I meant this not from a marketing perspective but from operations.  When they blew 20 feet on superstar and stayed open til June... that's when they were the BEAST in my mind.  Marketing was just behind.

I still think Kmart is beastly, but the reputation was formed in a different day.