Bulgaria Ski discussion board

Apparently - Crocus are now breaking through the snow!

This is quite a long feature - but thought some of you might want to read it.

Eight are green and ten are red, while two more show both colours. This time, green does not mean that there is grass growing on the slope – it is the exact opposite, it means that there is pnly just enough snow to allow skiers on the slope, if you dare brave it, better not use your own skis, or you run the risk of damaging them.

That is the situation in Bansko at the peak of the winter skiing season. It is a good thing that there is artificial snow, or even those would be closed as well.

The picture is no different in Borovets or Pamporovo. In the middle of January, the resorts have long been open for business, but their administrators are praying for snow against a background of tiny crocuses rising their heads on the slopes.

Who did their homework
Ski resorts are caught in a no-win scenario because of the optimistic expectations for tourist numbers and the high temperatures. While the first can only be a reason for joy, because it appears as if visitor numbers will exceed last year's figures, the second has become a bad nightmare for everyone up in the mountains: ski lift owners, hotel managers, tour operators and everyone else counting on the snow. Because tourists have come to ski, not for walks in green meadows.

For the first time, ski resorts will have seen the return from investing in artificial snow equipment. If not for that, this year's winter season would have been a catastrophic failure – the artificial snow allows skiing on at least part of the slopes.

Over the past three or four years, the three biggest resorts in Bulgaria have invested in artificial snow machines, albeit with some differences in the amounts spent.

In Bansko, 230 artificial snow machines cover about 90 per cent of the resort's area. In Borovets, similar machines are blowing artificial snow over the entire lower sections of the resort – between Christmas and New Year's Day, even with the sun shining brightly and warm weather, skiing on the Yastrebets slopes was pleasant and passing close to one of the machines left the impression that the falling snow was real.

Pamporovo also hit the wave of artificial snow, with a system of 140 machines, according to Mariyan Belyakov, executive director of the company operating the ski lift in the resort. Artificial snow covers a total 15km of the 37km of skiing slopes.

"There is no real snow in Bansko. When temperatures dropped, we began blowing artificial snow on slopes one by one, until we got to seven, and now we hope that the weather will turn cold again," the marketing manager of Yulen, the company that owns the ski lifts in the resort, Ivan Obreikov, said.

Pamporovo's Belyakov said: "Right now in Pamporovo you can ski anywhere where there is an artificial snow installation. That is one of the reasons why we had a successful start of the season."

Hold on tight
Still, when counting only on artificial snow, the ski resorts are forced to operate as if in a crisis. Because there is snow cover only on part of the slopes, that means longer queues at the lifts and unhappy tourists.

Even on the weekdays between Christmas and New Year's Day, despite a lack of inflow of weekend tourists, the gondola lift in Bansko saw long lines of skiers waiting for their turn at the bottom of the slope. Waiting times got as high as two hours, so that those who arrived at nine would finally get on the gondola at 11.

At the top, instead of the usual 15 slopes, available under normal snow conditions, they had their choice cut in half. For fast and experienced skiers, making their way between the crowds of children, ski school groups and regular skiers was a real challenge. But skier pile-ups tend to annoy rather than please.

A big number of skiers would go down the slope once or twice and give up. So as not to feel badly for shelling out for a full-day pass, they would discreetly sell their passes to people still in the queue at the lift. This kind of secondary market for passes has always been in place in Bulgarian resorts, but never to the extent seen this year – and not just in Bansko, but in Borovets too. Even foreigners have started joining in and selling their passes – demand will always generate supply.

Less is less
Whenever slopes were not being used to their full capacity, as well as to minimise the impact of day pass resale, some resorts have introduced more flexible pricing policies. For example, on several occasions, Pamporovo offered promotional prices for full-day passes, offering them at prices ranging between 25 leva and 45 leva. "Our goal is to compensate our weaker periods by offering cheaper passes," Belyakov said.

Chepelare employed a similar strategy. Around Christmas, when there was not enough snow, day passes came with a discount.

In Borovets, in the week before New Year's Day, passes for the Yastrebets slopes were 25 leva, but full-access passes went as high as 55 leva. After the holidays, daily passes cost 35 leva, but a large number of slopes did not work.

"I'm buying a pass for all slopes, but I can only use it on a small number of them. It should come with a discount," one tourist waiting in line for the lift in a major resort, said.

But from an investor point of view, discount on passes are not a priority. Yulen's Obreikov said that the company would notify tourists which slopes were in operation and let skiers decide on their own whether to hop on the lift.

"The lifts and artificial snow machines are an investment that we must get a return on. When the investment is made, no one cares whether there will be enough snow, the amount invested is still the same," he said. The company invested 13 million leva in new lifts, snow-making machines and slope maintenance to prepare for this season alone, he said.

High expectations
Unfortunately, the lack of snow and the problems stemming from that fact for the big slopes are happening in a year that was forecast to be better than average. The last two winter seasons have been challenging for Bulgarian resorts, mainly because of the global economic crisis, which led to a drastic decrease in the number of British tourists, which account for 80 per cent of the foreign visitors to Bulgarian ski resorts.

Pamporovo was hit the worst because foreign tour operators no longer operated flights to Plovdiv, the airport on which Pamporovo's business relies the most. Starting this year, tour operator TUI resumed flights to Plovdiv, while the launch of regular flights by Ryanair further helped increase passenger traffic to the airport. As a direct consequence, foreign tourists have returned to Pamporovo. Early forecasts were that Pamporovo would see an increase of 30 per cent to 40 per cent over last season's 140 000 visitors.

Tour operator data showed that Borovets would also see an increase in visitors, albeit in the five per cent to 10 per cent range, the chairperson of the board at resort operator Borosport, Neli Sandalska, said. The numbers of British and Russian tourists were both expected to rise, in part due to the fact that "mid-season" offers were made even before "high-season" ones, which means that the packages being sold on those markets now are already with a promotional discount.

The number of Greek tourists was also up, the expectation being that skiers from the neighbouring country, who previously went to Austria, would prefer the less expensive Bulgarian resorts because of the crisis.

World-class sport
Another positive aspect this year is Bansko hosting a leg of the men's alpine skiing World Cup, scheduled for the second half of February and expected to bring thousands of additional tourists. As well as the prestige value of hosting a world-class event in a Bulgarian resort, it has a strong advertising effect, since for several days, all international sports media would be broadcasting from Bansko (it is another issue altogether that to finance preparations, the state allocated 2.5 million leva).

The international competition will not affect just the immediate environs. The timing of the World Cup event coincides with school holidays in Britain, which marks the peak inflow of British tourists. With Bansko booked to bursting, the other major resorts in Bulgaria were expected to benefit from the redirected inflow of Britons.

But for all that to happen, there must be snow, the natural kind at that.

Lets all hope the weather forecasters have got it right for this weekend guys!

Pete

Pete

Snow cannons in front of Rila made huge diference this new Year (and early Jan). I know it was a bit colder this year but compared to 2009 when all the slopes were mud and grass and the only place to really ski was Yastrebets and Popangelov, the cannons at least spread people about a bit. You can see the economics of the ski passes (made the investment whether snow or not) but people don't want to pay full price and then not ski. Works for BG for one year and then next people will vote with their feet.

We love BG at Christmas and the better half is already talking about next year, but two years of pain do make you think (although to be fair we skiied every day this year and changes in conditions during the day does teach you to cope better with ice). I think we have done BG 6 out of last 7 years and only 2009 was a real nightmare