Nineteenth article in this silo, and deliberately the mirror of one already in it. A ski resort and a landscaping contractor run on the same calendar and have opposite balance sheets.
Key Takeaway
A trade source reports lift revenue down 5.6 percent against a 14.9 percent fall in visits, and concludes the pass model immunizes the company from bad winters[7]. Our own arithmetic on an invented resort agrees about revenue and disagrees about profit: a 15 percent visit decline costs 8.3 percent of revenue and 38.7 percent of margin, because snowmaking rises as visits fall.
The Verdict, Stated First
Five claims, in descending order of confidence.
One. The pass model does protect revenue, which two independent data points support.
Two. On our own arithmetic it does not protect margin, and that is a contradiction of the source we are testing.
Three. The cash shape is the exact inverse of a seasonal contractor's, which changes what the working capital question even is.
Four. On our own arithmetic the weather risk is deferred rather than transferred, arriving a year later as a renewal problem.
Five. And the industry association's own published figures do not agree with each other, which we document rather than resolve.
The second is why this article exists, ours. A conclusion that is right about the top line and wrong about profit is the most dangerous kind, because it is half true and reassuring.
Our Grades For These Claims
Applying the scheme this publication uses throughout.
Grade C for all industry data, which comes from ski industry associations reporting on their own members[1][2], and which contradicts itself across the association's own pages.
Grade D for the United States comparator, from a ski trade site, which is nonetheless the source of the claim we are testing[7].
Grade C for the climate figures, from a business magazine describing an academic study we did not obtain.
Grade A for our own arithmetic, which is reproducible.
Grade D for the inputs to that arithmetic, every one of which we invented, including the revenue mix and the snowmaking escalation that drives the central result.
A Note On Method
Everything here is checked to 29 August 2026.
We obtained two reports and one profile page from the Canada West Ski Areas Association[1][2][3], a provincial association's season figures via trade press[6], and two ski trade publications[7][8].
We obtained no underlying dataset and no financial statements. The association states that its detailed financial analysis is a members' benchmarking product[2], and we did not have it.
We did not obtain the 2024 University of Waterloo and University of Innsbruck study on climate and ski seasons, and describe it only as a business magazine reports it[5].
We found no Canadian data on season pass revenue as a share of resort revenue, having looked for it. That figure is the hinge of this entire analysis and we have invented it.
All arithmetic is ours. The resort, its revenue, its cost base and its revenue mix are invented to demonstrate a structure.
This article discusses resort operations and is not accounting or business advice.
A Warning About The Border
The same warning as our trucking article, and for the same reason. Ours.
Four observations.
The claim we are testing is about a United States operator, reported by a United States trade site[7].
Our supporting Canadian data point, a 15 percent visit decline producing a 2 percent economic impact decline[1], measures something different again: economic impact across a region, not one operator's revenue.
So the two figures we use to bracket the pass-through rate are not measuring the same quantity in the same country, and we say so where we use them.
And the structural argument survives that, ours, because it depends only on money being collected before a season, which is how passes work on both sides of the border.
Where Canadian Skiing Sits
The scale, from the industry's own reporting.
The association reports Canadian skier visits of 19.5 million, up 8.6 percent from 17.9 million in the prior weather-challenged year, with domestic visits growing to 17.4 million of the 19.5 million total. British Columbia posted a 14.96 percent year over year change, while the return of snow to Ontario and Quebec allowed those regions to grow by 9.67 and 3.83 percent. British Columbia and Quebec own the largest share of the national visit total at 34.5 and 33.4 percent. International visits remain some 1 million behind pre-pandemic levels, with the USA the largest international market at 5.9 percent of visits and other offshore markets 3.2 percent. An estimated 2.57 million Canadians purchased at least one lift ticket in winter 2024/25[1].
Quebec's provincial association reported a 2025/26 season of 6.317 million skier days, a 6 percent increase, with lift ticket revenues of $263.7 million, a record high for the province, and season passholders up 11 percent. The province has over 70 ski resorts, more than any state in the United States or province in Canada[6].
Four observations, ours.
This is a domestic business. 17.4 million of 19.5 million visits are Canadians skiing in Canada.
