Kmart 5/1/11 RIP

cd

New member
Haven't posted in a long time. Fantastic day at Kmart, too bad it doubled as a wake for the former eastern giant's season. Another record early closing and this time amidst some of the most letter perfect cover in recent memory. Granted most eastern areas closed with thick wall to wall cover but Killington used to be different. Sadly they're just another ski area now (notice how few Kmart reviews are on this forum?).

That said it really was great today in the moment w/ bluebird skies & Superstar lift serving multiple trails with the crown jewel being its namesake (see photo hopefully attached!) with thick side to side bumps from top to bottom. Hundreds and hundreds of people proved that spring skiing IS viable (note cars in pic- yes many were there only because it was last day, but there would have (and has been) a huge crowd on any spring weekend day this nice). People were hanging everywhere making it look like a rock concert parking lot. Even the outlying slopes had beautiful cover and many could be seen hiking over to the K basin to ski slopes like Cascade & East Fall, and even making the trek over to Bear Mt to ski the still well-covered Outer Limits (as long as they'd arranged or could snag a kind-hearted ride back to the main area!!)

It's criminal that Kmart isn't staying open another couple of weeks (even longer would easily be possible) but their corporate homogenization is a pretty open book at this point -they surrendered their late season reputation years ago and will never get it back. I was recently rereading some of the threads here from ca 2005 when the Kmart late season worm turned and was having a good chuckle as some semi-anonymous company hack tried to post random justifications only to be blowtorched at every turn!

Hike em if ya got em- will be great for a good while!

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Welcome back CD.

I believe the last time you posted a TR of a Kmart closing in May, there were about 140 replies. :mrgreen: I would be surprise if it becomes a long thread. The Beast isn't back. Everyone knows it. If I would have gone skiing today, Kmart wouldn't have barely my top 4 ski area for this May 1st. Sad state of affairs. They were charging $49 and they were a ton of people for 7 runs. Look at the competition this weekend (okay, Kmart is closing to BosNYC metro)...same price and cheaper with more terrain (except MSS).
 
I wasn't about to pay $49 for a day at Kmart with 7 runs open. It just doesn't seem worth it it for that price.
 
rfarren":1k12y564 said:
I wasn't about to pay $49 for a day at Kmart with 7 runs open. It just doesn't seem worth it it for that price.
When I was checking who survived and was calling it quits, I saw that Jay was charging $69!!! I know they had a deal with the Tram Haus Lodge for $69/pp/pn including lift tix, but lift tix alone also????

Can anyone confirm this?

PS. As of last night...

Miller, Bush and Kmart are done. As well as Daily skiing.
Loaf, Jay, MSS are planing to reopen next weekend.
No clear wording at the Saddle about next week.
 
Oh these last few times were definitely worth the $50, would be doing it multiple times more if they hadn't dropped the ball. Only downside yesterday was that so many people agreed with the above that it made for some hi-density sections at times. Besides the usual looking ahead on your line you often needed that extra sense of other peoples lines. There's worse things haha, but this is why many were adventuring elsewhere (see pic). Other downside of course was the aforementioned "wake" aspect and sadness about once mighty traditions there, but it was easy to forget in the day-at-the-beach moment...hey it's not the snow's fault!

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Roger that, seemed to be the prevailing opinion among the formerly faithful. And still this good after Bears been closed for coupla weeks (afaik, few of us follow the day-to-day up there anymore). Here's one last pic from top of OL, that skiers right line in particular was perfection! Note added knife-twist of locked gate to parking lot necessitating a trek across same to cars...

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cd":2w1yihkh said:
Roger that, seemed to be the prevailing opinion among the formerly faithful. And still this good after Bears been closed for coupla weeks (afaik, few of us follow the day-to-day up there anymore).

Bear closed the Sunday of Mogul Challenge. That was April 3. OL was wall-to-wall for most of April. Earlier in the month, Killington was trying to pull passes of people who poached it. That produced some fairly ugly confrontations. There was also a huge amount of snow on what used to be lower Bear Claw from the Mountain Dew event in January. Killington actually had a groomer in the half pipe removing snow from the bottom so it would be unusable.
 
cd":2gsd0g95 said:
It's criminal that Kmart isn't staying open another couple of weeks (even longer would easily be possible) but their corporate homogenization is a pretty open book at this point -they surrendered their late season reputation years ago and will never get it back.

