Who is Core, What’s Wrong with Snowboarding, and Why Not Make a Buck? A First Draft

Hang out in the snowboarding world long enough and you may encounter complaints about a particular snowboarder or snowboarding company “selling out.” You will also hear talk about people who are “hard core” or simply “core,” people who may be the salvation — or curse — of snowboarding.

I’m an amateur sociologist, and even took a couple of graduate-level courses. So please bear with me if it seems like I’m trying to overanalyze things. It’s in my blood, and after all, it’s not like this is the height of snowboarding season, so what else are we going to in snowboarding besides talk about it? At the risk of being the “crotchety old man” that one blogger feared becoming (I am a man and I am older than the two bloggers whose words I’m going to respond to), here’s my first draft on the subject. (Note: I’ll revise it in time to adjust for the mistakes I made when I wrote this, half-asleep.)

The impetus for this post is an essay by “The Angry Snowboarder,” titled “Where snowboarding went wrong.”

The key point seems to be that snowboarding is “inaccessible.” Among the reasons or symptoms:

Snowboarding is costly
Analysis: Yes it is. I don’t know what to do at it. Even Midwestern ski areas with 300 feet of vertical charge $40 or $50 a day (and sometimes more) for a lift ticket.

There are at least two reasons for this. One, it costs money to turn lifts, make snow (an essential in the Midwest), groom snow (also essential in the Midwest), buy liability insurance, and so forth. The second reason is that it’s what the market will bear.

I don’t know enough about the hardware side of snowboarding to comment. But again, manufacturing costs are only one factor in determining the price of a product; the other factor is what the end customer will willingly pay.

Solution: For lift tickets, buying a season pass can pay off. Use other strategies, too, such as coupons, buddy passes, Liftopia, and the like. For hardware, buy at the right time of the year, buy leftover stock, and go to second-hand sources.

“The industry is kidding themselves when it comes to the average rider.”

I would like to look at survey results. But I think the younger crowd dominates, even though I don’t like it.

“Snowboarding has sold out.”
Analysis: I don’t know what to make of this, as I’m not sure what it means.

“It has become a part of pop culture and mainstream media. It’s not like it was even 10 years ago, everyones mother really is doing it.”
Is this a good or a bad development? Put me down for “good.” It promotes healthy living, personal development (setting and achieving goals, etc.), and family activities–all good.

“Still there’s been a steady decline in participants from both returning and new.”
This is not limited to snowboarding. Skiing has the same problem, or at least a similar one–its market is aging.

“The big business side of the industry has only seen the bottom line which is the almighty dollar. This is where the segregation between marketing and the average rider begins.”
Analysis: It’s easy to bash ‘the almighty dollar,” and sometimes that is appropriate. (Quick example: If someone offers to pay me to poison your water supply, there’s only one moral response. Don’t.) But generally, prices are incredibly powerful ways of telling us which goods or services people prefer, and in which quantities.

If a company makes a buck off of me, it’s because it gives me something that I value–more than holding the money, and more than what I could spend with that dollar.

The snowboarding industry says that its core market is age 13-21. They’re leaving a lot of money on the table by neglecting the 22 to 35 year old group.
Is this true? If you look at rider surveys, it probably makes sense to concentrate on the youth market. Yet it’s also true that the 22 to 35-year old age group has more money to spend, though not necessarily more time. And as someone who belongs to an even older age group, I’d emphasize that yes indeed, people 36 and up buy snowboarding gear and lift tickets, too.

But here’s the challenge: Are there enough of us to make raising the age limit on the target market worthwhile? If a company that turns from the youth market to the adult market make the same amount of money? If, instead of dropping the youth market, it simply adds an adult unit, will it suffer so much in the youth market (distracted focus, kids won’t want to buy “you’re father’s snowboard,” etc.) that it loses money?

I don’t know. I do suspect that some adults would appreciate the chance to buy a board that isn’t geared for the an adolescent market.

“The ultimate rise in prices besides inflation is the fact Ski Resorts are more or less Real Estate Companies now. So for them to afford making more condo’s, hotels, and retail space they just raise prices.”
If this is an argument that real estate development causes lift ticket prices to increase, I would probably disagree. As I said above, there are certain costs to running lifts, and that’s regardless of whether the people who run the ski operations are selling condos on the side.

On the other hand, it’s possible that for some people, expensive lift tickets are a good thing, since they perceive that high prices signal high-quality service. I suspect that’s a minority segment of the population, however.

There are other points made in the post that I haven’t covered here, by the way.