Two provinces hold two thirds of the visits between them, so national figures conceal a great deal.
The 8.6 percent rebound is measured against a weather-challenged year, which is the association's own characterisation, so it is a recovery rather than growth.
And the Quebec data is the more useful of the two, ours, because it reports revenue alongside visits, and passholder growth alongside both, which is exactly the combination the national data lacks.
The Association Contradicts Itself
A conflict we found across the same organisation's own material. Ours.
The association's profile page states that ski areas in Western Canada attract 10 million alpine skier visits, generate $2.5 billion in spending annually, and employ over 27,000 people, being 22,590 full time equivalents[3].
A provincial body reproducing the association's profile states that ski areas in Western Canada attract 9.5 million alpine skier visits and generate $2.1 billion in spending annually, employing 28,600 people, being 19,000 full time equivalents[4].
And the association's own economic impact reporting gives Western Canada 2023/24 skier visits of 8.75 million, 15 percent below the prior season's record high of 10.3 million[2], with total economic activity of $2.67 billion against $2.73 billion the year before[1].
Four observations.
Three different visit figures and three different spending figures appear across material sourced to the same association.
Two of the three are undated summary figures on profile pages, which is the most likely explanation: they describe a typical year rather than a measured one, and were written at different times.
The employment figures move in opposite directions, with headcount higher in the version that has lower visits and lower spending, which no single-year story explains.
And we record it rather than resolve it, ours, because anyone quoting a headline Western Canadian skiing figure will land on one of these three and will not know the others exist.
Which Figure We Use
Our own choice, stated so a reader can disagree with it. Ours.
Four observations.
We use only the dated, season-specific figures: 8.75 million visits in 2023/24 against 10.3 million the prior year, and $2.67 billion against $2.73 billion.
Those come from the economic impact reporting rather than from a profile page, and they carry a season label, which the others do not.
We use none of the undated summary figures in any calculation, and cite them only to document the conflict.
And that is the general rule this publication follows, ours. A dated figure beats an undated one even when the undated one is more convenient, and here the convenient ones were rounder.
The Inverse Of The March Trench
The structural comparison, and the reason we wrote this article next. Ours.
In our article on seasonal contracting, an invented landscaping business worked from April to November, was paid after the work, and passed through a cash trough of $52,800 in March, before its revenue arrived.
Four observations.
A ski resort has the same calendar problem and the opposite cash shape. It sells passes from roughly September, and delivers from December to March.
So the resort's cash peaks before its season where the contractor's bottoms before its season.
The contractor borrows to reach its season. The resort is funded by its customers to reach its season, at no interest and with no covenant.
And that is a genuine structural advantage worth naming, ours, because pre-selling converts a working capital problem into a working capital asset, and very few seasonal businesses can do it.
The Claim We Are Testing
Stated precisely, because the rest of the article is a response to it.
A ski trade site, reporting on the 2025/26 North American season, records that a large operator's skier visits to its 37 North American resorts fell 14.9 percent, with Rocky Mountain properties hit hardest at negative 25 percent, in what its chief executive called one of the most challenging winters in history. It then observes that lift revenue was down only 5.6 percent despite a 15 percent drop in bodies, because the operator had already collected most of its money before the first flake fell, and concludes: that is the pass model working exactly as designed, it immunizes the company from bad winters, and skiers absorb the risk[7].
A ski trade site, not a filing, an analyst or a regulator, flagged, and the operator is American.
Four observations, ours.
The observation about revenue is well evidenced and we do not dispute it.
The word immunizes is the one we are testing, because immunity from a bad winter would have to mean profit, not turnover.
The site itself hedges elsewhere, noting that the insurance policy might be fraying and referring to pass price fatigue[7], which is the renewal problem we reach below.
And it is a good piece of observation regardless, ours. Noticing that revenue barely moved while volume collapsed is the right thing to notice; the question is what follows from it.
Thirteen Percent And Thirty-Eight
Our own arithmetic on how much of a volume shock reaches the top line.
Defining pass-through as the revenue decline divided by the visit decline: the Western Canadian case gives a 15.0 percent visit decline against a 2.0 percent decline in economic impact, a pass-through of 13.3 percent. The United States operator case gives 14.9 percent against 5.6 percent, a pass-through of 37.6 percent.
