Dear Camelback

[Ski]

Just an open letter to any CB rep:

 

I was at a friends house this afternoon when my oldest found out some friends were going to be at CB tonight. So I used my friend's phone to find out the policy for little kid's tickets. We had planned on dropping my oldest off, then skiing BB, since I figured their conditions would be better and I'm not a big fan of paying for Pocono lift tickets after having purchased season passes at our still closed mountain.

 

So here's the conversation I had with the CB employee:

 

Me: Hi, I just wanted to know how much it is for little kids.

CB: Hold on...(three minute pause)sorry to keep you waiting...children under 46 inches are free with a paying adult.

Me: Oh, great, so I just come to the ticket window?

CB: Hold on...(three minute pause)...hello? You must purchase your adult ticket, then come inside the office just to the left of the main ticket windows.

Me: Thanks very much!

 

 

Later that day, around 7:30pm, I bought my ticket, then went inside with my 45" child. The guy behind the counter told me the following:

 

"She may be 45 inches tall, but you should have checked the website. It's under 46 inches with ski boots."

 

Me: "I wasn't on the computer, but spoke with someone in this office and came here instead of Big Boulder, where she would have skied free. I did EXACTLY what the girl told me to do. Why wouldn't your employee have told me that it was with ski boots on? I wouldn't have paid for a lift ticket to ski for an hour."

 

CB: "Well, what was the name of the person you talked to?"

 

Me: "How the fuck am I supposed to remember? And will it make a differenc if I do remember?"

 

CB: "I just don't believe someone didn't tell you the correct height requirement."

 

Me: "So you think I came here looking to try and bitch my way into a free lift6 ticket? You think I'm lying?"

 

CB: "That's certainly possible."

 

Me: "You are a fucking asshole. I'll go buy the $22 lift ticket for her, but it's the last fucking ticket I'll ever buy at Camelback."

 

So, if a mountain rep reads this, I just want you to know it's truly the last fucking lift ticket I'll have ever bought at CB. Bait and switch is a crime. NYC camera dealers went to jail for exactly what you fuckers did tonight. I hope you really stretch that extra $22 you scored tonight.

 

Last word to CB: scumbags.

[Shadows]

yup

gotta love cb

[Schif]

Thats absolutely rediculous. I don't blame you for never wanting to go to CB again. Did they actually come out and measure her?

[Ski]

They have a wood block with a horizontal stick attached. The block is held on the counter, so the stick is at 46", then it's held over the kid's head. Ty was clearly under the 46" stick by 1/4" or so and she had sneakers on. But the guy said "there's no way she'll be under the stick with ski boots on." Period. I asked to speak with his manager and he said "I am the manager."

 

Again: I don't have a problem with the policy, I have a problem with a CB employee telling me one version, then her manager telling me another after we drive to the mountain, buy the adult ticket, then go inside the office.

 

To CB: my daughter's friends are staying at the Chateaux. They bought night tickets tonight, but weren't allowed to buy multi-day tickets to add on. Good thing for them.

 

Listen: because the manager of the skier service/customer service office called me a liar, I was happy to give them directions to Jack Frost and Big Boulder. Two adults and two college students that would have bought day passes at CB tomorrow, are now headed to JF or BB.

 

I'm not looking for a future freebie or comp. I would tear it up. If the manager had apologized for his employee's mistake and said he simply couldn't make an exception, then all would have been okay. But to tell me his employee wouldn't have done it and call me a liar? F*ck that.

 

Guess where I'll recommend The Hideout ski trip not go? Hint: they listen to me for advice because they know I follow area conditions better than anyone. As a matter of fact, I just finished posting my experience on our community message board. And I plan on spreading my feelings to every kid at our ski hill and every person that asks my opinion.

 

My angry rant is done for now, but I'm far from done telling people what CB did to us and plan to cost Camelback 100x what they burned me for tonight.

[Ski]

Here's a cut and paste of the ticket price page from CB's website. Anyone see what the manager was talking about? Shit, I just assumed he was telling the truth...

 

 

12/28/2006

[Papasteeze]

even if your kid is at, or even a little above the heighth, that really stinks. I can't believe that a customer service mgr or whatever mgr it was would be that insensitive, especially to a kid, however it doesn't surprise me. I always worry that I am going to have to produce ID for Ridge who stands nearly as tall as me for the 12 and under ticket, I have NEVER had anyone ever question me.