This isn't about corporate homogenization. It's about Chris Nyberg being totally incompetent. Mount Bachelor extended their season by 2 weeks into mid-May so this has nothing to do with the corporate bean counters in Utah. I don't know about you guys but if I took over a business and lost 1/3 of my customers in the first year, I'd expect to get fired. Chris Nyberg's spring skiing policy is only one of many moronic changes he implemented that chased all the people away. If you ask any of the staff, the guy is a total tyrant and the staff is afraid to speak their mind for fear of being fired. The guy was a western ops guy and never had the reins of a whole ski resort. He had an in-between job selling snow grooming equipment for Bombardier to other ski area ops guys. He has zero experience with the eastern drive-to market. As an ops guy, he's done a great job repairing the snowmaking system and making sure the roofs didn't leak in the base lodges. As the visionary to carry Killington into the 21st century as the premier ski resort in the east, he has been an epic failure.

I doubt Chris Nyberg will be around much longer. Word is that his wife hated Vermont and is now living in the Carolinas. If POWDR hires the right replacement, Killington could easily restore their late season reputation. Unfortunately, POWDR could also hire somebody who is worse.
 
Geoff said:
Bear closed the Sunday of Mogul Challenge. That was April 3. OL was wall-to-wall for most of April. Earlier in the month, Killington was trying to pull passes of people who poached it. That produced some fairly ugly confrontations. There was also a huge amount of snow on what used to be lower Bear Claw from the Mountain Dew event in January. Killington actually had a groomer in the half pipe removing snow from the bottom so it would be unusable.

Yes I heard some of those tales from the cadre of ski gypsys we met over there. Sounds about right given their recent track record or lack thereof.
 
Geoff said:
cd said:
It's criminal that Kmart isn't staying open another couple of weeks (even longer would easily be possible) but their corporate homogenization is a pretty open book at this point -they surrendered their late season reputation years ago and will never get it back.

This isn't about corporate homogenization. It's about Chris Nyberg being totally incompetent. Mount Bachelor extended their season by 2 weeks into mid-May so this has nothing to do with the corporate bean counters in Utah. I don't know about you guys but if I took over a business and lost 1/3 of my customers in the first year, I'd expect to get fired. Chris Nyberg's spring skiing policy is only one of many moronic changes he implemented that chased all the people away. If you ask any of the staff, the guy is a total tyrant and the staff is afraid to speak their mind for fear of being fired. The guy was a western ops guy and never had the reins of a whole ski resort. He had an in-between job selling snow grooming equipment for Bombardier to other ski area ops guys. He has zero experience with the eastern drive-to market. As an ops guy, he's done a great job repairing the snowmaking system and making sure the roofs didn't leak in the base lodges. As the visionary to carry Killington into the 21st century as the premier ski resort in the east, he has been an epic failure.

I doubt Chris Nyberg will be around much longer. Word is that his wife hated Vermont and is now living in the Carolinas. If POWDR hires the right replacement, Killington could easily restore their late season reputation. Unfortunately, POWDR could also hire somebody who is worse.

Thanx for the background. It is homogenization as far as opening/closing in line with everyone (or most) else but if it's more one guy's doing than the mothership well guess there's a sliver of hope. Sure seemed more systemic at the time the spring policy changed amidst debt restructuring, land swaps, etc. Of course we all knew that the "late season as reason for $ woes" was a red herring. Guess there's hope that the next guy won't be so myopic but we'll see. After so many years away from the long tradition it'd be awhile before their hardcore reputation truly returned, if it ever truly did...but hey I'll talk em up if they change ;)
 
I may be naive, but what else has Nyberg done that has harmed the brand other than shorten the season? (it's been 4 or 5 years since I last skied there)
 
>>>>>I may be naive, but what else has Nyberg done that has harmed the brand other than shorten the season? (it's been 4 or 5 years since I last skied there)>>>>>

Hmm that's kinda like asking "Other than that how was the play, Mrs Lincoln?" haha. Seriously, I'll let someone who pays attention to Kmart's day-to-day season answer that BUT meanwhile it's impossible to overstate just how much the drastic shortening of the season has harmed the brand. Having your area be the first one people talk about in the fall and the last one they talk about in the spring (or summer!) pays off in *huge* ways that don't always show up on the ledgers as a line item on a particular day. Not only did they blow it off but during the fairly sudden change they actually had company leghumpers out on forums like this one lying about motivations, fudging reasoning and in some cases openly sneering at/insulting their most faithful late season customers for calling them out on it all. They forgot that cachet, loyalty and reputation are everything. Maybe they can get it back, but every additional year they shut down and leave conditions like are on the mt right this minute to rot they get a little further away from a possible recovery...
 
