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Will Dear Valley ever allow snowboarding?

  • Never

    Votes: 31 54.4%
  • This coming season 17-18

    Votes: 1 1.8%
  • The following season 18-19

    Votes: 7 12.3%
  • At some point after 2019

    Votes: 18 31.6%

  • Total voters
    57
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Philpug

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I am sure this was part of the discussion of the purchase. Do you think Dear Valley will now have to offer snowboarding, if so when?
 

Monique

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There should be a parallel poll: Do you *want* them to allow snowboarding?
 

Muleski

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No, no way do they "have to", and as I posted in the other thread, the risk is changing something that is very special and alienating the current and target clientele.

What will opening the place up to boarders add to the the experience? Or detract?

Same goes with limiting numbers on the hill. What do they gain, and what do they lose?

The HCC/KSL entity bought DV for a reason, and their reasoning is a LOT different that VR's plan IMO. I don't see them making a lot of wholesale changes. If I live in the RFV, and ski Aspen, I might really like to be pampered at DV on vacation. Just saying.......

Perhaps they will get rid of boarding at some other properties down the road, and limit ticket sales?

All up in the air, IMO...........
 

Jully

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In the press release DV said there are no plans to allow for snowboarding, but they did not say a much more appealing "we will never allowing boarding at DV."

Makes me think it was discussed and that it will happen at some point. I could be wrong, but in my experience (elsewhere, not at DV) the really anti snowboarding clientele are the older demographic of skiers who didn't grow up skiing with boarders.

While they don't HAVE to allow it, I think the clientele will begin to care less as the loudest naysayers age out over the next 5-7 years.
 

LKLA

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I don't think they will change either their "no snowboard" policy or refrain from capping the number of skiers.

I don't see why allowing snowboarders would have to be part of the discussion. If anything, it would be to re-affirm it.

IMO, Deer Valley will make more money this way than by allowing snowboarders and/or not capping the number of people on the mountain.
 
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Muleski

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I doubt if this was even on the radar in the discussions to buy DV. However in the ensuing months and year, as this group works to establish a brand, embarks on a marketing plan, etc, I would bet that many hours will be spent determining what makes each property special and attractive. What do we do differently? What should we be doing?

At that point, I think that snowboarding and ticket limits at DV get a lot of air time. I would not be surprised if they actually commission some market research. Not the kind done with a clipboard at the mountain base.

If it's apparent that the customers don't want snowboarders, and don't want more skiers, I assume they'll gauge how price sensitive it is. Will people pay more to share less?

All I hear is "top of the line 5 star customer experimence."

Here's another factor. "Snowboarders" cover a wide range. I have friends who ride, in perfect control, fast, in hard boots on long carving boards. They are really fun to ski/ride with. And demographically, they fit at DV.

But they don't get all militant about areas that don't welcome snowboarders, mainly because 98% of the riders can't ride like they do. And they realize that most of them can really irritate good skiers. For many, many reasons.

You will have some ski families who rule out DV as some of the family rides. You will also have others like @Started at 53 who will be "out" if they open things up.

My guess is they might stand to lose more than they gain. I mentioned above that it might be more interesting to see if KSL/HCC ends up banning boarding elsewhere. Sort of doubt it. But good research is pretty compelling.
Of course, I have NO clue what the research might yield.

I would not be surprised to see DV's pricing increase in a year, BTW. Pay more to share it less.....
 

Started at 53

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I don't think they will change either the "no snowboard" policy or refrain from capping the number of skiers. I don't see why allowing snowboarders would have to be part of the discussion. If anything, it would be to re-affirm it. IMO, Deer Valley will make more money this way than by allowing snowboarders and/or not capping the number of people on the mountain.

Exactly

I doubt we are the only ones who are prepared to pay a premium for what we like. But we are also always prepared to walk away if things change
 

crgildart

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I thought a big part of why they don't allow snowboarders is layout logistics.. lots of flattish traverses to reach the most popular powder terrain... Maybe a better descriptor would be ... "poles and pushing required".. that way they aren't discriminating against snowboarders directly..

What is the policy for adaptive skiers around those traverses anyway??

Is that both Alta and DV or are the reasons different for each of those??
 
