Notes

Everyday my rig gets racked hard multiple times coming up admin road. The sand in the pot holes has washed out in a week of them being filled. I am suggesting towards upper management to show some appreciation to the workers here 40 hours a week and to keep us coming back happily pulling into work.
Or a 3 week session in that new Toyota would not be bad for a laborer/not a manager. 😉

1. EV's for Public Safety, transfer buses and vans, ATV's and snowmobiles
2. Lunch chit and/or summer lift ticket for anybody who works with a cleanup trail crew 4 hours
3. Local artist paint mural on the inside wall in full view as you unload the upper Cascade terminal
4. Revisit the vomit-colored pinkish purple color scheme of our terrain parks because it is depressing
4. I apologize for being too candid about my personal reaction
5. Materials, tools and training for Ski Patrol and Facilities Maintenance sign shop in the woodshop at the bottom of Daisy

This has been a difficult season for everyone for a multitude of different reasons, one thing I did not hear a lot of talk about this year was the perpetual stoke model. Not only did this not seem to be such an important concept this season but was one that despite believing in firmly I felt was nearly impossible to actually see be actualized or buy into personally.

This season I started out fighting for ways to progress in my supervisory role after having completed my wage matrix in my first season as a supervisor. This was met with a complete lack of action on anyone's part who could make changes, despite several meetings and conversations. I was not arguing solely for a wage increase but for an opportunity to develop my skills to further benefit the company and my department. Again so little came out of these meetings I felt (and still do) like upper management does not actually want to see me succeed and is happy to let me be a busy little worker bee with little incentive to progress.

When our employees were dealing with a difficult winter break and their meal discount was increased what did supervisors receive? Nothing. We kept our 70% discount and did not receive any sort of thank you for the work we had put in all break with mask mandates etc. This felt like we as supervisors were in some limbo. We are expected to perform at a higher standard and lead our employees but are usually left out of any major discussions regarding changes or operations. It does not feel like we as supervisors are any different from any other non management employee except for a higher food discount (although apparently only sometimes) and a higher wage with significantly higher levels of responsibility. I have seen tons of employee appreciation but that rarely seems to reach the supervisor level.

Another major issue that I have had this season (and last) is the lack of Human Resources support after 3pm. I understand that the department is small but the fact of the matter is if we do not have a single HR representative available during ALL hours employees are on site than we are not doing our best and not supporting our employees equally. I have personally needed HR support during my regular scheduled shift and been unable to reach anyone. I know we have had other employees who had an HR representative been available would have much rather gone and spoken to them than to me but because they know HR is unavailable they turn to me instead. I am not getting paid to do HR's job nor do I have the proper training to accurately and successfully help our employees in every circumstance it has been necessary for me to fill in. I have been told this issue is being worked on but would like to hear what exact plans are in place to fix this besides saying "call, email or use the chat function on the team site" which does not yield timely results after 3pm.

This season has not left me stoked and has continuously been a challenge to bring what little stoke I have left to work everyday. I do not know If I want to return next season but I sincerely hope if I do I am able to see and find the stoke that I know exists at this resort.

Thank you for giving us a place to voice these concerns but please post EVERY comment submitted. I have seen several of my comments not be posted and it makes me wonder are there other opinions and comments being submitted that are not being posted too? If so why?

A chair at the bottom of Ballroom Carpet!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
For real, as the OIC there this whole season, I found that when we experimented with it, it enabled us to constantly by looking up lift line, which reduced reaction times, increased responsiveness when guests might stumble or fall, and better enabled prevention of injury. All of which reduces risk, and lowers chances of incidents and reduces potential points of liability. I do understand there's a "visual" stigma associated with sitting, however statistically, the Carpet is one of the most dangerous lifts, and anything that increases potential safety is a good thing IMO. As someone who's worked on that lift for probably hundreds of hours, I realize this measure seems counterintuitive at first, but hundreds of hours of experience on that lift has taught me that the benefits far outweigh any negative stigma, and it really does deliver a net gain in terms of safety,

Also: just an observation... Ski Patrol was often grumpy all season. Oftentimes I'd go out of my way to say hi to them or be friendly and they'd be kinda grumpy back. Idk if they just need a teddy bear or chocolate or something but like maybe give them some love and tell them Lift Ops loves them, and IDK, feed them or something? Maybe their blood sugar is low. Anyway give them some love! <3

Suggestions regarding the summer trail map. The trails and terrain contours against a satellite image are extremely difficult to see. My suggestion are:

-Ditch the satellite image all together and go all out topo maps. Wooded areas in green, meadows in white, with easy to read terrain contours.

