Beginner lessons help keep ski industry growing

Ski instructor Jake Howe helps five-year-old Emma Grissom form a snowplow at Winter Park Resort in Colorado.

• Winter Park Resort

• Vail Resorts

• National Ski Areas Association

• Professional Ski Instructors of America

YOUR E-MAIL ALERTS

WINTER PARK, Colorado (AP) -- With a half-dozen other 5-year-olds watching from the top of the Winter Park Resort bunny hill, Emma Grissom stretched out her arms in a puffy, pink coat and pointed her tiny skis down the gentle slope.

"Make the pizza!" her instructor yelled as Emma wobbled and then forced her skis into the snowplow position resembling a pizza slice.

"Emma, that was great!" shouted her mother, longtime skier Ruth Grissom of Milton, Florida. "I can't wait till she's skiing with me."

Children like Emma are emerging as a boon for the North American ski industry. Amid the modest growth in overall skier visits since 2000, "we've seen consistent growth in children's lessons," said Tim White, education director for the Colorado-based National Ski Areas Association. "It's a bright spot."

During the 2004-05 season, the total volume of ski lessons for all ages increased 0.5 percent, but children's lessons were up 2.5 percent. Since 2002, children's ski lessons have grown 3 percent.

As the baby boom generation ages, the emphasis on teaching the sport to a younger generation and other beginners makes sense and may already be having an impact. Skier visits were averaging about 50 million a year in the 1980s and '90s, but the 2004-05 season was the fourth-best on record, with 56.9 million skier visits, White said.

"We're optimistic as an industry," White added. "We hope to keep aging baby boomers skiing as long as we can, while seeing them bring their children and grandchildren to the slopes."

For the five ski areas owned by Vail Resorts, total skier visits were up 5.3 percent in fiscal year 2005 from the previous year and ski school revenues were up 9.8 percent to $63.8 million in those two years.

The numbers suggest that a program started by NSAA four years ago to help beginners become full-fledged snowriders is paying off. That program urged resorts to offer discounts to first-timers for repeat visits after research showed that beginners who took three lessons were much more likely to stick with the sport.

Booming business

Ski instruction has also adapted. In the past, lessons focused on technique and skill level, but instructors now also show off the full range of their knowledge, including tips such as where to rest up after a day's runs or where to find the best powder, said Rebecca Ayers of the Professional Ski Instructors of America.

Dee Byrne, ski school director at Vail Mountain, credits such personal touches for the growth in the resort's private lessons, which run up to $595 for up to six people per day.

"A private instructor is a coach, companion, guide and concierge and our instructors understand that they fulfill all of these roles instead of teaching a straightforward lesson," Byrne said. "That makes a difference."

Vail Mountain has about 960 full- and part-time instructors. Vail Resorts wouldn't disclose how many lessons they give, but Byrne said there is enough business to keep 500 full-time instructors busy four days a week.

Business also is booming at Winter Park, which set a record December 27, 2004, with 780 students, ski school assistant manager Chris Koch said. The ski school staff includes about 360 instructors.

Like roughly half of Winter Park's ski school students, 14-year-old Scott Geringer of St. Louis and 10-year-old Jake Dunoyer of Severna, Maryland, were visiting from outside Colorado. They spent a brisk day in late January tackling moguls with an instructor.

"Skiing's only fun if you get good at it," said Jake's father, Francois Dunoyer. "The only way to get good is to take lessons from a professional. Children don't learn very well from their parents."

Elsewhere on the mountain, 10-year-old snowboarder Luke Olexsak of Upper Freehold, New Jersey, was mastering how to land. From the top of a run with three small jumps, instructor Amy Rogers kneeled in front of him and gave him advice before she rode away easily over the jumps.

Then it was Luke's turn.

Tentative, he fell to the ground just before the first jump, then stood back up, rode over the first two jumps and went airborne on the last one, landing comfortably next to Rogers.

"He learned more in three days here in ski school than he learned in three years in New Jersey," said his father, Steve Olexsak, an avid skier.

Luke said it was his dad's idea for him to take lessons. By the end of his first day of lessons, he said, he was asking for more.