Today, I want to plant a seed. The size of the plant that will grow from it is a mystery until it’s planted, but let me share some statistics. You already know what website these numbers are describing, but I’ll pretend you don’t and imagine I am building some sofa-gripping suspense.

• 4 million unique US visitors a month looking for computers & technology alone
• A pair of shoes is sold every 8 seconds
• Total active user count of nearly 90 million

The source? You’ll never guess, so I’d probably better tell you. I am talking about the great eBay. Yes, the seller of all things random. The seed I hope to plant is that maybe, just maybe, you can use this auction behemoth to add a notch or two to your resort’s revenues. You won’t be the first (read further to see who your competition is) but an opportunity for a unique method of generating sales awaits the clever and brave. Here are a few stats:

• As of this morning, there are 495 results on eBay for the search “lift tickets”
• The only seller, as far as I could tell, that was an actual ski resort was Song Mountain, NY
• An auction for two Killington lift tickets has 15 bids with the latest for $127.00

Lift tickets are just one thing that could be sold. Gear, vacations, stuff with your logo plastered on it, one-of-a-kind swag you come up with: whatever it is, there are lots of people looking for random stuff (and buying it) on eBay.

Just something to think about…

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.