What We Learned From Our First Season in the Ski Industry
Last winter, we did something we'd never done before: we took on a ski resort. Echo Mountain, tucked into Idaho Springs, Colorado, brought us on to help navigate one of the toughest winters the industry has seen in years—and what we learned along the way is exactly why we're excited to keep working with resorts like it.
The Season, By the Numbers
The 2025–2026 season wasn't kind to winter resorts. Unseasonably warm temperatures shortened the snow season by roughly 40%, and many resorts across the industry saw revenue drop by as much as 30%. Echo Mountain needed a strategy that didn't hinge on snowfall—because snowfall wasn't something anyone could control.
So we shifted the story. Instead of leading with "snow conditions," we leaned into "mountain experience": a refreshed brand voice, clearer storytelling about what actually makes Echo special, six on-site content shoots, and a data-driven social strategy across Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok that produced over 350 unique posts in six months.
The result: digital engagement up 794% over the previous season, and social click-through rates up 1,554%—in a year when the snow, quite literally, didn't show up.
Here's what got us there.
Lesson 1: It's About a Lot More Than Snow Conditions
Every ski resort thinks its product is snow. It's not—or at least, it's not only that. Echo's real product is what happens on the mountain regardless of conditions: the community that shows up every weekend, the events that give people a reason to come back, and the feeling of getting outside with people you love. When we stopped talking about snow quality and started talking about experience, accessibility, and community, we gave Echo a story that couldn't be undercut by a warm winter. Weather is out of anyone's control. A brand built on connection isn't.
Lesson 2: Iterate and Optimize
We didn't land on what worked by guessing once and getting lucky. We tested—a lot. Different content formats, different tones, different business units, different platforms. Some things performed immediately; others we killed after a week. The 350+ posts we put out weren't 350 shots in the dark—they were a continuous feedback loop, and the results compounded because we kept paying attention to what actually moved the needle instead of what we assumed would.
Lesson 3: It's a Lot Easier to Market Something That's Already Awesome
This might be the most important lesson, and the simplest: Echo Mountain is fun. Skiing is fun. A day on the mountain with your friends, your kids, or your dog is inherently joyful—our job wasn't to manufacture that feeling, it was to get out of its way and let it show. The best marketing we did all season was the marketing that leaned into what was already true. Spread the joy that's already there, and people will find their way to it.
What's Next
Working with Echo taught us that small, community-rooted resorts have a story that's arguably easier—and more fun—to tell than the big destination mountains. If you run a ski or snowboard resort and warm winters have you rethinking your marketing strategy, we'd love to talk. We've got the playbook, the case study, and a genuine love for what you do.