As with so many things, the days of knowing what your lift pass will actually cost appear to be numbered as more and more ski resorts switch to dynamic pricing – which tends to reward those who buy early and travel low season. Ever more ski areas are also joining multi-resort season passes that allow you to ski at dozens, sometimes hundreds of different resorts, in some cases all around the world for 12 months, having paid one up front price.
The problem is that up front price is ever changing and if you’re lucky enough to visit two or more resorts in a season, are they all on the pass? Plus, the small print needs to be studied – some passes give full access every day at some resorts but only offer limited periods, outside peak dates, at other ski areas on their list. It’s also worth noting that most of the passes have variants for different demographics.
So what to do? It’s always been complex, calculating lift pass prices, but now you need to be even more on the ball to get the best deal, probably keeping an eye on socials too as resorts tend to announce sudden short-term ticket price drops too. It’s essentially the same as booking a hotel room or airline ticket. It’s also a bit like football teams trading players as some resorts switch between pass schemes like top players being transferred. This winter its Crans Montana moving from Magic to Epic (although you can still get it on Magic with a supplement). Some resorts don’t go exclusive though and you can find them signed up to multiple passes.
What’s for sure is it’s not likely to change anytime soon. Stats from the US, where both trends began, should more than half of American skiers now buy one or more of the multi-resort season passes and where the old day or week pass still exist, prices are rising to incredible highs if only to make the season passes appear better value. One of the passes recently promoted itself by claiming it delivered a 65% saving on buying tickets by the day or week …although (it didn’t say) that does depend on where and how often you plan to ski. Even in Europe now, resorts like Zermatt have credited its membership of one of the pass schemes for a big boost in sales.
Andermatt
Vail Resorts’ pass is the original multi-resort season-pass and is constantly innovating and expanding to try to keep ahead of the growing competition. Along with Vail’s 40+ resorts, mostly in North America (Including Heavenly pictured top), the pass provides limited access to plenty of top name areas in the Alps too including Verbier4Vallées, Les 3 Vallées, and The Arlberg around lech and St Anton, plus full access to Vail Resorts-owned Andermatt and Crans Montana as well as North American centres like Whistler Blackcomb, Vail Mountain and Breckenridge. With ski areas in Australia and Japan also included there are about 80 resorts covered in total. At the time of writing the full pass was $1047 (£807) for everyone aged 13 or older.
The main competitor to Epic, Ikon has a similar structure with unlimited access to resorts owned by the Alterra group . The main pass, for those 23 and over is $1449 USD at time of writing which gives unlimited skiing at 17 destinations including famous names like Mammoth, Steamboat and Winter Park and up to seven days at 42 more well-known ski areas around the world such as Zermatt, St Moritz, Jackson Hole, Kitzbuhel, the Dolomiti Superski region and many others.
Glencoe
An interesting variant. This pass is available with limited numbers (you sometimes have to join a waiting list to be allowed to buy it) and only offers two days of skiing at each resort, but it does offer more than 200 ski areas worldwide, most recently even adding three UK centres. They’re Glencoe in the Scottish Highlands and indoor skiing at Chill Factore near Manchester and at The Snow Centre in Hemal Hempstead. The full Indy+ Pass costs $539 (about £415) at time of writing.
“Indy Pass now has over 230 resorts on three continents, and you can expect our remarkable growth to continue,” said Indy Pass director, Erik Mogensen. “Our mission and values command our support of independent ski areas and will continue to drive every decision we make, including not overselling the pass.”
Europe’s main player is valid at 80 French and Swiss ski resorts. To be fair these are mostly smaller centres but they do include Glacier 3000 near Gstaad, Saas-Fee and Villars. Crans Montana (below), formerly part of the pass but now owned by Vail Resorts, can be added with low-season access for a supplement. Its full adult price is 899 Swiss Francs (about £800) but discounts are offered in summer and early autumn.
The Mountain Collective Pass features 27 resorts on five continents, with two days of skiing or snowboarding with no blackout dates at each resort, and a 50 percent discount on all additional days. It’s latest additions for the 24-25 season are Megève in France and Sunday River in Maine, USA.
“These two world-class resorts complement our existing network perfectly,” said Mountain Collective Pass CEO Todd Burnette.
