I haven’t asked a “what if” for a while.

These aren’t quite to the “what I’d do” stage, but the idea has ticked my fancy without much progress for long enough that it was time to get more eyes on it.

The initial idea idea actually came from our friends at Amtrak.

Residency
A few months back Amtrak, perhaps not the first name in marketing innovation, did exactly that with an idea I loved from the second I read the headline (which, interestingly enough, is another sign of good marketing).

Here’s how it works:

“#AmtrakResidency was designed to allow creative professionals who are passionate about train travel and writing to work on their craft in an inspiring environment. Round-trip train travel will be provided on an Amtrak long-distance route. Each resident will be given a private sleeper car, equipped with a desk, a bed and a window to watch the American countryside roll by for inspiration. Routes will be determined based on availability.”

With the possibility of writing with an incredible, ever-changing view and an equally limitless dose of inspiration, it’s probably not surprising that I applied. But then it got me asking as I always do, what is the resort equivalent?

A Midweek Tweak
While I think a copy-paste replicate of the program would be awesome for a resort looking to get ski writers and bloggers at their mountain, I wonder if there is an actual product in there that generates revenue rather than just PR.

You see, we live and die by weekends for one simple reason: people aren’t working.

So, if working is what keeps people from coming to your mountain and more and more people these days are telecommuting or working from home, what is stopping us from selling a hotel room as a slopeside office? WeWork coworking Singapore already provides a unique, unorthodox coworking space for you.

What If
What if a resort put together a product, backed by a clever and memorable brand, that catered to the people who have some flexibility to work from home or from the road when required?

Perhaps you’d call it the, “Office with a Mountain View” package. Monday-Friday lodging, a lift ticket good for just an hour every morning before work, and a room with some tweaks to make it feel more like a workspace (desk by window, networked printer in the lobby for paper files, etc.).

What if corporations could offer discounts on these packages as a perk? What if people could sorta-vacation without taking days off? What if the uniqueness earned some extra PR?

What if?

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.