Vail Resorts Is First in the Mountain Resort Industry to Provide Full Visibility into Lift Line Wait Times at Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge, Keystone and Park City with EpicMix Time Insights
- Guests can use the ground-breaking new EpicMix Time Insights desktop and mobile website to view last winter season’s daily lift line wait times recorded at Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge, Keystone and Park City to plan their next ski vacation.
- Analyzing the EpicMix Time data collected last winter from the app on lifts at Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge, Keystone and Park City, lift line wait times were greater than five minutes only six percent of the time overall, and only eight percent of the time during the Christmas and New Year’s holiday periods.
- Vail Resorts also is using the lift line wait time data to determine lift upgrades for the 2017-18 winter season, including new high-speed lifts at Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge, Keystone and Park City.
BROOMFIELD, Colo. – Sept. 26, 2017 –Vail Resorts, Inc. (NYSE: MTN) today announced the launch of a ground-breaking new desktop and mobile website, EpicMix Time™ Insights (“Insights”), that provides full visibility into lift line wait times recorded for every lift each day of the 2016-17 winter season at Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge, Keystone and Park City. Using the data collected last season through the EpicMix™ Time app, the Insights website highlights lift line wait times for each day of the winter season including holidays, daily snowfall totals and specific tips designed to help guests navigate the mountain and maximize their day of skiing and snowboarding.
“Vail Resorts is continually enhancing the guest experience across our mountain resorts and Insights offers guests full visibility on actual lift line data from last ski season so they can make the most of their day on the mountain during their next trip. Across Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge, Keystone and Park City last winter season, lift line wait times exceeded five minutes only six percent of the time,” said Robert Urwiler, chief information officer for Vail Resorts. “The EpicMix Time app and this new Insights website collectively set a new guest service standard for the mountain resort and leisure industry, using technology to seamlessly improve the guest experience.”
Using Insights on their desktop or mobile device, guests can select a specific resort and date from last season to access resort trail maps that display individual lift line wait times for every lift during the 2016-17 season, sliding across the day in 15-minute increments from the time the lifts open until they close. Insights also highlights new lift upgrades for the 2017-18 winter season and provides mountain tips on how to best navigate each resort.
“The lift line wait time data collected by EpicMix Time during the 2016-17 winter season have also helped us to identify where to invest in additional lift upgrades. This coming winter season, our guests will be able to ride several new high-speed chairlifts to access popular terrain, including six-passenger lifts at Vail, Breckenridge and Keystone, and a new four-passenger lift at Beaver Creek,” added Urwiler.
Vail Resorts was the first company in the mountain resort industry to introduce real-time lift wait times in the 2015-16 winter season with the EpicMix Time app. The app uses anonymized crowd-sourced Wi-Fi and Bluetooth signals to estimate lift line wait times. The system works by logging and analyzing these signals which are emitted by guests' mobile devices (phones, cameras and watches) as they queue up at a lift. Sensors are installed at strategic points around each lift loading area that gather anonymous device probe data and transmit them to a cloud-based database. In real time, the system analyzes the data to determine the location of each mobile device detected through triangulation and signal strength. Looking at the data at a single lift in aggregate, the system can determine how long specific devices are present in the lift loading area, producing accurate wait time projections. The data is then displayed in real time through the EpicMix Time mobile app and on-mountain digital signage.
Guests can access Insights on their desktop or mobile device at time.epicmix.com. To learn more about EpicMix or the EpicMix Time app, visit www.epicmix.com.
About EpicMix
EpicMix debuted in 2010 as a ground-breaking app that allows skiers and riders to track their days and vertical feet skied, earn digital pins, share photos, race against the pros and check real-time lift line wait time using their RFID chip-embedded season pass or lift ticket. Vail Resorts followed up the original EpicMix with EpicMix Photo, delivering free digital photos taken on the mountain that could be shared through social media; EpicMix Racing, recording digitized amateur racing statistics; EpicMix Academy, tracking progress for guests enrolled in ski and snowboard school; and EpicMix Time, which uses anonymized, crowd-sourced Wi-Fi and Bluetooth signals to calculate and display up-to-the-minute lift line wait times.
About Vail Resorts, Inc. (NYSE: MTN)
Vail Resorts, Inc., through its subsidiaries, is the leading global mountain resort operator. Vail Resorts’ subsidiaries operate 11 world-class mountain resorts and three urban ski areas, including Vail, Beaver Creek, Breckenridge and Keystone in Colorado; Park City in Utah; Heavenly, Northstar and Kirkwood in the Lake Tahoe area of California and Nevada; Whistler Blackcomb in British Columbia, Canada; Perisher in Australia; Stowe in Vermont; Wilmot Mountain in Wisconsin; Afton Alps in Minnesota and Mt. Brighton in Michigan. Vail Resorts owns and/or manages a collection of casually elegant hotels under the RockResorts brand, as well as the Grand Teton Lodge Company in Jackson Hole, Wyo. Vail Resorts Development Company is the real estate planning and development subsidiary of Vail Resorts, Inc. Vail Resorts is a publicly held company traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE: MTN). The Vail Resorts company website is www.vailresorts.com and consumer website is www.snow.com.
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