I'd pay $49 just to ski that pic of Superstar.

I don't get to Killington often, but I love the place and wish it was run the old way.

Hell I think all the northeastern mountains should have an add on to their full pass that gives you rights to ski Kmart after your hill closes, with Kmart getting most of the revenue generated.
 
Patrick":12apgtb1 said:
rfarren":12apgtb1 said:
I wasn't about to pay $49 for a day at Kmart with 7 runs open. It just doesn't seem worth it it for that price.
When I was checking who survived and was calling it quits, I saw that Jay was charging $69!!! I know they had a deal with the Tram Haus Lodge for $69/pp/pn including lift tix, but lift tix alone also????

Can anyone confirm this?
Sunday was $39 at Jay. They had Jet, Bonnie, Metro, Village, and the Magic Carpet turning. Amazing that they truly had terrain for all abilities. I heard that the Tram and Flyer had electrical issues and as a result got shut down which probably lowered the price to $39. Otherwise, it was most snow making terrain open except trails that dump into Ullr's/Kokomo as that run out was blown. Seriously impressive offering from Jay last weekend. I know where I'll be skiing this coming weekend... VT's new King of Spring. :-D Jet and Haynes, FTW!

Though, much as I like Jay better than K... Superstar is a superior spring skiing offering and I would be there over Jay if they were open.

:sabre fight: :dead horse:
 
cd":1mr4v9ba said:
rfarren":1mr4v9ba said:
I may be naive, but what else has Nyberg done that has harmed the brand other than shorten the season? (it's been 4 or 5 years since I last skied there)

They forgot that cachet, loyalty and reputation are everything. Maybe they can get it back, but every additional year they shut down and leave conditions like are on the mt right this minute to rot they get a little further away from a possible recovery...

Killington was THE place. The only places running weekends in a row. Open until you had to tale off your skis 3-4 times before you did top-to-bottom. At one point, I'll post some old stuff on Ski Mad World about the good old Spring Days. The blog is still a work in progress.

Here is something from a few years ago...
viewtopic.php?f=2&t=6809&p=34630&hilit=Kmart+June+days#p34630
Patrick":1mr4v9ba said:
Geoff":1mr4v9ba said:
Killington is day trip distance from metro-Boston and 4-ish from metro-NYC. In the spring when everyone else closes, there has always been a huge amount of day ticket business at Killington as the people with all the ski passion from other Northeastern mountains wander in. Tons of Canadians. Tons of Massholes. Tons of New Yorkers.

Sure, the 7 month season and snowmaking reputation has always been a reason to settle at Killington and buy a season pass. A big April into May is also a viable business based on walkup day ticket sales. You don't get the same skier yield since lodging is steeply discounted and there's a price break on the lift ticket but it doesn't take many staff to operate the resort at that time of year. They run the K1 in the summer for mountain biking and touron lift rides when the place gets very little traffic. There's no reason why they can't do the same thing in at least the first half of May.

I remember arguing this point a few years ago. Speaking as a ex-"Canadian within a day trip distance", I've almost exclusively skied Kmart on the margin of the season. Killington is, I believe it's still, my 3rd area with the most visits, although I've only skied a handful of time in months other than May and June. I haven't skied at Killington much in the last few years, because the Kmart isn't the only game in town for me and I've had other choices.

Geoff":1mr4v9ba said:
I think ASC really created the problem when they ripped out the Killington double chair. They could load at the midstation and operate the lift with 3 or 4 staff for October and late-May skiing. Upper Downdraft held snow much better than Superstar and the trail is much narrower so the costs to stockpile snow were much lower. To restore the Killington brand, I really think they should buy a used double or triple and run it from midmountain up to Killington Peak for fall and spring skiing.