Four observations.
Between 13 and 38 percent of the volume shock reached revenue, and the rest was absorbed by money already collected or by spending that did not move with visits.
The two are not measuring the same thing, as our border warning sets out: one is regional economic activity, the other one operator's lift revenue.
The association itself cautions that skier visit totals do not directly correlate to revenues and that guest origin and per capita spending significantly influence revenue outcomes[1], which is a warning against exactly the calculation we have just done.
We do it anyway and flag it, ours, because a range bracketed by two imperfect measures is more useful than no estimate, provided nobody mistakes it for a measurement.
What A Bad Winter Does To Revenue
Our own arithmetic on an invented resort with $30,000,000 of revenue.
Assume a revenue mix of 45 percent season passes, 20 percent day tickets and 35 percent ancillary, being food, rental, lessons and retail. That mix is invented, we found no Canadian figure for it, and it drives everything below. Pass revenue is banked before the season; ticket and ancillary revenue scale with visits.
At no decline, revenue is $30.0 million. At a 10 percent visit decline: $28.4 million, down 5.5 percent. At 15 percent: $27.5 million, down 8.3 percent. At 25 percent: $25.9 million, down 13.7 percent.
Four observations.
A 15 percent visit decline costs 8.3 percent of revenue, a pass-through of about 55 percent, which sits above both of our real-world data points.
That is what our invented mix produces, and a resort with a higher pass share would show a lower pass-through, which is presumably why large operators have pushed pass sales so hard.
The ancillary line is the reason our figure is higher than the reported ones. Food, rental and lessons all scale with bodies on the hill, and a pass holder who does not come buys none of them.
And so far the trade source's conclusion holds, ours. Revenue is materially protected, which is the next section's starting point and its problem.
And What It Does To Margin
Our own arithmetic, and the finding that contradicts the source.
Add an invented cost base to the same resort: $12,000,000 fixed, $9,000,000 visit-variable, and $3,000,000 snowmaking. Visit-variable cost falls with visits. Snowmaking rises in a warm winter.
At no decline: revenue $30.0 million, cost $24.0 million, margin $6.0 million. At a 10 percent visit decline with snowmaking up 20 percent: revenue $28.4 million, cost $23.7 million, margin $4.7 million, down 22.5 percent. At 15 percent with snowmaking up 40 percent: revenue $27.5 million, cost $23.9 million, margin $3.7 million, down 38.7 percent. At 25 percent with snowmaking up 70 percent: margin $2.0 million, down 66.3 percent.
Four observations.
The same 15 percent visit decline costs 8.3 percent of revenue and 38.7 percent of margin.
So the pass model protects the top line and does nothing at all for the cost side, which is where a bad winter actually lands.
Immunizes is therefore the wrong word, ours, and it is wrong in the direction that reassures: a reader who stops at the revenue line concludes the business is insulated when its profit has fallen by nearly two fifths.
And our snowmaking escalation assumptions are the weakest input in this article, invented and unsourced, which is why we show the whole table rather than one figure. A reader with real snowmaking data should substitute it; the direction of the effect will not change.
The Cost That Moves The Wrong Way
Why the cost side behaves as it does. Ours.
Four observations.
Almost every cost in a resort falls when visits fall. Fewer lift attendants, less food prepared, fewer rental fittings, less parking staffed.
Snowmaking is the exception, and it moves the other way, because the conditions that keep skiers away are the conditions that require more manufactured snow.
It is also the least avoidable cost of the group, since a resort that stops making snow has nothing to sell to the pass holders who have already paid.
And that is the mechanism in one line, ours. The pass converts revenue into a fixed amount and the weather converts a cost into a variable one, in opposite directions, and the margin absorbs both.
Minus Two Degrees
A physical limit on the mitigation.
A business magazine quotes a geographer that the overnight temperature has to be colder than minus 2, and the colder the better, for artificial snow, and that if it is mild and the nights are not getting cold enough, you cannot make it. He predicts that before long temperatures will rise enough that snow farming and snowmaking will no longer be viable solutions. The same article notes that in a recent poor year conditions were poor at resorts across North America rather than only in the east or west[5].
