Ski Southeast Messageboard

Whenever I go over to Sugar I am treated like a KING. I mostly can only go to app because its closer to Lenior. You talking about customer service. App's college rejects who work full-time keep the place in a careless attitude. Sugar's the Best place for service. The other 3 especially APP are the pits in my book. Sugar's more like a little resort out West. The only thing I hate a Sugar is the High lift tix prices. Its a few $$$ cheaper then a big resort out west for much less skiing. Give Sugar another shot.

See THIS is why we posted on the Sugar customer service complaint post that we really didn't need to go down this road. Personally ALL of the ski resorts are somewhat understaffed and/or staffed with young people or migrants. Anytime you get an overworked, under qualified, minimum wager handling people you will have issues. By the time you get to the top brass, tempers can get in the way of good dialog.



There are many resorts that handle this aspect of their business well, and personally our opinion is that Appalachian is the best managed ski area in the Southeast. It MAY be because of it's size...or maybe not. However they manage what they have very well.

Ah yes... nice timing on the Sugar post Admin.



I guess people have to realize that when you go to a ski resort, you shouldn't expect the best customer service. There are literally thousands of other people there, and the object of those workers- whether it be the rental shop, the cafeteria, or the lift ticket line- is to get you through and move on to the next person. Personally, I don't expect much at all from the workers. As long as it works, then I'm good.



If you do want top customer service, then you need to go to a place like Beaver Creek, Telluride, Sun Valley, Park City, or so on... and even there you have college kids working. At least they're college kids with manners though.



Can you tell I'm bored at work at the end of the day?

I'm trying to figure out where you are experiencing this bad customer service.



I guess its just me, but when i go skiing, I park my car, buy my lift ticket, and walk to the lift that takes me to the top. This means only 2 employees interact with me. Person selling the lift ticket, and the liftie. I then ride all day long, and go home at the end of the day.



If you are still paying for food in the cafeteria, buy yourself a cooler, pack your own lunch and save enough money doing this 3 times to get yourself a lift ticket the fourth.



I guess a scowl from a single liftie is getting panties bunched.

jamsandwich wrote:
I'm trying to figure out where you are experiencing this bad customer service.



I guess its just me, but when i go skiing, I park my car, buy my lift ticket, and walk to the lift that takes me to the top. This means only 2 employees interact with me. Person selling the lift ticket, and the liftie. I then ride all day long, and go home at the end of the day.



If you are still paying for food in the cafeteria, buy yourself a cooler, pack your own lunch and save enough money doing this 3 times to get yourself a lift ticket the fourth.



I guess a scowl from a single liftie is getting panties bunched.



I have to agree.



Park, Buy tickets, Ski, & See YAA



Not to much to complain about..

I am not going to name the resort in question here because the PLACE isn't important. However, you CAN have issues with customer service at MANY different places during a visit to a ski area. Case in point a few years ago, I and my family (wife and two young daughters) were in a huge lift line that was four rows across and rather lengthy. The lift operator was unorganized in his rotation of which lines he was taking people from and he happened to miss the line we were in a number of times and a few of the people in front of us complained. The lifty was smoking a cigarette, and barely raising his head to motion people forward, while sitting on a fence.



It became a joke with a number of people in the lines across but only the guys in front of us had made their complaints hearable by the lift dude. When he heard the complaints instead of attempting to get better at the rotation, he then purposely skipped our line twice in a row. Things escalated to the point that he actually told the guys in front us to shut up or we'd be standing there the rest of the day. The guys in front of us walked away...leaving me, my girls and wife at the front of the line.



Having some "connection" to the industry I calmy told the guy in a friendly voice that he should not have allowed the guys to get to him AND I told him that he had, in fact missed the rotation several times. Instead of being decent about it he told me that I'd be standing there for awhile. I was incredulous. I told him that he shouldn't penalize all of the behind us and the previous people for mistakes that he probably had inadvertently made. He told me to be quiet or he'd have me thrown out. I then DID get vocal and told the creep that he should enjoy his last day at the job.



He actually threatened me. I lost control and I invited him to meet me at the entrance sign at 4:30pm. He said he'd be there...and that I would be right where I was in line until that time. I asked my family to step out of line, while I went to the admin offices and discussed the creep's behavior. They told me that they'd had other complaints and they walked back to the lift with me and fired the guy on the spot. Of course he was an idiot and threatened me again and the crowd applauded as he was escorted off.



I was happy to see that he wasn't at the entrance sign, because I too was an idiot for allowing things to get to that point.