Even before they removed that double, they moved late Spring skiing operations on the new Superstar. This was shortsighted, because it required some much more to get Superstar to open that late in the season. Once they decided to removed the double and replace it with K1...that pretty much made the energy and efforts to start early and end late so much harder...the fate of K legacy (early/late skiing) was living on borrowed time.

It would be great if they would try to restore the K brand the way that Geoff mentions, however I would be surprised if that would happened. How many people saw the arrival of the K1 Gondola has an improvement over the 0ld K Peak double? Not many people had a tear from that old double, the ones that did really understood what it meant. :cry:

PS. Superstar would look in much worst shape than the actual pic of a closed OL on K's closing days. [-X

PPS. Superstar and Skye Peak is a way better terrain than Jay (Haynes-Jet) for late late season. As Mt. Ellen with FIS is better than Sugabush Valley.
 
I agree that the early (Oct) season was greatly affected by the loss of the old K peak double w/ midstation, but they had started doing Superstar in spring prior to that and IMO it was a very good call. Making some extra snow on that huge wide ribbon, esp with parking/social scene at bottom, is (oops, was) just right for the warm May/June cult!

As for the early season a higher elevation definitely does help with a jump on the snowmaking. The big problem with the olde K double was that skiers loading at midstation had to wait for chairs not already occupied by leaf peepers or mt bikers, plus the chair had to slow down for any pedestrian up or downloading so it made for some glacially slow waits/rides. A rope tow (are those even legal anymore?) or Poma on Upper Cascade would serve that purpose more cleanly but overall Kmarts Glades chair is more suited for early season IMO, with it's high altitude and at least semi-northern exposure. The method with the pickup truck ride> Canyon chair > Glades chair was admittedly a bit silly although it was always appreciated for evidence of their then-commitment to the experience. Now that they've installed a catwalk between the summit (that the gondola is running to anyway in the fall) and the top of the Glades area there's a little more flexibility- only time will tell if they take more advantage of it.

This subject will never be a completely dead horse to some of us.....tho I do admit it smells a little funny at times haha....
 
Patrick":3mb4y874 said:
PS. Superstar would look in much worst shape than the actual pic of a closed OL on K's closing days. [-X
I'll leave Patrick's syntax alone this time, but the OL picture vs. old days closing pics of Superstar is what immediately popped into my mind also.

cd":3mb4y874 said:
Now that they've installed a catwalk between the summit (that the gondola is running to anyway in the fall) and the top of the Glades area there's a little more flexibility
In the marathon thread a few years back I had advocated using the K1 as a transport lift. I chatted with Tom Horrocks once at a NASJA meeting and he conceptually agreed but had no idea if it would ever happen. Given Vermont Act 250 the catwalk is probably the best they can do in terms of access vs. the ideal of extending Glades to the top.

I agree with most of the posters above. Killington is the closest viable spring mountain to a huge population base in metro Boston and NYC. There is ample historical evidence of more than adequate patronage, at least on the weekends. I might add that Powdr is even being stingy about what lifts they ran last weekend. When I skied April 29, 1990 the lift out of the Bear base was open even though you you had to move your car from the main base to ski there. And K1 was open serving Downdraft I think.

Geoff":3mb4y874 said:
Mount Bachelor extended their season by 2 weeks into mid-May so this has nothing to do with the corporate bean counters in Utah.
BFD! With 633 inches of snowfall Bachelor is going to have wall-to-wall cover for its full 3,100 vertical well into July this year. And the extension is one week, to Sunday of Memorial weekend. They have always been open to 3rd weekend of May for the Pole, Pedal, Paddle event.
 
Tony Crocker":7iy56lrt said:
BFD! With 633 inches of snowfall Bachelor is going to have wall-to-wall cover for its full 3,100 vertical well into July this year. And the extension is one week, to Sunday of Memorial weekend.
Whoa! Tony is starting to talk like he's in a Killington thread for real and not just arm chairing. LOL.

:rotfl:
 
Lots of Killington Refuges at Jay today. Last week, it seemed like at least every other skier was from Quebec. This week it seemed like at least every other skier usually skis Killington. I bet Jay broke even if not made a profit this weekend.

:stir:
 
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