Four observations, ours.
Snowmaking is a mitigation with a hard physical ceiling, not a cost that can simply be increased.
Which caps our own arithmetic in a way the table does not show. Above some temperature the snowmaking line stops rising and the visit decline gets worse instead, and that scenario is materially worse than any row we modelled.
The observation that a bad year was continent-wide matters commercially, because a regional bad year sends destination guests elsewhere while a continental one does not.
And the prediction is a geographer's forecast rather than a finding, ours, which we flag and do not build on.
Deferred, Not Transferred
The second half of our disagreement with the source. Ours.
Four observations.
Skiers absorb the risk is accurate for one season and not for two. A pass holder who paid in September and got a poor winter has taken the loss.
But the pass is an annual purchase, and the same person decides again the following September with the previous winter fresh.
So the risk has not left the operator's balance sheet. It has moved along it, from a weather risk this year to a renewal risk next year.
And that reframing changes what a resort should do about it, ours, because weather cannot be managed and renewal can, through credits, rollovers, insurance products and pricing.
Which is why the mid-season credit is more than goodwill, ours. A resort that gives something back after a poor winter is buying down next year's renewal risk, and it is doing so with money it has already banked, at a moment when the alternative is a customer who feels they paid for nothing.
The Renewal Is The Real Exposure
Our own arithmetic, sizing the deferred risk on the same invented resort.
If pass renewals fall 5 percent, next year's pass revenue is $12.8 million against $13.5 million, a loss of 2.3 percent of total revenue. At 10 percent: $12.2 million, a loss of 4.5 percent. At 20 percent: $10.8 million, a loss of 9.0 percent.
Four observations.
A 20 percent renewal loss costs more of total revenue than a 15 percent visit decline did, at 9.0 percent against 8.3 percent.
And it arrives with none of the offsetting cost relief, because a pass holder who does not renew removes revenue without removing a body from the hill in the way a no-show does.
Worse, it is persistent. A lost visit is one season; a lost pass holder is a relationship that has to be rebuilt.
And the trade source saw this coming, ours, describing the insurance policy as possibly fraying and naming pass price fatigue[7], which is the same observation without the arithmetic.
When Is A Pass Earned
An accounting question we raise and deliberately do not answer.
Four observations, ours.
A season pass is cash received in September for access provided from December, so it is deferred revenue on receipt.
The question is what it is earned against. Access over the operating period, or use by the pass holder, and those give different answers in a short season.
If earned over the operating period, a shortened season recognises the same revenue over fewer days, which raises revenue per operating day and flatters a monthly comparison.
And we have not researched the applicable standard and will not assert one, ours. We raise it because it is the single largest number on a ski resort's balance sheet at the point the auditors arrive, and because the answer determines what an interim statement means.
The Lift Is A Thirty-Year Decision
The capital side, which the seasonality discussion usually omits.
Trade reporting records continued capital investment particularly in lift infrastructure, with examples including a new quad, two heated six-passenger bubble lifts, and plans for a new gondola across four adjacent Alberta areas in a single season[8]. Quebec reporting notes three new lifts planned at one mountain, a new quad at another, and snowmaking investments at others to better prepare for warmer winters ahead[6].
Four observations, ours.
Lift capital is committed on a horizon far longer than the weather forecast, and longer than most pass holders' loyalty.
The Quebec framing is the striking one. Snowmaking investment described as preparing for warmer winters ahead is capital spent to defend against a trend rather than to grow.
That distinction matters for how the spending should be appraised, ours. Defensive capital does not have a return in the ordinary sense; it has an avoided loss, and the two are appraised differently and frequently are not.
And it interacts with our margin finding, because a resort spending more on snowmaking capital is raising the fixed cost that a bad winter cannot flex.
There is a version of that trap worth stating plainly, ours. Spending capital to defend against warm winters makes a warm winter more expensive, because the depreciation and financing arrive whether or not the snow does, and the operating cost of running the new equipment arrives on top.
What The Climate Work Says
Reported at second hand and flagged as such.
