Rent The Mountain: + and -

The powder-princess regulars at Massif du Sud, one of my favorite Quebec ski areas, are displeased (TR in French, sorry). The mountain runs on a Fri/Sat/Sun schedule and despite receiving 20 inches of new snow since Sunday, their traditional Powder Friday yesterday was a bust. A corporate outing on Thursday -- 100+ ravenous boarders paying $80 CDN per person -- tracked out most of the mountain.

An under-the-radar ski area can't say no to revenue like that and they only have one chair to operate, so it's a no-brainer (Plattekill allows you to rent the mountain midweek for far less money). Given that Massif du Sud has gone through multiple owners since opening in 1989 and was in danger of going NELSAP a decade ago, it's a part of their business model and locals have to understand, but they still felt obligated to complain.


BTW, in this northeastern winter where we had consistently below-average temps accompanied by below-average snowfall, MdS has already reached its annual average of 240 inches. For background on this great hill, here's a Mag article from a few years back.

I don't see an issue here. I can see why there would be disappointment. But it isn't like the mountain cancelled a regularly scheduled day or something.

I would be interested to hear policies on private reservation days when the big storm falls on the big private day. For example, Plattekill does rentals and they also have their Powderdaze, what if the two coincide? Would they still open for Powderdaze despite the private reservation? I'd be pissed if a ski area normally would open mid-week for a powder day for X inches of snow but didn't open to the public because of a private event. But the private event organizer would also be pissed if they paid for a private day and the ski area opened. There needs to be clear policies regarding these types of issues and there needs to be up front communication on what happens in the event of a conflict.

Which isn't the case here, correct? The event was Thursday when the mountain would not have opened and the locals are just pissed that the week long accumulation was tracked? They need to realize that those types of private events help subsidize the mountain, keeping it open and keeping pass prices lower than they might be. Sucks but deal.

riverc0il wrote

There needs to be clear policies regarding these types of issues and there needs to be up front communication on what happens in the event of a conflict. Which isn't the case here, correct? The event was Thursday when the mountain would not have opened and the locals are just pissed that the week long accumulation was tracked? They need to realize that those types of private events help subsidize the mountain, keeping it open and keeping pass prices lower than they might be. Sucks but deal.

MdS doesn't do Powder Daize Monday through Thursday, so that's not an issue.

Upon further review, it seems that a snowboard company has booked two Thursdays during the season for private events and the locals are annoyed that a) it wasn't noted on their website (they went to the mountain Friday expecting untracked and found everything chewed up), and b) it was 100% snowboarders instead of the usual 2%, resulting in particularly ugly conditions.

For Point A, I understand their annoyance. For Point B, heh, I understand their annoyance.

rehash of this http://forum.nyskiblog.com/Platte-2-2-15-tp4053975.html

Yeah, Platty thread, part deux....