I see a lot of what I would consider “questionable” business ideas around my local area.  For example, we’ve got a ‘Bed, Bath, & Beyond’ that seems to be on its last legs in one of our local shopping strip malls, and what did some genius decide to put in just a few storefronts down?  A ‘Home Goods’ store.  Are their pillows really that much better than the ones at BB&B?  Just how many candles holders does one household need, Mary?  But I digress.

I’m really here to talk about the local ski resort, Whitetail.  Yes, you heard me correctly.  There is a full-fledged ski resort a mere seven miles from my home (across the Pennsylvania border).  It opened in 1991 to much fanfare.  Weekenders from Washington and Baltimore flood the small back roads of my area to get to it during the “season”, and it boasts 25 ski runs, high-tech lifts, a snow park for snowboarders, a separate snow tubing park, several restaurants, a ski shop, as well as some condominium style lodging and houses that have cropped up right alongside the slopes on the mountain.

It’s quite a sight, but here’s the problem.

Snow – as in lack of it.

According to “the internets”, the average amount of snowfall for my area in any given year is about forty inches.  I can tell you that with what seems to be milder and milder winters, we haven’t hit forty inches in the last three years combined.  That’s good news if you hate winter weather, but bad news if you’re trying to run a ski resort.

So what’s a ski resort to do?  They have to make their own snow for the slopes, which is expensive, time consuming, and still relies on the local weather to cooperate.  Case in point, Whitetail states on their website that they are going to open their 2022-2023 season on December 16^th.  That’s this coming Friday.  Here’s what the resort looked like on 12/9/22:

With a ten-day forecast showing daytime temps in the high-thirties to low forties, all the snow making equipment in the world can’t stop whatever they make overnight from melting during the day, and that seems like an expense that is unsustainable in the long run, unless you charge outrageous prices for lift tickets.  Oh, wait, it says here that a one day ticket is $94.  I guess they do.  Heck, at those rates, I’ll throw a few bags of crushed ice down my back steps and let weekenders from the city slide down that for $10 a head.

Whitetail is owned by Vail Resorts, a huge ski-based conglomerate with resorts all over the US, so I guess they know what they’re doing, but it does seem like dumping in all of that money, time, and employees to provide for a resort that, at best, is only going to operate for around 80-100 days leaves me scratching my head on profitability, but hey – what do I know.

I wish Whitetail the best – I really do.  I hope we get a cold snap and enough snow every week to open all 25 of their trails, the snow park, and the tubing park.

It just seems like Mother Nature has other plans for their winter wonderland.