A business magazine reports a 2024 study by researchers at the University of Waterloo and the University of Innsbruck finding that human-caused climate change has already shortened ski seasons, costing the United States ski industry an average of US$252 million a year, and that by 2050 that could climb to US$657 million in a low-emission environment or US$1.4 billion under higher emissions, with those numbers not accounting for the capital costs of expanded snowmaking, reduced revenue in related businesses, or the hit to real estate values at ski destinations. The same article notes that ski areas pump $2.15 billion into British Columbia's economy and employ more than 16,000 people, and quotes the association's president that skier visits in British Columbia in a recent season were down by 1.2 million, roughly 15 to 20 percent[5].
Four observations, ours.
We did not obtain the study and report only what the magazine reports of it.
The figures are United States, and the article applies them to a British Columbia discussion without a conversion, which we note rather than repeat.
The exclusions are the most useful part. The estimate excludes snowmaking capital, related business revenue and real estate values, which is an explicit statement that the number is a floor.
And the excluded item that matters most to our analysis is the first, ours. Snowmaking capital is precisely the cost we found driving the margin result, and the study says it is outside the estimate.
If You Run A Resort
Practical, and not accounting or business advice. Ours.
Four points.
Model a bad winter on margin, not on revenue. On our own arithmetic the revenue effect understates the profit effect by a factor of nearly five.
Treat snowmaking as a counter-cyclical cost in the plan, because it is the one line that rises when the season disappoints.
Manage renewal as the real exposure. A 20 percent renewal loss cost more of total revenue in our model than a 15 percent visit decline did, and it persists.
And appraise defensive snowmaking capital as an avoided loss, not as a return, because it raises the fixed cost base that a bad winter cannot flex.
If You Advise One
For our own profession. Ours.
Four points.
Split the cost base into visit-variable, fixed and weather-inverse, because the third category behaves unlike anything in an ordinary business and is the one that decides a bad year.
Establish the revenue recognition basis for passes explicitly, since it determines what every interim statement in the season means.
Report pass renewal rate alongside revenue, as a leading indicator of the following year rather than a description of this one.
And be careful with industry benchmarks here, since the association's own published figures for the same region disagree with each other and the association itself warns that visits do not correlate directly to revenue.
What To Do
Do not read revenue protection as immunity. On our own arithmetic a 15 percent visit decline costs 8.3 percent of revenue and 38.7 percent of margin.
Model snowmaking as rising when visits fall, and test the case where temperature prevents it rising at all.
Track pass renewal as the deferred half of the weather risk, arriving a year later.
Recognise that the cash advantage is real: pre-selling funds the season, which is the inverse of the seasonal contractor's problem.
Fix the revenue recognition basis for passes and state it.
Appraise snowmaking capital as defensive, with an avoided loss rather than a return.
Use dated, season-labelled industry figures only, and check them against a second source.
And treat the ancillary lines as the visit-sensitive ones, since food, rental and lessons are what a pass holder who stays home does not buy.
The Limits Of This Analysis
Several caveats matter. This article discusses resort operations and is not accounting, tax or business advice. Every input to our arithmetic is invented: the $30,000,000 of revenue, the 45 / 20 / 35 revenue mix, the $12,000,000 fixed, $9,000,000 visit-variable and $3,000,000 snowmaking cost base, and above all the snowmaking escalation assumptions of 20, 40 and 70 percent, which are unsourced and which drive the central margin result; a reader with real figures should substitute them, and we show the full table for that reason. We found no Canadian data on season pass revenue as a share of resort revenue, having looked, and that share is the hinge of the whole analysis. We obtained no financial statements and no dataset; the association states its detailed financial analysis is a members' benchmarking product and we did not have it. All industry data comes from ski industry associations reporting on their own members, and we document that the association's own published figures for Western Canada disagree across its pages on visits, spending and employment. The association itself warns that skier visit totals do not directly correlate to revenues, which is a caution against the pass-through calculation we nonetheless performed and flagged. The claim we test is about a United States operator reported by a United States trade site, and our Canadian comparator measures regional economic impact rather than one operator's revenue, so the two figures bracketing our pass-through range are not measuring the same quantity in the same country. We did not obtain the 2024 University of Waterloo and University of Innsbruck study and report it only as a business magazine describes it, noting that its United States figures are applied to a British Columbia discussion in that article without conversion. We raise the revenue recognition question and expressly do not answer it, having not researched the applicable standard. And our disagreement with the trade source is about a word: we accept its revenue observation entirely and dispute only that revenue protection amounts to immunity.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does a season pass protect a resort from a bad winter?
