Vail Resorts Says Next Season's Pass Sales Are Down After Challenging Year Out West
As the snow settles after a memorably challenging Western ski season, Vail Resorts is reporting a decline in pass sales for next winter and readjusting it's financial forecast.
The resort conglomerate, which sells the popular Epic Pass and owns ski areas in the US and around the world, trimmed its expected yearly net income to between $128 million and $162 million, down from a previous forecast of between $144 million and $190 million.
Sales of Vail Resorts' 2026-27 season passes also sagged about 10% this spring compared to the same time period last year. The announcement was made in Vail Resorts' most recent quarterly earnings report on Monday, June 8, 2026.
The company also unveiled a new pricing category this winter for young adults that, despite the overall decline, solidly outperformed other age groups, according to a news release. It costs $889 and applies to those aged 18 to 30.
Vail Resorts' flagship Epic Pass offers access to numerous ski resorts and, right now, costs $1,119 for adults.
The announcement comes at the tail end of ski season, which, for avid skiers, needs little introduction.
Record heat and thin snowpacks stymied western ski resorts from Colorado to California. The National Ski Areas Association recently reported a significant decline in skier visits nationwide, a data point offset somewhat by the Northeast and Southeast, which both saw solid conditions and strong visitation.
CEO Rob Katz, in the release, called it "one of the most challenging winters in history across the western U.S." That drove "continued pressure on visitation and revenue in the quarter, particularly at our destination resorts in the Rockies," he added.
Even so, Katz said Vail Resorts' "advance commitment model" provided "considerable stability."
Like other ski resort companies, Vail Resorts sells its passes at a discount far in advance of any given ski season, a strategy meant to hedge against weather-related uncertainty in an industry exposed to it.
Following this winter, though, demand for the company's upcoming season pass offerings has softened. Vail Resorts noted this fall-off was most apparent in places that saw the brunt of the bad weather, like Colorado, Utah, and Lake Tahoe.
The drop in pass sales was disappointing but not surprising, said Katz, again pointing to the warm weather that wracked mountains out West. And he said that Vail Resorts was encouraged by third-party data, which showed that the company's spring pass results were "meaningfully" outperforming others.
"We believe the challenging conditions have delayed purchase decisions, creating the opportunity for improved pass performance in the Fall selling season and/or ultimately through lift ticket purchases during next season," Katz said, adding that according to historical data, ski resort visitation typically bounces back after rough years if the following season has normal conditions.
Katz acknowledged, though, that given how much of an outlier this past season was, there's still ongoing uncertainty about how the ongoing pass sale and visitation next winter will pan out.
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This story was originally published June 9, 2026 at 5:32 AM.