The Mountain Collective Pass currently costs $659 (about £510) for adults with discounted bands for teens and children.
Power Pass covers just a dozen ski areas in the USA and Chile owned by Mountain Capital Partners. As with all the passes there’s a big variety, the most expensive, for adults aged 37-64, is $1,149 (£885) at time of writing but there many other options including three price bands for younger adults and a free pass for kids under 12.
Ever Changing Prices
Pass prices tend to change regularly but are typically cheapest about six months before the season starts, going on sale, often, when the previous season is ending. This also gives the pass sellers plenty of opportunities to suggest you buy at the lowest price of the year, or before prices go up next week, or whilst the limited availability pass is available.
The big passes often have many variants, with cheaper versions for limited geographic areas or perhaps a version you can only use outside peak dates.
There are also family, child, teen and young adult versions, often with the age groups for each category varying between passes. So as with old fashioned lift tickets you need to do your maths and work out the best prices for your particular family demographic if you’re buying on price rather than included resorts.
Breckenridge
More Than Just Lift Access
Of course, most of these passes are more than just your standard lift-ticket to the slopes. Most also endeavour to tie you into all aspects of your ski holiday with discounts on partner ski schools, ski rental shops, restaurants and accommodation to name but a few and often cross-promotion with other businesses nothing to do with your ski holiday. Most of the tickets have their own apps to help deliver all this.
Vail Resorts are the experts and most advanced in this area through their Epic product. There’s are new ideas every winter
New this winter, My Epic App now offers My Epic Assistant to answer questions and provide mountain information at user’s fingertips – anytime, anywhere. Vail resorts say it’s “powered by advanced AI and resort experts,” Initially available at the groups four original Colorado resorts Beaver Creek, Vail Mountain, Breckenridge and Keystone, Vail Resorts say that it plans to expand the technology to additional resorts in future seasons.
Also new, My Epic Gear, available across 12 North American resorts “eliminates the hassle of traveling to the mountain with gear,” Vail Resorts say. Instead skiers can expect luxury slopeside valet service coupled with more than 60 of the most popular and latest ski and snowboard models.
“The entire membership experience, from gear selection to personalized expert recommendations to delivery, is available at members’ fingertips in the My Epic app. Memberships are limited for the 2024/25 winter season and on a first-come, first-serve basis,” a Vail Resorts statement explains.
Battle Over More Than Just Resort Numbers
Although the different passes are battling to offer ever more resorts to increase value to holders, there are other areas of competition.
One is how many months of the year you can use them, with the big passes trying to get North American resort open in October or early November so their holders can use them from mid-Autumn. Then at the other end of the season it’s a case of trying to keep at least one participating resorts open to late spring or early-summer to claim a 9 month season. Most also have some southern hemisphere participation to enable them to say you’re buying 12 months of skiing access. Vail Resorts own three Australian resorts, the Power Pass owners have been buying resorts in Chile. Others have partners in South America, New Zealand and Australia on their passes.
There are also increasing signs that some popular resorts are limiting peak dates access to holders of their passes only.
Perisher
Whilst US industry data indicates more than half of all skiers there now buy into one or more of these passes, it remains to be seen how fast these passes will become appealing to the UK market. The companies behind them are certainly pushing hard and trying to think of more ways to increase their appeal. But they’re not keen to publicise how many Brits are currently buying them.
Some years ago, a Vail Resorts director did let slip they were selling over a million Epic passes a year and to people living in more than 100 countries, but official data isn’t normally published for reasons of commercial confidentiality.
Some big-name resorts in the Alps that are include on one of them reckon that at the least their participation has brought tens of thousands of Americans over, all spending on resort services.
“Much like how our Europeans friends go skiing, Americans jump in the car and go skiing for the weekend or a few days. Brits tend to ski fewer times and for a full week because, it’s more expensive and requires more planning when you need flights and transfers and therefore more time off work and so on. Add to this, the spectacular level of pre-planning of where you want to go this winter, before you can choose between these quite different multi-pass offerings, and you can see why they have not yet caught on in the same way with UK skiers. That said, if you are planning to go to multiple resorts, especially in North America and they happen to be on the same pass anyway, it might make sense getting one,” said Richard Sinclair of ski holiday travel agency Sno.co.uk
