# Colorado Resorts Booming



## f00bar (Mar 6, 2014)

In summary, it's a rich persons sport now and rich people can stand the extra jacked up prices so sales tax revenue will increase.


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## lab49232 (Sep 13, 2011)

f00bar said:


> In summary, it's a rich persons sport now and rich people can stand the extra jacked up prices so sales tax revenue will increase.


Summary extension: Rich people love spending more money when around other rich people. Also while the rest of us sit and bemoan and talk about the death of the industry in many ways, resorts are still recording record profits with lower visits which also means less work and lower overhead...


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## BurtonAvenger (Aug 14, 2007)

Actually it's pretty much a known fact that if we have a record breaking year, the year after everyone and their brother will show up. Then you add into that legalized weed and it's not out of the question that our tax revenue is high. 

Breck alone can hold over 40,000 people at peak time without issue.


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## lab49232 (Sep 13, 2011)

BurtonAvenger said:


> Actually it's pretty much a known fact that if we have a record breaking year, the year after everyone and their brother will show up. Then you add into that legalized weed and it's not out of the question that our tax revenue is high.
> 
> Breck alone can hold over 40,000 people at peak time without issue.


Right but the point of the article was that people DIDN'T show up. In fact visits were way down but money was way up.


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## BurtonAvenger (Aug 14, 2007)

That's my point, record breaking year, next year we get more visits. That means rad dad that loves to shred brings little Timmy while his wife and lil Susie that don't shred just go down town. 

Case in point we doubled to tripled our sales compared to the last years sales at the shop I work at. Town visits were WAY up. We had between 88 to 100% occupancy through the first week of April. Then the second week of April it hit 8% visitation. 

I personally spent more time this winter recommending pot shops and restaurants to people that "we don't ski, we just wanted to have a snowy vacation" types.


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## Noreaster (Oct 7, 2012)

Yes, the town was full. I think it was mostly due to how incredible the previous season turned out. As far as pot is concerned... I don't see it as a driving force in tourism uptick. Not for ski towns. All of their sales tax revenues are falling short of projected numbers and what's brought in is just a drop in a bucket really. It does look like upper middle class is having more of a disposable income now.


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## f00bar (Mar 6, 2014)

This reminds my of an article on CNN/Money about how the CEO of Cartier worries at night about income inequality and the oncoming social impacts.

Reading what he actually said it wasn't about improving conditions of the poor. It was about how he is afraid things will get so bad that the rich won't be buying as many lavish gifts for themselves because they are afraid of being labeled rich and killed.

He wants to see conditions for the poor raised just enough to keep them from revolting, but not high enough that they can enter into his special club.


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## Maierapril (Oct 25, 2011)

lab49232 said:


> Right but the point of the article was that people DIDN'T show up. In fact visits were way down but money was way up.



This article is highly misleading. The basis of the lower ski visits is off of a national average (which includes west coast resorts). Given how badly battered the west has been, it would be safe to assume that a portion of the population that normally would have ridden the west coast resorts may have opted to travel to Colorado. We won't really know until Colorado releases their attendance statistics.

As for the lower occupancy, I would like to see what they based their numbers off of. It would be interesting to see if they factored in the changing real estate market by adding in figures from sources like VRBO and airbnb.

That's not to say that lift ticket prices in the US has become absolutely batshit crazy. Around $100+ for a day lift ticket? Dude...Niseko was only about $50 a day...


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## lab49232 (Sep 13, 2011)

Maierapril said:


> This article is highly misleading. The basis of the lower ski visits is off of a national average (which includes west coast resorts). Given how badly battered the west has been, it would be safe to assume that a portion of the population that normally would have ridden the west coast resorts may have opted to travel to Colorado. We won't really know until Colorado releases their attendance statistics.
> 
> As for the lower occupancy, I would like to see what they based their numbers off of. It would be interesting to see if they factored in the changing real estate market by adding in figures from sources like VRBO and airbnb.
> 
> That's not to say that lift ticket prices in the US has become absolutely batshit crazy. Around $100+ for a day lift ticket? Dude...Niseko was only about $50 a day...


I wouldn't say it's misleading when it directly states that right next to the numbers but ya I didn't post it to call out specific numbers or pinpoint problems, more just to show that the wealthy people are out there spending money still and that resorts are still making money despite the industry as a whole stagnating/dipping. The question is will them chasing the big buck eventually kill them or are a lot of us useless fodder in the grand scheme. (For me I happen to know I'm useless. Weird being super involved in the industry I get the luxury of not having to spend money o most of it, have season passes to where I ride which they make no real money off of, etc.)


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## BurtonAvenger (Aug 14, 2007)

What's going to kill the big resorts is their real estate/retail/amenities focus and not on the resort.


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## lab49232 (Sep 13, 2011)

BurtonAvenger said:


> What's going to kill the big resorts is their real estate/retail/amenities focus and not on the resort.


That's my question. It appears that more and more people are going to these places but skiing/riding less. Hard to focus on the mountain when it's the rest of the are people are spending money at. But Isn't it still the mountain that initially brings the people there? 

At the end of the day companies only care about what increase their bottom line and you can't blame them for that. People say what they think is important/what they would spend their money on but often times that differs from what they actually spend money on. It's just a wait and see what people actually do with their money. Right now the industry has obviously shown that rich people control the resorts and are paying enough to support it and so that's the way it's going to go. If that changes resorts will change. Ever changing marketplace, ineresting to watch.


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