Costs outweigh benefits of staying open longer

Our announced closing date of April 5 has generated several questions from our core skiers/riders.  Our traditional closing date does coincide with this weekend, Sunday, April 5. 

I’ve done some research on my end and the latest closing date in Schweitzer’s history was April 23, 1988, the earliest closing date was March 5, 2005, the biggest snow year was 1998-’99 at 412 inches and Schweitzer closed that year on April 11, the end of the Lake Pend Oreille school vacation week that year.  This year’s closing date also coincides with the Lake Pend Oreille school vacation schedule. 

Unfortunately the risk of staying open longer far outweighs the possible upside.  I’m not a big risk taker and I have a fiduciary responsibility to do what is best for Schweitzer at this stage in our development. Our business levels have already tapered off significantly yet our overhead remains the same (grooming, transportation, patrol, lift operations, etc.).

I had considered reducing the size of our operation (two or three lifts) in an effort to cut costs but that would also limit what we could charge for the reduced operation which would require a larger number of skiers to generate the revenue necessary to cover our expenses.  I’m willing to take the heat for this decision (it’s never easy) and hope that you will continue to support Schweitzer in the future. 

Hopefully you’ve had a much fun this year as I have.

TOM CHASSE

President, CEO

Schweitzer Mt. Resort