-dotted black trail instead of the continuous line.

If you guys really really want to keep that satellite image, at least change the color of the trail to make it more visible such as an orange color. And mark the timberline trail out in red.

And thank you for a full season! Pretty satisfying not having to close early!

To my management team, my fellow instructors, and all the supporting team members at Meadows, thanks for a great season! As an instructor here at Meadows, I have found this to be the most gratifying and most fun job I have ever had! And I have held many jobs, starting when I was a kid working in my dads radio and TV repair shop, to being a GM dealership mechanic, to being a project engineer/ manager. in the pulp and paper industry to being a small business owner. Don't get me wrong starting up a $500M pulp and paper mill and seeing the new paper machine make a saleable finished product at the end of a long project is very satisfying to say the least, Owning my own business is satisfying as well. But when I see my students progress,, the smiles on their faces when that light bulb moment happens, and when I get letters from the kids I taught this year. To me that's really is the cats meow! And to top it off I get paid to have this much fun and I get tips as well!! Life is good!

I’ve already sought out clarity for myself on this issue, but wanted to put it in front of a larger leadership audience to reinforce the need for clarity on it for others in the future.
While there are a handful of reasons I’ve given lower than historic job satisfaction ratings on these surveys this season, part of it has been a compromise I’ve made myself around a goal of prioritizing long term wellness in reaching the 1000 hour mark for the year to qualify for a 401k over short term wellness in spending time outside and skiing. This is the second season that I’ve made this compromise to try and achieve this, and the second season that I’ve ended it feeling disappointed in myself for both not reaching any of my skiing goals and falling short on this one as well.
This season, that disappointment in myself is paired with an immense frustration. I take responsibility for not asking the appropriate questions and reading enough into the details when I originally set these goals, but also feel like I both pay due attention to the handbook and other available resources, and have had several conversations where I would have expected to be corrected in my impressions regarding details of benefits access and timelines. A big thank you to Bain for speaking up this winter and prompting me to look further into the benefits access to at least set realistic expectations of what I was working towards; clarity that it is a 401k offered and not benefits as a whole had not been brought up prior.
I’ve been using the ACA benefits measurement period on Dayforce the last two seasons to keep track of my hours as I’ve worked towards this. The dates listed, I have come to learn recently upon surpassing that 1000 hour mark with that date range, are only applicable for your first year. Once the first year has past, you move to a calendar year for tracking, which is not measured in this location. In being unaware of this, I missed the 1000 hour mark by less than 6 hours for 2020; had I have known, I easily could have achieved that this fall.
I’m thankful that this is something MHM offers and absolutely don’t want to overshadow my appreciation for making benefits of any sort available for seasonal employees…I think this is a huge step in a positive direction. As an employee who does not often get frustrated about how I feel impacted as an individual and puts effort into staying updated on policies, the frustration I’ve felt associated with this seems important enough to share so hopefully others don’t run into the same in the future. It feels like there is potential to educate those with benefits to the details on this more thoroughly to offer better guidance when employees working towards this bring it up…I felt as though that was missing in conversations I had until I asked for specific clarifications. I have already brought this up, but having the appropriate date ranges specified under that ACA benefits measurement would have been an easy way to prompt clarity early on, instead of now going into my third season working towards this.

Been one hell of a tough season.

I'm so glad this season is over! The job itself in lift ops is awesome and cody is a great boss. But it is very clear that the company themselves don't care about us. You allow thousands of guests to crowd around the deck everyday and drink but you wont allow us to have a beer with each other on "appreciation" day? No instead you're going to play cop and patrol the parking lots and slopes. Such a joke. Not to mention the owner of the company can't even be bothered to wear a mask while we are forced to yell at every guest with it below the nose. Yeah your mountain home if you're part of the rich clientele, the rest of us are just tools. Get it together.

