Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Sun Valley seeks skiers’ views

Resort conducts season-long customer survey on its mountain amenities


By TREVON MILLIARD
Express Staff Writer

Bald Mountain has several new additions this winter season. Most of them—like the gondola and renovated Roundhouse—stand out, but many people may not have noticed another major addition, even if they're on the mountain every day.

A team of Sun Valley Resort employees has been conducting on-mountain customer surveys five days a week every week this winter. They're collecting data on who's coming here, why they came here and whether they enjoyed their experience, as well as asking other detailed questions on satisfaction levels pertaining to different services.

Resort spokesman Jack Sibbach said on-mountain surveys are something the resort has intermittently done before, but never for this long or this systematically.

He said a six-week on-mountain survey was done in 2001, with the resort also conducting an airport survey in 2005. But this survey will continue through March.

So far, more than 430 of the written Scantron surveys have been completed, with a goal of 2,000 to be reached by late March. Sibbach said several surveyors are all over the mountain asking every fifth person they see at Roundhouse or River Run Lodge to participate. The completed surveys are then given to RRC Associates in Boulder, Colo., a consulting firm that provides market research. The firm returns a report to the resort every two weeks.

Sibbach said the resort's "very pleased" with results so far, but declined to provide exact information about survey answers.

"This is our survey for our management team. It's not public information," he said, adding that on-mountain services will be adjusted according to apparent trends in answers. "At the end, I'm sure we'll share some of the demographic information with the chamber and cities."

He said RRC Associates would also provide comparable data of other mountain resorts to give Sun Valley's results some context.

Sibbach said the vast majority of customers asked to participate in the survey have welcomed the request.

"People are just glad to be asked," he said.

He said the survey shows that the resort cares and is trying to improve guests' experience.

Sibbach said the goal is to have 75 percent of people giving a 9 or 10 in overall satisfaction and willingness to recommend Sun Valley to family and friends. The scale goes from zero to 10, with zero being extremely dissatisfied and 10 being extremely satisfied.

Currently, Sibbach said, results indicate that a little more than 74 percent of people surveyed rate their Sun Valley experience as extremely satisfying.

Sibbach said such a survey might become an annual affair, but that decision is still pending.

"It would definitely be a good benchmark," he said.

Trevon Milliard: tmilliard@mtexpress.com




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