Eaglecrest Manager Matt Lillard began his speech at Thursday’s Chamber of Commerce luncheon by asking audience members to raise their hands if they predict a snowy winter. Nearly everybody in the crowded Moose Lodge dining room raised a hand.
“That’s better than I might have thought,” Lillard joked.
Maybe next week’s chilly forecast was responsible for the optimistic outlook. Maybe it was Eaglecrest’s impending opening weekend. Either way, the cheery outlook wasn’t characteristic of the public at large, according to Lillard, who is trying to turn things around after two consecutive bad seasons.
During the five years that he has been at Eaglescrest, Lillard has seen a few recording-setting years. His first season in Juneau, the 2011-2012 season, was one of the snowiest on record. There were 365 inches of snow at the base of the mountain. During the 2014-2015 season, the ski area’s worst season on record, there were only 70 inches at the base of the mountain.
The ski area only opened the upper mountain for five days that season compared to 96 days during the 2011-2012 season, a fact that Lillard said damaged people’s confidence when it comes to buying season passes. Last year’s 69-day season didn’t help.
The ski area has suffered a 30 percent drop in season-pass sales, and the ski area has had to cut staff positions as a result, Lillard said.
“We’re really trying to fight that, to get confidence back in people,” he told the chamber lunch crowd.
Snowfall, above anything else, is what the ski area needs in order to restore that lost confidence. The weather is beyond Eaglecrest’s control, but Lillard and his team are doing everything they can to make the coming season last as long as possible.
Ski area staff spent a combined total of 1,500 hours trimming trails this summer to make sure they are skiable even in low-snow conditions. If brush and stumps aren’t poking through the snow, skiers can make it down the mountain even if there’s less snow than in years past, according to Lillard.
“We’re trying to be as aggressive as possible in opening terrain,” he said. “We’re skiing off the top of the mountain and finding whatever patches of snow we can to get people off of that mountain.”
This weekend, Eaglecrest will open the Porcupine Lift, which they are able to supplement with man-made snow. It’s still too early to tell when the ski area will be able to open the lifts to the upper mountain, but Lillard hopes that they’re open soon.
“I’d like to think it’s going to happen in the next two weeks, but that really just depends on the weather,” he told the Empire after the lunch.
Temperatures are expected to drop into the teens and single digits at sea level next week.
• Contact reporter Sam DeGrave at 523-2279 or sam.degrave@juneauempire.com.
Assistant Rental Shop Supervisor Gage Acha works on a pair of skis on Thursday, Dec. 1, 2016, in preprepation for this weekend’s opening at Eaglecrest.
Eaglecrest Manager Matt Lillard speaks to the Juneau Chamber of Commerce during its weekly luncheon Thursday. Lillard said that the ski area is working hard to restore confidence in skiers who have been hesitant to buy season passes after two low-snow seasons.