[skifreak]

Scumbags, clearly sums up what they are. I couldn't have put it any better myself. This is just BS. They were so greedy for $22, and now they got it. They just don't know how much business they lost from everyone not returning there anymore. Thats just unbelievable, and like Rob said even if the kid was just a hair over 46" they should be allowed in.

 

Should post this over on ridecamelback, I'd love to hear their response.

Edited December 28, 2006 by skifreak

[Stevo]

You have every right to be pissed off. You should have spoken to a manager (sorry if i missed like half of the fine print up there and you did speak to a manager) CB is just a rip

[sexkitten]

Hate to say it but I'm not suprised by any of this. Bob and I won't ever go there again either becuase of the customer service of lack thereof. It's too bad too cause we had a lot of fun on the mountain.

[bigdaddyk]

Theoretically, if you would have a 2 or 3 year old who is 46" tall, you would have to pay for them . It should go by age, not height. And why would wearing boots matter...other than to keep from giving out a free ticket.

[YummerzZz]

Ski,I understand you being pissed off,as I would have been myself.But why send them to JFBB???A place that care's even less about their customer's and employee's???The king's of bait and switch...Parklogic,Shawn+Julian,etc.!!!Lying to everyone to get their hard-earned season pass money....shame on you Peak!!!!!!!Here's a rundown on some of the change's at JFBB this year if you all didn't know yet.

 

1.Fire Parklogic prematurely

2.Eliminate the Super 7/5 season pass

3.Get rid of daycare at JFBB and throw out the playground equipment for the kiddy's

4.Raise up all the season pass price's substancially

5.Eliminate passholder preferred parking lot's

6.Implement passholder validation(Which you all just LOVE I bet!)

7.Eliminate passholder food/retail discount's

8.Charge $100 for the "priviledge of walking onto the slope's" VIP pass

9.Raise cafeteria food price's quite a bit

10.Lower quality...yes lower quality snowmaking/grooming

11.Eliminate the pre-christmas $25.00 lift ticket

12.Less hour's and day's of operation(JF closed christmas,BB opening later)

 

Well I'm getting tired of typing,but you get the point,there is more.I won't even get started of how they are hurting the employee's,I'll leave that for another time.Send them to Blue Mountain instead Ski,I never had nothing but stellar service and goodtime's there.Or Sno Mountain when they open.Or Elk,you get the picture.

Edited December 28, 2006 by YummerzZz

[bigdaddyk]

8.Charge $100 for the "priviledge of walking onto the slope's" VIP pass

9.Raise cafeteria food price's quite a bit

 

The VIP pass has been a hastle. I ran into numerous lift attendants who questioned me about not having a lift ticket. I understood where they where coming from, because they were doing their job and I'm glad they are checking for tickets. They didn't even know about it and they had to check with their higher ups. They all said that nobody informed them of the VIP pass. Everybody has been helpful and friendly, though.

 

The food that I get seemed to stay the same price, though.

 

5.Eliminate passholder preferred parking lot's

 

 

I couldn't figure out why they eliminated the preferred parking...that was a good way for them to make money.

 

12.Less hour's and day's of operation(JF closed christmas,BB opening later)

 

JF was also closed on Christmas last year, which I don't have a problem with because nobody wants to work on Christmas. Financially, BB opening later makes sense and I've often thought about that myself. As far as the convienence of having the choice from early in the morning, it stinks. BB has also seemed to be icy, because it is groomed too early on days that they open at 3. I still feel that JFBB has been doing a good job overall, especially compared to some of the other places.

[YummerzZz]

JF was most definitely open on Xmas last year,as I was there working.And btw,people did enjoy working on Christmas day,if only because Blue Ridge use to give you $5.00 hour extra for working both Xmas day and New Year's Day.That has also became extinct this year,much to my chagrin and other's.I can't believe I'd ever say this,but I hope Blue Ridge see's how poorly Peak is operating JFBB and come's back to operate it once again.

