As fall begins, resorts across the Mountain West are preparing for the start of the ski season this winter, following one of the worst seasons ever with record low snowpack and plummeting visits to ski areas.
The poor snow made for the worst ski season in almost fifty years: visits to ski areas in the Mountain West were down almost 25% from the year before, according to the National Association of Ski Areas. When Vail Resorts put its Epic Pass on sale this spring, it saw a 10% decline in sales from the year before.
Michael Childers studies environmental history and the ski industry at Colorado State University. He thinks resorts are hoping to rebound after last year, but it's not clear whether they're doing enough to win back customers.
Rocky Mountain Community Radio's Caroline Llanes spoke with Childers to learn more about what the industry is doing to rebound from last year.
Editor’s note: This transcript has been edited for length and clarity.
Llanes: Why don't we start with a recap of what happened last winter with snowpack and the ski industry?
Childers: Well, we didn't see snow, so that was kind of the big takeaway. So, as anyone really probably knows now, it was the worst snow season in recorded history in Colorado and for most of the West. That dramatically impacted the skiing, which impacted skier numbers, which impacted local communities reliant on those skiers. So, it was a, you know, a historically bad year of snow. Interestingly, economically, things did take a hit, but not a major hit.
Llanes: So, to your knowledge, did that awful winter we had change anything about how the ski industry and resorts are planning for future seasons like this one?
Childers: Yeah, I mean, there's a couple things that changed. One, the large Ikon and Epic passes have seen less sales, upwards of 10% last I heard. And in response, Vail and Alterra, owner of the Epic (and Ikon) pass, didn't increase prices as much as they had the previous year. So, they increased prices by like 3% rather than 6%. They also came out with new packages. Vail, of course, came out with a new package for people between the ages of 18 and 30, lowering prices trying to get a younger crowd invested in skiing. And then there's you know, new kinds of ticket packages for buddy passes and various things. So, they changed somewhat. I would say that for most skiers, not enough. After investing a sizable chunk of cash last year into a season pass, I think a lot of people were looking for a little bit better deal and response from the ski industry. I think we're going to see fewer numbers of people investing in those passes.
The ski towns and kind of surrounding areas, if they hadn't diversified, they are now really focusing on diversifying their economies, moving into, you know, Zoom towns and summertime tourism—something that's been going on for decades, of course, but just so they can become more resilient if and when this sort of winter season occurs again.
Llanes: I think we've all heard some predictions for this super El Niño. People are saying it could bring so much precipitation and snow to our region—that correlation may or may not be there. Do we have a sense of how the ski industry is thinking about El Niño?
Childers: Yeah. I mean, we first started hearing about the Super El Niño, you know, last spring, and it got everyone's hopes up because we're all so hungry for a powder day, especially after last winter. And what you've noticed is the industry, media, hydrologists, climatologists all tamping down expectations because we can't truly know. The forecast looks very promising, but it's not gonna solve the drought that has affected (the industry). It's going to be a mix for some areas, parts of the state will be really good, others will be maybe less good. So you're hearing a lot of, ‘let's lower expectations of this’ out there.
And, you know, looking at it historically, kind of the other closest parallel to this is the ‘76-’77 winter, which (brought) a horrific drought, skier numbers dropped by 40% that year. The state of Colorado initiated a task force of, ‘how are we going to adapt to this new reality?’ The next winter was an epic snow winter, and so all those plans went out the window. It should be said though that in 1981, there was another drought. So we could be on a little bit of a rollercoaster moving forward.
Llanes: So you talked a little bit about how the industry is thinking about sort of that consumer-facing aspect, pricing tickets being the big one, but how does drought, climate, El Niño, how does that factor the operations side of things, how they're planning for their season?
Childers: Yeah, I mean, I think one of the most obvious ones is gonna be snow making. Not necessarily that they're going to need it, but who has the water rights to make the snow? We just simply don't have as much water in the high country right now after the last winter, and unless the ski resorts have more senior water rights or have bought more water, this might limit how much water they get to have this coming fall and early winter and to make that early snow. Otherwise, I think they are just moving— everyone's moving forward with the expectation that the snow will come and, you know, doing the old bumper sticker idea of ‘pray for snow.’
Llanes: More broadly, we know that climate change is making conditions in the West a lot more variable, a lot more swings between the really good years and the really bad years. Do we have a sense of how the industry is responding to some of this uncertainty?
Childers: Yeah. So I think there's largely two tracks. One is adapting to this and one is addressing climate change. In the ‘addressing’ box, there's a lot of ski resorts that are looking to lower carbon emissions, educate the public—but not to really excessive levels, right? They're not offering mass transit to reduce the number of cars, for example. But you do see places like Aspen having embraced a lot more solar and kind of these things to reduce their carbon footprint, which is part of the addressing.
The adapting: diversifying their offerings so that they become more friendly to summertime tourism, and whether that's a golf course or an alpine slide or mountain biking or weekend music festivals, these sorts of things. And then building infrastructure that is needed. You know, snowmaking for its limitations is still gonna be essential to ensure that skiing occurs.
And then a lot of these resorts, if you look at like Vail and Alterra, are expanding globally so that they, as a corporation, can absorb, like, if one part of the continent or the globe has an adverse snow year, another will be able to retain, which is kind of what happened last year. I mean, I had a lot of friends who ended up getting on a plane and going to Japan because Japan had great snow. And if you had enough money to afford a plane ticket and you already bought an Ikon or an Epic (pass), you can make that work. It looks like with the Super El Niño, Japan this year is forecasted to have much less snow, so maybe people will then migrate back to North America. So these are the sort of things that they're doing to adapt to the changing climate while at the same time trying to address it in some limited manner.
Llanes: Michael, thank you so much for taking the time to talk with Rocky Mountain Community Radio.
Childers: Yeah!
Copyright 2026 Rocky Mountain Community Radio. This story was shared via Rocky Mountain Community Radio, a network of public media stations in Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, and New Mexico, including Aspen Public Radio.
