When Keystone Resort became the first ski area in North America to open for the season in the fall, nearly all of the snow on its two open runs was artificial. The snow guns that Keystone’s staff fired up in the two weeks prior to its Oct. 25 opening enabled it to win the annual race between resor ts. But Vail Resorts didn’t invest $100 million in recent years to update the snowmaking technologies across Keystone and the rest of its nationwide alpine portfolio just for bragging rights. At Keystone, those snow guns have kept blasting as snowfall remained scarce in this abnormally dry winter, allowing the resort to stay open. As climate change shrinks Colorado’s ski season and increases weather variability, Vail Resorts and other ski companies are investing millions of dollars in snowmaking equipment that will allow them to open — and keep operating — with or without the help of Mother Nature. But pouring money into snowmaking is only one of many ways the industry is hedging its bets against a warmer future. To better weatherproof their revenue, the industry’s largest companies are leaning heavily on sales of season passes purchased months before the snow even begins to fall. Resorts of all sizes are expanding their non-winter offerings — like summer mountain biking and wedding venue rentals — and looking for ways to draw visitors to their mountains in the cold months, even if snow conditions aren’t stellar. “It used to be that ski resorts had to rely on the feast or famine of snowfall,” Vail Resorts spokesman Max Winter said. The behemoth ski company is already noticing higher variability in early-season conditions due to climate change, he said. That’s why company leaders are expanding event offerings with concerts and competitions to bring visitors to its resorts. Staff at other resorts are also seeing changes in the early season. For decades, ski areas hustled to open before people began traveling for Thanksgiving and Christmas. But opening terrain for the lucrative holiday season may become more difficult as warmer temperatures linger at the beginning of winter. “Ski areas were always chomping at the bit to have everything open by Thanksgiving; that’s when most skiers and riders were starting to do trips,” said Mike Nathan, Arapahoe Basin’s sustainability manager. “With climate change and added variability, that is harder to plan around — that’s one thing that we expect to be an added challenge going forward, and one we’re already experiencing.” The Arapahoe Basin ski area in Summit County on Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025. (Photo by Hyoung Chang/The Denver Post) Snowmaking is the future At Arapahoe Basin, one of the biggest needs is more pipes. While many of Colorado’s ski areas began making snow in the 1980s, the resort perched near the summit of Loveland Pass installed its system only in the last 20 years, Nathan said. The network of snow guns and the pipes that bring water to them is ripe for expansion. “We have a very small system, since we were so late to the game,” he said. “We absolutely need more pipes going to different corners and nooks of the mountain so we can better spread the snow we make.” Colorado resorts began investing heavily in snowmaking after a series of shockingly dry winters in the late 1970s and early 1980s, said Russ Schumacher, Colorado’s state climatologist. Photos from the winter of 1976-1977 season show the hills around Dillon completely dry in late January. The snow drought prompted calls for President Gerald Ford to issue an emergency declaration for Colorado’s mountains. When the president arrived in Vail for his Christmas holiday that year, he was forced to take the lift down at the end of the day because the snow at the bottom of the mountain was too scarce to ski. During the winter of 1980-81, Breckenridge Ski Resort didn’t open until Feb. 11 because of a lack of snow, which prompted headlines like: “Snow survey: woe, woe.” The snow droughts during those winters were likely more dire in most places throughout the state than this year, though changes in how scientists measure snow complicate the comparison. But this year’s drought will reinforce the importance of snowmaking, Schumacher said. “For ski areas that don’t have the resources or capacity for snowmaking, they’re at the mercy of what’s happening with the weather and climate,” Schumacher said. Snowmaking capability covers only 10% of skiable acres in the Rocky Mountains, according to a 2023 report by the National Ski Areas Association. Snowmaking will become increasingly critical to resorts as the climate changes, but the often-warmer temperatures that come with it will, in turn, mean it’s less common to get the colder temperatures needed for snowmaking. “Looking ahead 30 years, climate models universally show a warmer future with precipitation patterns shifting from snow to rain due to higher air temperatures,” the report states. “As these air temperatures increase above the threshold to make snow with today’s technologies, there will be increasing demand for ‘all season’ snowmaking equipment.” Vail Resorts’ multimillion-dollar investment in snowmaking that began in 2019 included upgrading the hundreds of