Don't surf, ski the net

By STEPHEN WOOD

About a year ago the ski resort of Mammoth in California started selling season-long lift passes. For six weeks - "or while supplies last" - the passes were offered at $US375 ($900), a huge discount on the full price of $US1620 ($3890).

Supplies did not last long. The passes became available at midnight at Mammoth Mountain on May 1. By the time the resort office opened in the morning, more than 6000 had been sold.

Anything that can generate $NZ5.2 million of revenue while the sales staff are asleep is bound to cause excitement among ski companies and resorts.

Yet most of those who have embraced e-commerce have done so with lesser ambitions and for more prosaic reasons.

When a British ski holiday firm did a survey on Yahoo recently it found 4500 skiing websites. Now every resort has its own site, even Lassing in Austria, which boasts just one drag-lift and 300m of piste.

A vast network of sites promoting winter sports products worldwide, 24 hours a day, is obviously good for business; but does it make life easier for skiers and snowboarders? That's not so obvious.

It's worth browsing through the big general sites such as If You Ski, Iglu, Ski Solutions and 1 Ski - provided you have the patience.

The If You Ski site grew out of the Complete Skier site, which boasted 40,000 pages of resort profiles, snow reports, webcams and holiday deals.

The new site has added 360-degree panoramic images and interactive maps that show you around a resort, pointing out lifts, accommodation and sports facilities.

You can book holidays through these sites but the technology struggles to keep up, even with simple operations. When I tried to access webcam images of Vail on each of the four big sites, only Ski Solutions could come up with the goods.

In theory, it's possible to do a complete online transaction with, for example, Rocket Ski, a site designed by Brighton-based Equity Total Ski to let users create their own packages by selecting individually priced items (flights, accommodation, lift passes) from an "electronic supermarket."

Unfortunately when I tried to compare its lift-pass prices with those available in a sample resort, navigation difficulties led me to phone its helpline - to be told that an electronic glitch was preventing the company from accessing its own site.

Everybody believes that somewhere on the web there are great bargains to be had, if only because sites are littered with "special deals" and "superdeals". But it's almost impossible to know how good the savings are because ski websites don't quote "was" and "NOW!" prices.

It's also worth bearing in mind that most reports on snow depth and condition, however "independent," can ultimately be traced back to resort tourism offices; and no resort has ever seen much point in underestimating the quality and quantity of its snow.

It is possible to buy winter-sports equipment online, but not advisable. If you want something that fits and looks good - which you probably do - then flicking

My favourite ski website - for its economy - is Vail Sucks.com. It was created, so the story goes, after the Dunkin' Donuts chain bought the www.dunkindonutssucks.com site - created by a disaffected customer. The site become so popular that the company bought it simply to close it down.

The resort of Vail took pre-emptive action to ensure that it never suffered such embarrassment. Call up www.vailsucks.com and you get this simple message: "No it doesn't."

- INDEPENDENT

Links

Mammoth Mountain

Lassing

If You Ski

Iglu

Ski Solutions

1 Ski

Complete Skier

Rocket Ski

Vail Sucks