Well I’m no marketing expert, but you know there is a problem at Apex when the parking lot is basically empty during spring break and nearly 20CM fell in the last 7 days! And who suffers from the blunder in marketing; the season ticket holders. They pay a tremendous amount of cash upfront to get a full ski season in and they get cut off early when more snow is falling, the temperature is perfect and the sun is out. This past season is probably one of the best seasons in 10 years and season pass holders are told that their season is over this weekend. BS!

Let me give Apex a little objective advice:

1. Give some tickets away as promotions, and not just 50. What exactly does it cost the ski hill for one extra person on the hill? What you get from this is people that get addicted to boarding or skiing and decide to buy a seasons pass the following year or even better can’t afford to buy a season pass but buy 2 or 3 or more individual passes.

2. Spend some money on your website! Yes, it does the job for locals, but type in “BC ski hills” and what ranking does it come up? Big White is on the first page, is it not important to compete?

3. So you made this beautiful hotel, bar, restaurant and cafeteria…. and…. how are they doing? What do you think would happen if you got 2 or 3 known  bands to play during the course of the season in that huge bar you have. And if you want to go crazy, try marketing these events prior to launching.

4. Maybe hold a local or regional snowboarding terrain park trick contest and bring in a few semi-famous judges and give them a free ski pass for the follow year or maybe a weekend at the hotel.

Results:
Your booze sales: UP
Your ticket sales: UP
Hotel vacancy: DOWN
Restaurant food sales: UP 

All this would probably generate traffic up like the woodstock concert of ’69. If money is what your after, get your shit together! Give me a call, I’ll run you up a list of quality ideas so long that you won’t be able to fold your wallet back in half.

I would love to meet the nice people that run this establishment and ask them a few mind stimulating questions…