How much of a visit decline reaches revenue?
Why does snowmaking make it worse?
Is the weather risk really transferred to skiers?
How is a ski resort different from other seasonal businesses?
How big is Canadian skiing?
When is season pass revenue earned?
References
- Canada West Ski Areas Association, data and metrics for ski areas report, published July 2025. Reports Canadian skier visits of 19.5 million, up 8.6 percent from 17.9 million of the prior weather-challenged year; domestic visits growing to 17.4 million of the 19.5 million total; British Columbia posting a plus 14.96 percent year over year change while the return of snow to Ontario and Quebec allowed those regions to grow by 9.67 and 3.83 percent; British Columbia and Quebec owning the largest share of the national visit total at 34.5 and 33.4 percent; international visits remaining some 1 million behind pre-pandemic levels with the USA the largest international market at 5.9 percent and other offshore markets 3.2 percent; an estimated 2.57 million Canadians participating actively by purchasing at least one lift ticket as of winter 2024/25; that skier visit totals do not directly correlate to revenues but remain a key indicator of industry health, with destination guest origin and per capita spending levels significantly influencing revenue outcomes; and that the 2023/24 economic impact study reflects a challenging season for snow conditions across much of Western Canada, with a decline of skier visits of 15 percent from 2022/23 to 2023/24 producing a change in economic impact of just 2 percent, being $2.67 billion in total economic activity compared to $2.73 billion, of which $2.1 billion from British Columbia ski areas and $493 million from Alberta ski areas. Note: an industry association reporting on its own members, NOT an independent statistical source, flagged. Our source for the Canadian visit picture and for the 15 percent visits to 2 percent impact figure used in our pass-through calculation. Note its OWN CAUTION that visits do not correlate directly to revenue, which cuts against that calculation. cwsaa.org
- Canada West Ski Areas Association, economic impact of ski areas, published July 2024. States that skier visits in Western Canada for 2023/24 reached 8.75 million, 15 percent below the prior season's record high of 10.3 million, ranking in the top 8 of the past 20 years; that the association and its members gather performance data including skier visits, tax contributions, direct and indirect employment, economic impact and export revenue; that the primary industry reports are a consolidated skier visits report, an economic impact study measuring direct and indirect contribution, and a financial analysis giving detailed metrics of ski area business units for internal benchmarking; and that timing is influenced by seasonal cycles and ski area fiscal year ends, with financial data collected between spring and fall and reported to study participants in December. Note: the same industry association. Our source for the dated, season-labelled Western Canadian visit figures, which are the only association figures we use in any calculation. Records that the DETAILED FINANCIAL ANALYSIS is a members' benchmarking product, which we did NOT obtain. cwsaa.org
- Canada West Ski Areas Association, association profile page, accessed 2026. States that as of 2026 the association represents 269 members including 123 ski areas and 146 suppliers to the ski industry, and that ski areas in Western Canada attract 10 million alpine skier visits, generate $2.5 billion in spending annually, and employ over 27,000 people, being 22,590 full time equivalents. Note: an UNDATED summary figure on a profile page. Cited ONLY to document the conflict with refs 2 and 4 and NOT used in any calculation in this article. cwsaa.org
- Provincial ski association page reproducing the Canada West Ski Areas Association profile, stating that ski areas in Western Canada attract 9.5 million alpine skier visits and generate $2.1 billion in spending annually, employing 28,600 people, being 19,000 full time equivalents. Note: the same association profile reproduced with DIFFERENT figures from ref 3, on visits, spending, headcount and full time equivalents. Cited ONLY to document the conflict and NOT used in any calculation. The page also contains placeholder Latin text, which is itself a signal about its maintenance. skiontario.ca
