Last year I made a plea to ski entrepreneur to find a big, hairy problem and solve it.

We have enough apps, we have enough clothing and ski brands, we have enough of just about everything except real solutions to our industry’s biggest challenges. We need ski entreprenuers to dream big.

One of our biggest hurdles manifests itself in the fact that of all first time skiers, only about 15% ever return.

The Chosen One
Looking across our industry’s landscape, there’s really only one entrepreneur whose efforts I’d say fit what i was pleading for.

Joe Hession.

He’s come up with a simple approach to teaching skiing that is solving this problem. At Mountain Creek, his “Terrain Based Learning” approach saw a return rate of 65%. I’ve often looked for ways to grow skiing, and this is about the best I’ve ever seen.

The Patterns
All the signs around Joe’s effort make me think he’s onto something big.

From pricing that removes the conversion-killing ski school upsell to getting into the mind of the beginner and more, it’s little wonder why NSAA’s Michael Berry said his approach was:

Not a bad endorsement, eh?

Go to Camp
In March comes the piece of Joe’s story that make me most excited. Joe and SAM Magazine have partnered to put on the very first Conversion Camp.

For all the doom and gloom stats circulated each year, there is a severe lack of discussion about solutions…perhaps because we haven’t had any in the past.

Thanks to Joe, I think we do.

What I’d Do
My schedule won’t let me go this year, but you should. Seriously, do some math on what your bottom line would look like if you could increase your conversion rate by just 10% and then register.

This is a discussion we need to have. We need to take our best solution to this conversion dilemma and put it in the hands of as many resorts as possible so they can iterate and improve.

I am totally pumped that this camp is getting started and couldn’t be happier that Joe is at the helm.

About Gregg & SlopeFillers
I've had more first-time visitors lately, so adding a quick "about" section. I started SlopeFillers in 2010 with the simple goal of sharing great resort marketing strategies. Today I run marketing for resort ecommerce and CRM provider Inntopia, my home mountain is the lovely Nordic Valley, and my favorite marketing campaign remains the Ski Utah TV show that sold me on skiing as a kid in the 90s.