Ski Area’S Focus: That First Outing

Just as it caught the attention of the ski industry with its phenomenally successful discount season-pass program, little Bogus Basin Ski Resort in Boise is cooking up another plan that may set the industry on its ear.

“We’re an ideal laboratory for something like this, having this great, growing population center here, having all this room up here and being so close to town,” general manager Mike Shirley said.

The latest plan: to attack a perennial problem with skiing and snowboarding, the that-wasn’t-fun-I’m-never-trying-it-again blues.

“One of the things that the industry is suffering from is, we’re not converting beginners to core skiers. We lose about 85 percent of those who try it one time.”

Why? In Shirley’s view, it’s because those one-timers haven’t had the essential ingredients to make their first ski experience a good one - professional lessons, good equipment and some preparation.

“It should be a criminal act for somebody to teach a family member to ski,” he said. “Think about your husband teaching you to drive. We call something like that a divorce in progress.

“It’s much better to learn from a professional, who’s not all emotionally involved.”

And then there are the “friends” who take a beginning skier or snowboarder to the top of the hill, “wish you luck and say by the time you get to the bottom of the hill you’re a skier. There’s very little chance of that happening.”

Bogus Basin can afford to experiment. It’s a nonprofit ski resort that’s become wildly popular since dropping its season pass prices from more than $500 to $199 three years ago. The resort used to sell 3,000 to 4,000 season passes each year.

Now, it sells more than 25,000.

Its new program is called the Passport. It offers beginning skiers and snowboarders - the “neverevers” - a package deal including a preseason orientation, four lessons and all rental equipment. Then, after all four lessons have been completed, the beginner gets a season pass and free rental equipment for the rest of the season.

The whole thing costs the same as Bogus’ discount season pass - $199.

“We’ve had over 1,200 people take advantage of this so far,” Shirley said. “Our December lessons are full, and Christmas, January, February. We’re working on March now.”

Passport purchasers who take their lessons in February or March will get a season pass and free rentals for the following ski season.

“We don’t want to give them a season pass until they get the lessons,” Shirley said. “There’s a natural progression you go through to learn how to ski. It’s a lot easier with the shaped skis and the newer equipment, but it’s still something you’ve just got to start from the beginning and go through the progression.”

Bogus Basin is hiring extra ski and snowboard instructors and buying additional rental equipment. It’s even put up a temporary building at the ski resort just to distribute rentals to Passport holders.

“We won’t be making as much money per new student as we might otherwise be making, but we’re not going to be losing any money,” Shirley said. “It’s in our interest to try to do this to develop our customer base.”

The infusion of new energy and people that snowboarding has brought to the ski industry has only kept it even, Shirley said. Nationally, ski area visits have stagnated around 50 million to 52 million a year for the past 20 years.

“This has not been a growth industry,” he said.

The discount-pass program turned Bogus Basin’s fortunes around in a big way. Where 60 percent of its business used to be highly weatherdependent day ticket sales, that figure now is down to 30 percent. And the resort gets most of its revenue before the season starts - when it needs it.

Ski resorts across the country have copied the program, from Colorado to Schweitzer in North Idaho.

If the Passport program works as well, Shirley said, “It’ll give us a sustainable skiing population.”

“We’re taking a long view,” he said. “You’ve got to look beyond just this season.”