snow guns at Keystone, Vail and Breckenridge so that each machine includes its own weather station. The snow guns turn on automatically as soon as the weather allows for snowmaking — and shut off when weather conditions no longer work for snowmaking. Skiers at the Peak 8 base area at Breckenridge Ski Resort on Thursday, Jan. 22, 2026. (Photo by Hyoung Chang/The Denver Post) The technology allows the resorts to take advantage of every possible minute of snowmaking, Winter said. “We’re able to make snow on the spot, automatically,” he said. “Ultimately, we’re using less snow to open up more terrain.” He added: “Of course, at some point, we’re hoping Mother Nature will take over.” At Arapahoe Basin, access to water can prove a challenge. While the resort’s high elevation means temperatures stay cooler, it also means A-Basin is situated at the very top of its watershed. The resort’s base elevation sits at 10,700 feet and its inbound terrain maxes out at 13,050 feet. The North Fork of the Snake River is a small alpine stream from which the resort draws its water. In the winter, sometimes there is almost no water in the snowmelt-fed stream. Then, when it is cold enough to make snow, the water that does flow often freezes. The resort also must leave enough water in the stream for wildlife, ecosytems and downstream users — like Denver Water. “You can’t just suck your creek dry,” Nathan said. Arapahoe Basin and five other Summit County ski resorts maintain agreements that allow them to use water that would otherwise make it to Denver Water’s reservoirs. The vast majority of water used to make snow still remains in the watershed after melting — about 80% — and the ski resorts compensate Denver Water for the amount lost to evaporation. Aspen Skiing Co. opened its four mountains on time this year in part because of their high elevation — but also because of the company’s investments in snowmaking at their top reaches, said Chris Miller, the vice president of sustainability at the ski company’s parent company, Aspen One. In 2023, the company opened 153 acres of new terrain above 10,000 feet on Aspen Mountain, in part to take advantage of the high elevation. The new area off of Hero’s lift also faces north, which protects the snow from the sun through most of the day. The new terrain was “a logical hedge against future climate-challenged ski seasons,” the company said in an announcement about its opening. But snow guns alone cannot replace declining snowfall, Miller said. And as temperatures warm, weather windows that make snowmaking possible will narrow. “Ultimately, this represents a problem that, over the long term — (and) in many places — this can’t be solved with snowmaking,” he said. From left, assistant director of mountain operations Zach Moore and ski patrollers Jess Franta and Pete Volkmann roll out a temporary snow fence before hammering the fence into the snow on the Sleepy Hollow run on Thursday, Feb. 12, 2026, at Monarch Mountain, west of Salida. (Photo by Timothy Hurst/The Denver Post) Committed to natural snow Some smaller resorts are dealing with the year’s scarce snow without snow guns. Staff members at Chaffee County’s Monarch Mountain went on a shopping spree this fall as the warm and dry forecast for the upcoming ski season became clearer. The independent ski hill, which is about 20 miles west of Salida up on Monarch Pass, needed as many portable snow fences as possible — and quickly. The mountain does not make snow and instead relies on a system consisting of dozens of fences that collect snow in drifts. “We purchased every portable fence we could find between here and Cañon City,” said Chris Haggerty, the resort’s general manager. Instead of turning snow guns on and off, staff at Monarch Mountain use those carefully placed fences to trap windblown snow, which can then be moved to other places. The system of “snow farming” allows the resort to avoid the heavier and wetter snow created by snow guns. “We are 100% committed to remaining all-natural,” he said. Skiers head down the mountain past permanent wooden snow fences after getting off the Garfield chairlift on Thursday, Feb. 12, 2026, at Monarch Mountain, west of Salida. (Photo by Timothy Hurst/The Denver Post) In the summer, staffers ensure that the ski runs remain “country club style” — clear of trees, large rocks and other obstacles so they can begin using snowcats to move snow around the mountain as soon as possible. As snow begins to fall, it collects behind more than a quarter-mile of permanent fencing. Mountain workers also transport more than 80 portable fences to where the wind is blowing that day. As feet of snow collect behind the fences, the snowcat operators get to work. Even when it’s not snowing, the resort can collect snow if the wind is blowing powder onto Monarch’s runs from an area outside the resort’s boundaries, Haggerty said. As climate change continues, the ski area’s managers still are not contemplating adding snowmaking, Haggerty said. Monarch’s high elevation — the base sits at 10,727 feet — helps protect its snow from warmer temperatures lower down. The system has worked this ski season. Unlike many other Colorado resorts, Monarch has opened