Mt Baldy’s Virtual Season Pass: The Future of Ticketing?

Mt. Baldy, once again, is offering a “Virtual Season Pass” through Liftopia. At a 75% discount ($179, normally $699), the holder never receives a physical pass but the savings may be worth the added effort to ski each day. Not only that, but the price is the same now as it will be the last week of the season. Here’s how it works according to the listing:

…simply complete your booking on Liftopia.com, and then anytime you want to ski or ride Mt. Baldy, all season long, all you need to do is make an online reservation through the Mt. Baldy website (www.mtbaldy.com)

So, instead of being able to simply roll up to the lift, you’re required to make a pit stop at the ticket window to snag your pass for the day. A small price to pay for a hefty discount. For the crew at Baldy, this pass presents a few perks:

• Can be sold on Liftopia all year and, at about 3x the price of a day pass, it makes for an enticing offer especially for repeat skiers who are buying their first day pass of the year
• Thanks to the pass’s innovative nature, they got some nice coverage from the Liftopia folks through social media and of course, high-profile, industry-dominating mega-blogs like SlopeFillers
• No need to print up, replace, or worry about physical passes
• Because reservations are required, Baldy can have an estimated volume of skiers and riders coming each day

The Deal Sealer
My favorite aspect of this concept is the ability to see, thanks to the reservation system, a rough estimate of how many skiers or riders I could expect to see any given day. As a marketer, especially one who is using social media/email, you could pick out a slow day or two a week and push a discount offer to try to snag a few more skiers than you normally would have.

A solid idea in my book, I’d be interested to see any variations of this that are tried at other resorts. Don’t see too many drawbacks.