It would be great if we had name tags that were a little more sturdy. I want to wear one, but it seems that every time I put my pack on or take it off my name tag pops off. Some people tape them on but that clutters up the straps even more.
Other than that it’s been nice keeping the resort open for our holiday visitors!
Could we please change the sandy side bus schedule because 5:45am is too early in the morning. Could there be a later bus that leaves Sandy at 7?
Is the bus schedule the reason for your "6" score? Is there anything I can do in the MLC to make your experience working here better? Please let me know! - Tyler Barnes, MLC Ops & Training Manager
-We've had a lot of employees out sick in our department, and one of our employees mentioned a lot of people on the bus have seemed sick as well. I know it's a hard time of year to encourage people to stay home when they're sick, but it's hard to see entire departments struggling when something starts going around. I love that vitamin C packets and other immune support is generally available for purchase in HR; I've worked at resorts in the past that were able to get entire pallets of Emergen-C donated...could we look into this to be made easily available to departments for free?
-Earlier this year, DPS' sent out emails to all staff about road conditions. They were really helpful to be able to read in the morning and plan my commute. It would be awesome if they resumed sending them to everyone; currently it appears that only our department manager gets them.
-The retail staff often struggles with other employees that get frustrated with them about not being able to stack discounts, the price of things, what is or isn't on sale, and trying to get exceptions made to the return policy or exceptions made for them in general. It's disappointing to see employees talk to our staff in such a way, and often puts our staff in a difficult position. I'd love to find a proactive way to communicate with all staff more of the resort policies...it seems like there were some frustrations expressed in earlier surveys in other departments as well feeling like employees weren't acting in a respectful manner. I'd also like to encourage employees to come find a supervisor to talk to about their frustrations to try and find a solution rather than take it out on front line staff in front of guests.
It was a challenging holiday with so many team members getting sick. It happens every year but did seem worse this season and it is good advice to stay home and not share your sickness with others.
As far as I know DPS is still sending ALL-TEAM emails early in the morning to warn about driving conditions when they feel it is warranted. The last one I saw was sent to all team on Monday 1/6/20.
Thank you for your comment regarding behavior for team members in other departments. I agree as team members we should be the most respectful customers on the mountain and not argue with front line team members. If you think a policy is not correct best to reach out to the Supervisor or Manager of the department with your concern and find our more about why that policy might be in place.
-Jeremy Riss
Good work getting through the holidays everyone. I love to see all the departments succeeding and helping each other out. I’m a hood river resident who relied on the bus since I don’t own a car. I live in the heights and have been able to pick the bus up at Rosaurs for several seasons. This new bus schedule has made it extremely difficult for me to get to work without major stress. I really hope you reconsider this bus schedule, or at least add a stop in the heights so I don’t have to walk over an hour to reach a stop.
I would also like to point out a few things I’ve seen with marketing/social media. There is a large poster by Higher grounds staircase with a picture of a snowboarder doing a Grab off a cliff drop. The grab he is doing is famously bad form and it shows the growing rift between the industry and the culture of snowboarding. I’ve heard other guests and employees comment on this as well. It’s obvious that this wasn’t vetted properly and money was spent on a large picture of a ugly and poorly executed move. Same goes for the social media, many posts with bad videos or pictures of riders/skiers with horrible form, and this is how we present ourselves as a mountain. It’s not a great look, I hope this gets seen and paid attention to more closely
Thank you for sharing your concerns about the skiing/riding depicted in our marketing materials. Mt Hood Meadows is an inclusive company which means that marketing materials both internal and external include people of varying ability, age, ethnicity, size, gender and socioeconomic background. We want people to feel comfortable and welcome regardless of how well they ski/ride. One proven way of doing that is to let them see themselves in our promotional materials be it Instagram or posters in the lodge. Our marketing is not meant to show elite athletes or perfectly executed turns (though sometimes it does), it’s meant to grow the sport and encourage everyone to join us on the mountain for some fun. The outdoor industry has struggled with an elitist and exclusive image in part because much of the marketing for outdoor recreation and gear shows young professional athletes doing things very few of us are actually capable of. That image can be a significant barrier to getting people outside. While we’ll always be stoked to see the pros skiing like alpine Jedis, we are equally as stoked to see people with less snow sliding prowess having a great time. Bad turns are always better than no turns! We welcome feedback and please reach out if you have input or suggestions.
- Anna Laxague
It has to be 28 degrees and lower, low winds, no moisture in the air, to make snow... During the days, I have not seen a single mound of snow been created at bottom of Vista...or anywhere that is...during the day... Ever... When you blow frozen water over head of hundreds of people with no progress, only an ice rink below Vista for all the new boarders and skiers to fall and hurt themselves on, and wet/frozen goggles every time someone rolls by any of them running during the day, wasting water... It doesn't make up for a good experience especially if you're on the south side all day..
I don't understand why we would have so many of these guns, some run during the day rendering them totally useless cause we "run out of water" and only degresses the mountain..
Snowmaking at MHM is more complicated than it may appear, we have not “run out of water”. We have temporary water rights to divert water for snowmaking that is limited to about 0.5 cfs. That right is further limited by the requirement that adequate water remains in the East Fork Hood River to satisfy water rights of users that have earlier priority dates. One of those rights is the instream water right that was granted in 1983 to preserve water flow for aquatic life. In October - December the instream water right is 150 cfs. This fall and winter has been exceptionally dry, and flow in the East Fork has only reached 150 cfs after periods of rain and warmer weather. Cold and dry weather is ideal for snowmaking but we can’t run snowmaking when there is not enough water in the river. Given that, when we can run snowmaking we try to keep it going the entire time it is allowed. Even though conditions got very marginal a couple of days, we turned it way down but not off because we would have lost time restarting when temperature dropped. We moved the Vista gun away from the maze as far as it’s power cord would reach in an attempt to minimize annoyance of the guests in line.
Another issue we have experienced is that the Easy Rider snow gun has an intermittent fault that draws too much current and blows it’s power fuses. When this happened water continued to flow, and without the fan and compressor running it falls as rain. The unit has run for days in between faults and this has made troubleshooting frustrating. Visual inspection has turned up nothing and test instrument readings are normal. Can’t fix it if it ain’t broke.
- Steve Warila
Go back to old routes, they were much more accessible and easier for the people
Increase the price of all the retail items from $xx.95 to $xx.00 so we don't have to have nickles in our bank.
Thanks for the feedback we will consider that.
-Jeremy Riss
employees consistently screw over each other by blowing off shifts. Absolutely poor labor pool makes it impossible to a good job! not a good feeling at all
Thank you for being a dedicated team member. We appreciate you for sure. We always hope that all team members consider their fellow team members as part of their work ethic. Do know that there has been a lot of folks out sick so many of the folks not at work actually called in and were home sick. This was the case in all departments at the mountain in the past 2 weeks.
- Mark Fellows
Blessed to have the product and experience we have to market considering the base depth.
Little to no breaks are given other than lunch. Little to no praise given. Always short staffed which is why the breaks are not given as needed. Supervisors seem to always get ride breaks while team members do not.
I'm sorry to hear that. I know Lisa and Ashley have been very focused on make sure team members get breaks the last couple weeks and I have heard them bring it up in each of the morning meetings I have attended. Not knowing who you are we can't follow up directly but please mention it to your Supervisor, Manager, Director or myself so we can address it specifically.
-Jeremy Riss