[fluffy]

I call BS on that YummerzZz. Every single JFBB employee that I asked said that he/she was super excited to not have to work on Christmas. Noone should work on Christmas. Noone wants to even if it does mean snagging an extra forty bucks on the paycheck. Ya it sucks for those of us who would have liked to be able to ride there on Christmas, but honestly I don't blame them for closing.

[YummerzZz]

I call BS on that YummerzZz. Every single JFBB employee that I asked said that he/she was super excited to not have to work on Christmas. Noone should work on Christmas. Noone wants to even if it does mean snagging an extra forty bucks on the paycheck. Ya it sucks for those of us who would have liked to be able to ride there on Christmas, but honestly I don't blame them for closing.

 

That's Ok,I guess it doesn' matter to JFBB that Camelback kicked their ass on Xmas day.Did you see all the Santa's there???And I'm sure a few made the decision to only go to Camelback during Xmas week solely because they were open that day and JFBB wasn't.Also,that $40-$50 a day for each holiday = around $100 when totaled,that may not seem much to you,but for other's it may be a major deal.Sorry for hijacking your thread here Ski,but your right,bottom line is company's should listen to their customer's and employee's or they won't be very successful long-term.The customer should come first,not the snow.

Edited December 28, 2006 by YummerzZz

[First Grade Teacher]

Yo buddy! I'm going to CB everyday now! I'm 71 inches without my ski boots. How much do I pay?

 

Edited December 29, 2006 by First Grade Teacher

[Timeless]

I have to add my 2 cents worth here, apart from having fallen foul of the stupid 46" rule myself over the previous season I had a rather poor experience at CB today.

 

I'll start by just stating that I am a "loyal" CB regular and season pass holder along with my 2 kids. I like CB and enjoy riding there when mother nature is being kind and they can open most of the terrain.

 

Today I was there for first lifts with the promise of 9 trails. Things looked bad from the off with groomers still pushing snow around on honeymoon lane, cleos etc, so that when they finally let us on the lift it was basically 2 trails (birches or tut's). I was one of, if not the first into the top section of tut's which was in fantastic condition, it really raised my hopes for the morning, but rounding the first bend it just turned to sh!t: ice, mud and scraped off rutted hardpack from there down to Meadows where it improved once you had crossed the frozen groomer tracks.

 

5 laps of this and I'd had enough, still no sign of the other trails opening, the bottom of honeymoon looked in such bad shape that it was hard to see how they could open these runs anyway, I decided to call it a day.

 

On my way out an "ambassador" gave me a surprised "had enough already?", so I explained to her that I was dissappointed with only 2/3 trails and was amazed that they could charge full price for this. She smiled and explained that they sold 3,000 ticket yesterday and expected similar crowds today, they actually shut the ticket sales down yesterday and so "things cant be that bad".

 

Then came the classic "what we need is a really big snowstorm so we can open all the trails" and she seemed confused when I suggested this probably wouldn't help as much as a few nights of very cold weather and a willingness to blow lots of snow. She said they were blowing as much as they can, but this morning it looked like a very small effort to get another lift open and spread the crowds out a little.

 

 

I left feeling like they really didn't give a sh!t about the lack of terrain as long as they can still pack in as many people as possible and that they were really only blowing enough to keep the expected crowd size paying, maybe this is good business but it doesn't sit well with me.

 

So tomorrow I'll be taking my kids back to JFBB where my son gets a free ticket and I am confident they will have some reasonable conditions. I dont even care that I wil have to pay $80 when we could ride for free on our CB passes.

 

If it doesn't turn around (and it's not just the weather no matter what anyone says) I will not be calling CB my home mtn for long.

[Schif]

This season is really proving without a shadow of a doubt that camelback is a business and nothing more. They don't care about conditions, open trails or customer satisfaction as long as they sell enough tickets. The worst part is that even if everyone on this board boycotts them, we're the minority and don't put money in their pocket anyway. They New York and Philly crowd will always be there and so will a poor mountain for all of us.

 

I feel terrible for all the CB locals who are passholders to this place. Especially the ones who live close and will continue to be passholders.

[bigdaddyk]

"what we need is a really big snowstorm so we can open all the trails"

 

That seems to have been their motto since the end of last season.

 

...

So tomorrow I'll be taking my kids back to JFBB where my son gets a free ticket ...

