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Situation normal, get used to it

Okay, let’s talk.
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Okay, let’s talk. The festival’s winding down, the season’s winding down – and hasn’t it been marvelously normal, which is to say spectacular – and it’s time to get down to work on some of the nagging problems we’ve been putting off while we either ski or hope they go away.

But really, people, enough is enough. Some of you are walking around with nothing attached to the ends of your wrists from all the hand wringing you’ve been doing. And some of you have been tsk-tsking so much your friends must think you’ve developed a stutter. Stop it. Stop it now. It isn’t doing any good and we’re really getting worked up about forces (a) we have very little control over and (b) largely the result of our own overreaching and hubris.

And for all of you who are moaning and whining about how much better Whistler used to be back in the happy go-go days… piss off. You’re insulting me; you’re insulting my friends; you’re insulting my town. Most of the people I know and work with are bustin’ their butts to make this place not just work but make it the best damn place imaginable for you to come play, stay, eat, party and generally carry on like the high roller you pretend to be while you’re here. You’re looking through a rose-tinted rearview mirror at a past that never really existed. Getcher eyes back on the future and stop wallowing in a planted memory of a phony nostalgiaville.

Since nobody seems willing to say it I guess the task falls on me. The basic, Economics 101 laws of supply and demand work, people. Whistler’s too big. We’ve got too many hotel – excuse me, privately-owned condo – rooms. We’ve got too many retail outlets selling insufficiently differentiated merchandise. We’ve got too many retail outlets selling boring merchandise. We’ve got too many retail outlets selling stuff not enough people want to buy. We’ve got too many rapacious, carpetbagger, absentee commercial landlords who don’t give a rat’s ass what happens to this town as long as their investment portfolio returns its target ROI. We’ve got too many rapacious, non-absentee, long-time local commercial landlords who seem to think lining their already well-lined pockets is what the game’s all about, everyone else’s future be damned. And, unfortunately, we’ve got too many people in too many of those businesses who are going to go belly up before this thing resolves itself. I feel your pain; many of you are friends.

But the grim reality is this: the destination visitors aren’t going to be coming back in the bold numbers we saw them flock to Whistler in the 1990s. In fact, more likely than not what we saw this season – a strong response from the local and regional market to lower prices – is going to be, like the weather, normal. And like Bruce says, the trouble with normal is it always gets worse.

Ask yourself this question. Why did destination skiers travel to Whistler throughout the ’90s like pilgrims traveling to salvation? It wasn’t because of the We’re Number One hype in the ski mags, although that certainly didn’t hurt. It wasn’t because we offered the tempting lure of the undervalued Canadian peso, although that certainly didn’t hurt either. It wasn’t because we were nicer people, or because we were easier to get to than other places, or because most of Europe had crappy snow or because we had deliriously happy Aussie lifties, although all those things helped.

The principal reason they came was because they’d never been here before. We were the big, bold, brash, new ski resort on the block. We were the flavour du jour, the flirty guy and gal at the bar 15 minutes before closing with the come hither glare, the Great Unknown.

But we’re not any more. They came; they saw; they skied and boarded. Some of them had the time of their lives. Some of them had a less good, perhaps wetter time. Some of them thought we were the best place they’d ever skied. Some of them thought we were good but not great. Some of them have and will come back; some of them haven’t and won’t.

Chalk it up to human nature.

When we were new and unknown, we were mysterious. Now? No mystery. So, from a marketing perspective, our market’s changed. We no longer have a huge universe of skiers who’ve never been here and are clamouring to see what Whistler’s all about. Now we’re competing – along with all the other players in the destination ski resort market – for the same pool of people who pick and choose where they’ll spend their ski vacation from among the universe of known quantities.

And how do those people pick and choose? Well, how do you pick and choose where you spend your vacation? Some of you are the kind of people who want to go back to a place where you’ve had a great experience, over and over again. Very few of you are weird enough to want to go back to a place where you’ve had a lousy experience. But I’m willing to bet most of you are the kind of people who want to go someplace different. Someplace you’ve never been to before. Or someplace you haven’t been to for a long time.

Now, I hear you saying, "So what? That’s why we’re trying to diversify what we are and what we offer. We’re not a ski resort; we’re a mountain resort."

While diversification is all well and good, and I support it wholeheartedly, let’s call for a reality check here. As a ski resort, Whistler will always be one of the very top resorts in the world… as long as the world has snow. Our mountains assure that. Big, bigger, biggest. No brag, just fact.

But as a mountain resort? Really now, what exactly do we have to distinguish ourselves? Let’s face it, whether you’re hitching your fortunes to events, health & wellness, adult education or any of the other ideas being pitched, you’re talking about being one of many, not one of few. And you’re talking about ventures that have lower barriers to entry and activities where it’s harder to build, let alone maintain, sustainable – used in the true meaning of the word – competitive advantages.

What it all means is this. Whistler’s future looks more like this season than the season of, say, 1999. It looks like a pie with a much bigger slice of price-sensitive, short-stay, less free-spending regional guests and a relatively smaller slice of hang-the-expense high rollers.

If we’re smart – we are, aren’t we? – we’ll adjust. We’ll work harder, build a broader base, make nice with everyone who comes here, not be killed by overbuilding and overreaching because of the Olympics™, and realize there isn’t going to be any quick fix.

Although tarring and feathering some landlords, and people building unnecessary quartershare hotels, wouldn’t be a half bad idea.