THE POINT of this story is that there are NUMEROUS areas where things can get nuts. It isn't always about buying a ticket and skiing. The fact is NUMEROUS people had a very bad experience with that ONE episode on that one day. ...and trust me as admin to this website I have heard hundreds of complaints MUCH, MUCH worse and from areas of the resort where you wouldn't think possible.

Great story admin.



Carolina Skier, you can think what you want about customer service. It's not a big deal, but sugar IS NOT cheaper than all or most of the resorts out west. Alta, Solitude, Brighton, Snowbird are all $41 a day(with a free UTA transit pass). If you keep skiing Vail, beaver creek, deer vallet, park city, Aspen, it may appear that sugar is cheaper, but when you include smaller, sometimes better resorts, you learn how much sugar overcharges for 100x better skiing. I will visit sugar in march when lift ticket prices are reduced.

Hmmmm, customer service at a ski resort... Here are a few of my bad and a few of my good experiences.



Good was at Winterplace and it goes to the waitress at the Snowdrift Lounge at the time. She went above and beyond the call of duty to see to it we were taken care of for lunch.



Bad would have to go to Snowshoe where I got moved from my spot at the bar so that a family could fit them and their 3 kids at the bar.



Good would be at Gunstock in NH where even the folks taking out the trash stopped to say "hi" and "are you having a good time?".



Bad would be at Killington where I was a complete inconvenience to most of the employees on the ski slope.



Good would be at Massanutten where I was always greeted with a smile and treated like royalty. Even our co-travelers got a kick out of it.



Bad would be at App where I was greeted by a security guard with an attitude who wouldn't let me stop long enough to insure my disabled wife would be able to function there while I skied. Now mind you, I had no skis anywhere either on my vehicle or in a box. But that dollar they made from the parking fee was so important that they couldn't give me 5 minutes to quickly walk through the lodge to make sure she could get around without my help for a few hours. Needless to say, I didn't ski App.



One thing you may notice here is that an NC ski slope is only mentioned in one of these. That means that most of them fit in about on par with every other ski slope I have ever been to. No better, no worse, just average. No mention of Sugar, Beech or Hawksnest. They delivered exactly what I expected, no more, no less, no complaints.

skiatlanta wrote:
Great story admin.



Carolina Skier, you can think what you want about customer service. It's not a big deal, but sugar IS NOT cheaper than all or most of the resorts out west. Alta, Solitude, Brighton, Snowbird are all $41 a day(with a free UTA transit pass). If you keep skiing Vail, beaver creek, deer vallet, park city, Aspen, it may appear that sugar is cheaper, but when you include smaller, sometimes better resorts, you learn how much sugar overcharges for 100x better skiing. I will visit sugar in march when lift ticket prices are reduced.



Sugar charges that much because they can. They've got the entire Southeastern US to draw from.



Also- the only reason I keep skiing Vail/BC is because they're on my pass... otherwise I wouldn't pay $81 to ski there. (and those resorts are not $41/day)

Here's the other newbie to skiing and this forum with her two cents.



Last week was our first visit to the area (and basically first ski trip). I had a blast and didn't want to leave (in the middle of the good snow on Sun!). We were able to hit 3 of the 4 in the area: Ski Beech (full day Mon. w/ group lesson), Hawksnest (Wed. 1/2 day), and Sugar (Fri., 1/2 day). I wish I could've done App, but time didnt't allow.



Anyhow, Sugar was super busy (duh--on a Friday--what was I thinking!?), had terrible slope conditions, but had the BEST customer service. Everything was clearly marked. The attendants getting rental equipment were sooo helpful--got my poles and even put my boots on for me! (Yes, I'm a girl, and they were guys, but...!) It was great to see workers on the slope in "uniform"...I didn't notice anything like that at the other places. At Ski Beech, we walked all over the place trying to figure out how to get equip, lift tkts, lessons, etc. Nothing was marked, and except for our teacher, the staff barely grunted. It was a fend for yourself (and not crowded really). Not to mention, the "lodge" is in dire need of upgrading! (not that any were nice from what I remember of Winterplace 14+ yrs ago)Hawksnest was bare so they could help, but the place was too icy and small for me. However, I was able to get some good practicing/skill improving w/o others around.



Here are the pix (mind you, this was a disposable camera...my professional photographer husband FORGOT to bring a camera!), if you're interested:

http://www.paulalfordphotography.com/cu ... /index.htm



Those are my thoughts, for what it's worth. (BTW, it'll probably be another year before I ski again, but I can't help but keep returning to this forum!)