all of its terrain. The resort’s main goal this summer will be to better prepare for more years of low snowfall, Haggerty said. For Monarch, that means building more portable fences and fine-tuning its placement system. “For us, it’s about leaning into what we’re doing and perfecting that,” Haggerty said. Skiers and snowboarders move around the base area of Monarch Mountain, on Thursday, Feb. 12, 2026, west of Salida. (Photo by Timothy Hurst/The Denver Post) ‘Skiing is just one part of our larger experience’ In addition to tweaking operations on the ground, ski companies are working to shift their business models to become more resilient, regardless of weather and climate. For larger ski companies, like Vail Resorts and Alterra Mountain Co., part of the strategy is to entice ticket sales before the season begins by offering steep discounts on season passes and lift tickets for later in the season. “By incentivizing our guests to commit to the season early, we’re able to build stability for our business,” said Winter of Vail Resorts. “That kind of stability is ultimately what allows us to make investments, like (in) state-of-the-art snowmaking technology.” More than 2.3 million people purchased nonrefundable lift tickets and Epic season passes — which offer access to more than 90 ski areas — from Vail Resorts before this season even began, according to its most recently quarterly report. The sales totaled more than $1 billion and will account for nearly two-thirds of all expected ticket revenue across the company’s 43 resorts, which span three continents. “Changing weather and snowfall patterns are not new to us, but they reinforce the importance of the stability we create from our pass business, which remains a key long-term driver to our success,” CEO Robert Katz said in a Dec. 10 call with investors, noting the poor start to the snow season in the Rocky Mountains. Related Articles Record snow drought in Western US raises concern for a spring of water shortages and wildfires US ski resorts turn to drones to make it snow amid dire drought National Laboratory of the Rockies, based in Golden, axes another 134 positions Colorado AG, environmental groups challenge order to keep Craig coal plant open Believe NASA — human-caused climate change fueling larger wildfires (Letters) The strategy has helped buffer losses from this year’s poor snow, a Jan. 15 report from the company shows. While visits to the company’s resorts dropped 20% through Jan. 5 compared to the previous winter, lift revenue fell only 2%. Alterra’s Ikon Pass offers buyers access to more than 60 mountains around the globe. Unlike Vail Resorts, Alterra is privately held and therefore does not post quarterly financial information, such as pass sales. A spokeswoman for the company declined requests for interviews for this story. When the two competing companies announced this seasons’ pass prices last March, the Ikon Pass cost $1,329 and the Epic Pass cost $1,051; both programs also offer less expensive passes with more limits. For skiers and boarders who plan to hit the mountains multiple days, the preseason commitment makes sense — especially when lift tickets at some of Colorado’s most popular resorts can run several hundred dollars for a single day. A full-price, single-day ticket over President’s Day weekend cost $356 at Vail Ski Resort and $338 at Alterra’s Steamboat Resort. Fabien Ardila, 60, has purchased some version of an Epic Pass every year since 2002. It’s part of his Labor Day routine, the Boulder County resident said. This summer, he bought a pass that gives him unlimited days at Breckenridge and Keystone. By mid-February, he still hadn’t skied because of the lack of snow. “I can afford to be a snow snob because I live here. But at the same time, I paid for this pass that I’m not getting any use out of right now,” Ardila said. He’s not sure whether he’ll buy a pass next year, or perhaps downgrade to a package of four-day lift tickets. “Will I say, ‘This is going to be the year for snow?’ ” he said. “I don’t know. Then I start sounding like a Colorado Rockies fan.” Vendors prepare for the last event of the summer season at The 10th luxury restaurant on top of Vail Mountain on Saturday, Sept. 27, 2025. (Photo by Kelsey Brunner/Special to The Denver Post) Ski area managers are also looking to add new offerings to bring skiers like Ardila to the mountains even when the snow is lacking. Vail Resorts operates mountain coasters at multiple locations and is offering more events — like evening concerts and the Rockstar Energy Open snowboarding competition at Breckenridge. “Skiing is just one part of our larger experience,” Winter said. At Arapahoe Basin, that mindset applies to multiweek lesson programs that bring people to the mountain repeatedly, regardless of weather, Nathan said. The resort also runs a robust business as a summer wedding venue. Reservations to tie the knot on the mountain can book out one to two years in advance. “We’re looking at things that may not 100% rely on having a foot of fresh snow every Saturday to bring a crowd here,” Nathan said. Get more Colorado news by signing up for our Mile High Roundup email newsletter. ...read more read less