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LKLA

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Exactly

I doubt we are the only ones who are prepared to pay a premium for what we like. But we are also always prepared to walk away if things change

My guess is that they bought DV to gain operational scale as they bolt it onto their large platform so they can increase margins even if they operate it the same way it is being operated now. Deer Valley is a very special place and for every new customer they would gain by allowing snowboarding and/or taking off the cap, I think they would loose a very profitable skier who spends LOTS of money to ski there (lessons, meals, retail purchases, loding...). That is where the money is made!
 

fatbob

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Anyone under the age of say 50 who hasn't spent a bunch of time either boarding themselves or skiing with boarders is pretty rare IME. To be fair Id probably only be interested in hardbooting DV.
 

David Chaus

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They could keep DV as skiing-only, and make Solitude snowboarding-only. With Brighton and Solitude, BCC then becomes snowboarding central, and DV draws the skiers, along with LCC. One canyon for boarders, one canyon for skiers. Parity.

Mixed groups of snowboarders and skiers can just go to hell. Uh, I mean Vail, uh,I mean Park City.
 

Jwrags

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For some reason your poll won't let me vote, but, I would say never. It is one of the things that makes DV unique and I will say that when I skied there in 2016 it was nice not having boarders bomb past me or hear the sound of the scraping every turn on their way down, not that all boarders do those things.
 

Varmintmist

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Likely never. Its simply a factor of where they make their money. IF and only IF there are enough snowboarders who pony up enough enough cash to keep a hill alive on their own, will there be parity.
 

David Chaus

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My feeling is, they should only allow snowboarding at Deer Valley if and when I decide to take up snowboarding.
 

Mendieta

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My guess is that they bought DV to gain operational scale as they bolt it onto their large platform so they can increase margins even if they operate it the same way it is being operated now. Deer Valley is a very special place and for every new customer they would gain by allowing snowboarding and/or taking off the cap, I think they would loose a very profitable skier who spends LOTS of money to ski there (lessons, meals, retail purchases, loding...). That is where the money is made!

Yes. But the truth is, somehow this has turned into an I know my rights discussion. So, from a political correctness / PR perspective, they would look good by being more open. One of the things to note is that there are only two places in the US that only allow skiers, or am I wrong? So, where would the DV clientele go? Would we stop skiing? So, to your point @Started at 53 : I also vote with my wallet, but there may be no place to go. I certainly do most of mys skiing in Tahoe, with no ski-only options, and it is what it is. I go to DV when I can, because of the whole experience. Skiers-only is part of that.

As mentioned above by @LKLA , DV also has a cap on the number of skiers on the mountain. That's huge IMHO. We, humans, tend to be a lot less civilized when in a crowded situation. See the behavior of people on public transit, in a properly occupied train vs a crowded one. Part of the reason DV is so enjoyable is that there is elbow room.

Incidentally, I hope we don't go off-rails here. This is a difficult topic, because we can be hurtful in our opinions. And there is no need. I do prefer to ski in a place with no snowboarding, for a simple reason: most (but not all) of the bad behavior I see in the mountain (and this is my personal experience) is done by snowboarders. To be more specific: I normally see a ratio of 7 to 3 or 8 to 2 skiers vs boarders, and most of the bad stuff I see is from the latter group, which is even more striking. I think there is something about the culture of each sport, but I don't fully understand it, and I want to focus on the what, not the why.

But sure enough, there are lots of beautiful people out there boarding, and there is bad behavior on skis. We all have friends who board, and some of our Puggers also snowboard. So, I don't see it as an "us or them" situation.
 

KingGrump

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Three areas that still do not allow boarding. DV, Alta & MRG.

Used to be 4. Taos lifted the restriction March 19, 2008. There were gloom & doom predicted for Taos for that move. My experience - no change. Maybe the steeps & bumps at Taos skewed the effects a bit.

DV is my second favorite area in the SLC region. Really enjoy skiing there. I think the daily visitor cap is probably have more effect on the feel of the mountain than the boarder ban. My experience with bad behaviors is probably more age related than equipment orientation. My believe is that even if DV is to relax the boarder ban, I doubt DV's client demographics would change much.
 
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