 

He has to be under 5 foot tall. They measure from the floor up, but he has to stand on a 3 foot high box..........

[method9455]

I really do believe that shit from them. That is something Mountain Creek would do too. As lame as JFBB is to ParkLogic (not many people where more vocal on taht one than me), this is a case of the smallest of all evils.

 

I would say Blue is the smallest evil

Bear 2nd (some grumblings on snowmaking but who knows

JFBB 3rd (they would be #1 had it not been for the shaun/julian thing in my book)

Shawnee 4th

Camelback 5th

Mountain Creek is basically satan incarnate.

 

Realize the crowds Mountain Creek has on holiday week are on ONE trail right now. Last year it was deathly dangerous with 2 trails at South, and 3 on Vernon. I can't imagine the same crowd on less than 1/5 the terrain. And word is that the coverage is bad on that one trail. I haven't been up once yet and I have a season pass.

 

Camelback - the bait and switch is bullshit. I gave a guy a discount at work today, right now I'm allowed to do around 25% off on most snowboards. The cashier punched it in and i was looking over and the discount came up as 46%. I raised an eyebrow to myself because that is losing money price and I could have made an error on my math before, but even had I quoted the guy the wrong price originally I would have sold it to him at the price I quoted. He agreed to $600 for boots bindings and board (which after the cashier corrected her mistake was 28% off), but had I fucked up and it was 46% off, I would have given it to the guy. Now that mistake had the potential for being over a hundred dollars or more, and I would have let it go just to let the guy leave the store happy.

 

Here instead of hundreds of dollars, at a small mom and pop shop, we're talking about $22 to a company that did 3,000 tickets x 40 something dollars each yesterday, and its 1 inch difference.

 

LAME!

[Tyler]

I would say Blue is the smallest evil

Bear 2nd (some grumblings on snowmaking but who knows

JFBB 3rd (they would be #1 had it not been for the shaun/julian thing in my book)

Shawnee 4th

Camelback 5th

Mountain Creek is basically satan incarnate.

no one, no one, has nicer and more committed employees than BC, you hear them on here all the time. They are loyal to their customers and pass holders. The grumblings on here are just uneducated complaints. I know sexkitten can vouch for BC's great employees.

[Papasteeze]

Excellent thread! thanks to everyone who posted. If anyone wonders why I have been winding it up on the CB board, now you know! It starts with silly little stuff like allowing all thier employees to park in the upper lot. LOL! It's the stupid little things compounded that irk me. People in the know are telling me that it is the middle management who has been there for eons is the problem.

[SkiUtah]

I've not always been happy with CB but in all fairness I think it needs to be pointed out that one of the first replys to the same "Dear Camelback" post on the CB board was from an administrator asking for more details in a pm; presumably to take corrective action and possibly make amends. Two free passes, accepted or not, is the right thing to do.

 

I tried skiing at MC for a season and it was the most horrible thing I've ever experienced. So bad I now accpreciate CB somewhat. It is very clear that, in the case of MC, owner Intrawest is a real estate management/development/sales company, not a ski mountaitn operator.

 

Not goign into details, I've had two difficult problems with CB over the last couple of years and they resoplved both issues fairly and in a resoable amount of time. My complaints to MC were literally laughed at and I was told another time in so many words if I didint like it, go elsewhere.

 

I realize it's hard to verify a child's age, but why does CB penalize tall parents and favor short parents?

[sibhusky]

I remember that ski boots bit from years ago. I also remember when they went from age to height. Since plenty of kids don't have photo ID's proving their age, I can see why they did that, unfair as it is. Siblet actually got an extra year's season pass off the deal, though, since she is such a pixie.

[Papasteeze]

"Dear Camelback" post on the CB board was from an administrator asking for more details in a pm; presumably to take corrective action and possibly make amends. Two free passes, accepted or not, is the right thing to do.

 

Presumably.... yeah I fell for that last year. that administrator I have met personally. he is 100% lip service and has that soothing gift of gab unlike the last marketing directors at CB. Coincidentally, some friends from his previous home mountain verified his persona. For all the grief I have put that guy through, he apparently doesn't even have the clout to toss a bone to get a customer to shut up.