Math is hard, but counting numbers is big business for Utah’s ski industry, especially in summer when skier numbers for the last season are tallied to see how well our state is doing. So there is much anticipation for the skier-visit numbers to be released. Luckily we got good news this year as Ski Utah announced that skier days increased 5.4 percent from last year.
So much rides on millions of visitors traveling to our mountains to ski and in so doing, spend money. It’s good for the economy, good for ski resort infrastructure, and in turn, good for all us locals who like to ride the lift to shred pow from time to time. All told, Utah’s 2012/13 ski winter season which ended on Memorial Day weekend totaled 4,031,621 million skier day visits, up over 5 percent from the previous season’s 3,826,130.
This 5.4 percent increase is the sixth time in the last eight years that we’ve received more than four million visits, and it’s also a significant increase after the disappointing 2011-12 season, which was down 9.4 percent from 2010-11.
The folks at Ski Utah think early season storms helped meet the pent-up demand for skiers and snowboarders, which made the season start out strong. Although overall snowfall was below average, the total snowfall exceeded the previous season’s low totals, which kinda made a bad season actually kind-of good… in a way.
Ski Utah says that they are confident awareness and demand for the Utah wintersport product is continuing on a positive trajectory. Utah skier day visits for 2012-13 performed better than the Rocky Mountain (Colo., Idaho, Mont., N.M., Utah, Wyo.) average increase of 1.9 percent. Nationally, skier day visits were up to 56.6 million, an 11 percent increase from 51 million the previous season. This is the biggest rebound in 30 years with visits up in all regions.
Below are the Utah statewide skier day totals for the past 10 years:
Season *Skier Days Rank
- 2012-13 4,031,621 6
- 2011-12 3,826,130 9**
- 2010-11 4,223,064 2
- 2009-10 4,048,153 5
- 2008-09 3,972,984 7
- 2007-08 4,249,190 1
- 2006-07 4,082,094 3
- 2005-06 4,062,188 4
- 2004-05 3,895,578 8
- 2003-04 3, 429,190 10
*The National Ski Areas Association defines ‘skier days’ as one person visiting a ski area for all or any part of a day or night for the purpose of skiing/snowboarding.
**The 2011-12 number has been adjusted slightly due to a reporting error, adding an additional 23,594 skier day visits.
For a complete history of Utah’s skier days visit http://www.skiutah.com/media/story_starters/utah-skier-days-table.