- Business magazine feature on climate change and the British Columbia ski industry, November 2024. Reports that according to a 2024 study by researchers at the University of Waterloo and the University of Innsbruck, human-caused climate change has already shortened ski seasons, costing the United States ski industry an average of US$252 million a year, and that by 2050 that number could climb to US$657 million in a low-emission environment or US$1.4 billion under higher emissions, with those numbers not accounting for the capital costs of expanded snowmaking, reduced revenue in related businesses from hotels to retail, or the hit to real estate values at ski destinations; that ski areas pump $2.15 billion into British Columbia's economy and employ more than 16,000 people; quotes the association's president that skier visits in British Columbia in a recent season were down by 1.2 million, roughly 15 to 20 percent from the previous year; and quotes a geographer that the overnight temperature has to be colder than minus 2 for artificial snow, that if nights are not cold enough it cannot be made, that snow farming and snowmaking will before long no longer be viable solutions, and that in a recent poor year conditions were poor at resorts across North America rather than only in the east or west. Note: a business magazine describing an academic study WE DID NOT OBTAIN, flagged. Its climate cost figures are UNITED STATES and are applied to a British Columbia discussion in the article without conversion, which we note rather than repeat. The geographer's prediction is a forecast, not a finding. bcbusiness.ca
- Ski trade publication reporting the Quebec Ski Areas Association's 2025/26 season figures, May 2026. Records 6.317 million skier days, a 6 percent increase over the prior winter; lift ticket revenues of $263.7 million, a record high for the province; season passholders up 11 percent; that the Laurentians, Eastern Townships and Quebec City and Charlevoix together account for 77 percent of skier visits; that the Outaouais region saw a 20 percent rise and Mauricie a 19 percent rise; that the province features over 70 ski resorts, more than any state in the United States or province in Canada; and that forthcoming investment includes three new lifts at one mountain, a new quad chairlift at another, and snowmaking investments at others to better prepare for the warmer winters ahead. Note: a ski trade publication reporting a provincial industry association's figures, NOT the association's own release and NOT an independent source, flagged. The most useful Canadian data we found because it reports revenue and passholder growth alongside visits. unofficialnetworks.com
- Ski trade site's review of the 2025/26 North American season, May 2026. Records 52.6 million United States visits and the worst snowpack in 85 years; that a large operator's skier visits to its 37 North American resorts fell 14.9 percent with Rocky Mountain properties hit hardest at negative 25 percent, described by its chief executive as one of the most challenging winters in history; that the lift revenue number is the fascinating one, down only 5.6 percent despite a 15 percent drop in bodies, because the operator had already collected most of its money before the first flake fell, which it calls the pass model working exactly as designed, immunizing the company from bad winters, with skiers absorbing the risk; that the insurance policy might be fraying; and referring to pass price fatigue, antitrust lawsuits and a chief executive stepping down. Note: a ski trade site, NOT a filing, an analyst report or a regulator, and reporting a UNITED STATES operator, flagged. THIS IS THE SOURCE OF THE CLAIM THIS ARTICLE TESTS. We accept its revenue observation and dispute only the word immunizes. snowradar.com
- Ski area management trade publication reporting on the Canada West Ski Areas Association spring conference, May 2024. Records that more than 425 ski area operators and suppliers gathered; that final skier visit and active skier totals for Canada were not yet available but preliminary findings of the Canadian Ski Council suggested a drop from the prior year's record 21.1 million visits and 2.8 million active skiers; that operators reported steady demand despite the warmer, drier conditions of an El Nino pattern; and that four adjacent Alberta areas saw continued capital investment particularly in lift infrastructure, including a new quad opened at the start of the 2023/24 season, two areas installing heated six-passenger bubble lifts, and plans for a new gondola. Note: a ski industry trade publication. Cited for the lift capital examples and for the preliminary Canadian Ski Council figures, which are described as preliminary and which we do not use in any calculation. saminfo.com
This article discusses resort operations and is not accounting, tax or business advice. Every input to the arithmetic is invented, including the snowmaking escalation assumptions that drive the central margin result. No financial statements or datasets were obtained. All industry data comes from ski industry associations reporting on their own members, and those figures disagree across the association's own pages, which the article documents.