THE FOLLOW-UP
Courtney Wilson, who writes at The Lady in Shred. She describes her site as “just a blog to enrich the lives of female snowboarders,” but I think it’s great to see targeted sites.

She writes in response to the Angry Snowboarder post with one of her own, titled Is accessibility really where snowboarding went wrong?
I’m not sure what to make of the idea of snowboarding “going wrong,” as the term suggests that snowboarding has a quasi-religious status, or is perhaps a grand social movement with principles that must be honored, or at the least, an organization that has drifted far from its vision statement.

None of those apply. Snowboarding is a sport, an activity, an interest that many people share. But that’s all.

Still The Lady gets the discussion off to a helpful start by clearly identifying a problem she seeks to explain: Why has the number of people in snowboarding declined? (To be complete, I should pull out my participation surveys, but it’s late and I need to get to bed.)

She says “I blame greed, egos, and unrealistic expectations.”

Greed.
Courtney faults companies for having merely a short-term vision. That’s certainly possible, and business history is littered with companies that took the short-term path and suffered–or went kaput.

She then mentions that Gene Simmons has entered the snowboarding industry. Is that a problem? I say bully for him for having an idea and running with it. That’s business. Will it be a financial success? Will people respond? I don’t know. SHOULD people respond? I wouldn’t. But I’m not going to complain if you do. It’s your choice.

“While there are a few companies who are trying to make it with their integrity in tact, there is absolutely no way they can compete with Burton, K2, and Quiksilver.“

I have some idea what integrity means in general,
and even what it means in business, but does it mean something unique in snowboarding?

“Even those companies you think are against the man are trying their hardest to be the man. Core means poor. Bottom line. Fortunately this economy might be our chance to ditch all the high-power execs who are ruling the industry. Let’s face it, snowboarding isn’t going to make you enough money to buy a yacht and cruise around the world when you retire. My hope is that the next couple of seasons will shake out everyone who isn’t doing this for the right reasons.”

I’m more confused than I was before, after reading this. OK, I have an idea what “the man” is all about, but generally I’m not moved by rants against “the man.” One reason is that, as the text suggests, people who claim to be against “the man” (now who is he anyway?) are simply “the man” trying to pull a fast one on you through false advertising.

And what does “core means poor” mean? Who is “core” and how do we identify them? The best I can figure is that “core” is some soul, obsessed by snowboarding, laboring away building boards by hand, who ends up losing everything when a company headed by a CEO who knows squat about snowboarding steals market share by flooding stores with mass-produced junk.

And?

Meh. So what. Stuff happens. Beer is the only industry I can think of off the top of my head that has seen a resurgence of the craft producer.

Why do my-heart-is-in-this producers get squashed soulless, impersonal corporations? Because they can’t compete in the real world in which people have unlimited wants and limited means (not just money but also time to seek out producers). So little guy working in his garage turns out 100 boards a season while Behemoth Boards sells 100,000 a year. Who has done more to expand snowboarding?

EGO
The 100 Day-a-year-rider drives the lifestyle of this sport. And at the end of the day people want to buy into the lifestyle.

Of course we need these riders as the mascots of snowboarding. But we don’t need them hating on people who are only riding 5 days a year. Chances are those recreational riders are funding their pay checks and allowing them to ride that much. Resort locals need to be a little more grateful and stop hating on people who can’t ride 100 days and be stoked that they’re having fun on the mountain.

And all you shop bros out there, check your ego at the door.

DO people want to buy into a lifestyle? Some do. Others don’t. Oh, I do find the idea of moving to the mountains to be attractive–for a while. Then I think of the family, friends, familiar sites (and sights) I’d have to leave behind, and it becomes less attractive. I don’t think I’m alone in this.

As for shop workers or 100-day people “hating on people who are only riding 5 days a year,” it might help if recreational riders take this attitude: I don’t care. Sure, I know that people who live in mountains can mock tourists (it’s not just snowboarders, it’s common to the resort industry generally), people who ski or snowboard in jeans or wear neon one-pieces, etc.

Even so, Soup Nazi aside, you’re not going to grow your business by insulting your customers. So the diagnosis is largely on the mark, though I don’t know how big a factor it is in the decline /stagnation in snowboarding participation.

UNREALISTIC EXPECTATIONS
This isn’t an explanation for “the downfall of snowboarding” as much as it is a caution.

Snowboarding is “always going to be expensive and it’s always going to take a certain type of personality to embrace it …. Until it’s as easy as watching NASCAR, it’s just not going to be that popular.”

True enough.