I’ve already sought out clarity for myself on this issue, but wanted to put it in front of a larger leadership audience to reinforce the need for clarity on it for others in the future.
While there are a handful of reasons I’ve given lower than historic job satisfaction ratings on these surveys this season, part of it has been a compromise I’ve made myself around a goal of prioritizing long term wellness in reaching the 1000 hour mark for the year to qualify for a 401k over short term wellness in spending time outside and skiing. This is the second season that I’ve made this compromise to try and achieve this, and the second season that I’ve ended it feeling disappointed in myself for both not reaching any of my skiing goals and falling short on this one as well.
This season, that disappointment in myself is paired with an immense frustration. I take responsibility for not asking the appropriate questions and reading enough into the details when I originally set these goals, but also feel like I both pay due attention to the handbook and other available resources, and have had several conversations where I would have expected to be corrected in my impressions regarding details of benefits access and timelines. A big thank you to Bain for speaking up this winter and prompting me to look further into the benefits access to at least set realistic expectations of what I was working towards; clarity that it is a 401k offered and not benefits as a whole had not been brought up prior.
I’ve been using the ACA benefits measurement period on Dayforce the last two seasons to keep track of my hours as I’ve worked towards this. The dates listed, I have come to learn recently upon surpassing that 1000 hour mark with that date range, are only applicable for your first year. Once the first year has past, you move to a calendar year for tracking, which is not measured in this location. In being unaware of this, I missed the 1000 hour mark by less than 6 hours for 2020; had I have known, I easily could have achieved that this fall.
I’m thankful that this is something MHM offers and absolutely don’t want to overshadow my appreciation for making benefits of any sort available for seasonal employees…I think this is a huge step in a positive direction. As an employee who does not often get frustrated about how I feel impacted as an individual and puts effort into staying updated on policies, the frustration I’ve felt associated with this seems important enough to share so hopefully others don’t run into the same in the future. It feels like there is potential to educate those with benefits to the details on this more thoroughly to offer better guidance when employees working towards this bring it up…I felt as though that was missing in conversations I had until I asked for specific clarifications. I have already brought this up, but having the appropriate date ranges specified under that ACA benefits measurement would have been an easy way to prompt clarity early on, instead of now going into my third season working towards this.

This year was particularly interesting for me because I got credit for a job well done that I didn't even conceive of doing. Our Patrol team posts about 45 safety information signs around the hill within the main area excluding Heather Canyon. We moved most of these off the ski runs on to trees, power poles and lift towers. The resulting decrease in menial, time-sensitive work was an astonishment to all of us. I would encourage everyone to listen to those crazy ideas, get involved and keep evolving. I'm really proud of the people working with me who try new ideas.

With a good actitud we can do anything..!!!

-I've been struggling with the incessant "end of season" messaging this year, and feel like I've been battling it with reminding staff that while we are making preparations for seasonal transition that we are still operational and at work and need to not check out. I feel like we could find a better balance in our messaging than what feels like weeks of "last day of xyz!"

-Better internal communication on when Super Bowl opens. It's been a goal of mine to get up there this year and hasn't happened because I often don't know it's opened until I hear it being closed on the radio or see it posted about on social media later. I feel like this could be sent out in the operational updates throughout the day.

Pretty concerned about the condition of Mex. as the foremost route out of the base it should be in great shape. It seems to have a lot of maintenance issues

Considero que deben reconocer e incentivar el trabajo del equipo de Janitor y principalmente el de la supervisora Miroslava Patiño, ya que es ella quien en verdad está en primera fila cuando hay que limpiar el vómito de algún usuario, cuando un baño se tapa sea de hombres o mujeres, cuando hay que manejar de una oficina a otra para limpiar, no importando el clima extremo y las condiciones del camino, cuando hubo que limpiar las áreas públicas llenas de nieve para que los usuarios estuvieran seguros, la que tiene que cumplir con la limpieza de todos los edificios no importando si ese día solo se presentaron dos o tres miembros del equipo, la que tiene que lidiar con los estados de ánimo de los responsables de cada área, la que debe aprovechar las fortalezas de cada trabajador y minimizar sus debilidades para cumplir con las metas. Opino que Doña Miroslava merece ser reconocida e incentivada de la misma forma que lo son sus superiores ya que sin su trabajo y esfuerzo lo anterior no sería posible.
Agradezco la experiencia de haber sido parte del equipo de MT. Hood Meadows, se trabaja muy a gusto y nos otorgan todas las facilidades para poder cumplir de manera eficiente.

After reading comments on some of these surveys, I am curious:

Would the executive team at Mt. Hood Meadows support their workers in an effort to create a worker's union?

I'd like a direct response to this question in this survey response, please.

Ski racers are the worst human beings on the face of the planet. These highly privileged white kids are absolute monsters with no soul. They are disrespectful and down right rude. Please get rid of the ski racing program. Its a waste of time, money, and effort. Or, we can keep them and keep creating an elitist wealthy society of ass holes that come to our resort who will.push put all the queer/BIPOC people.

Electric vehicles and tools for trail work

Employee party sounds like a major buzz kill.. You don't even get a free beer after you sign your responsibility pledge?? Gee thanks for such a great season..

Keep making those hard decisions. Keep Meadows open.

Employee party sounds like a major buzz kill.. You don't even get a free beer after you sign your responsibility pledge?? Gee thanks for such a great season..

The new additions this season have been great. A few notes I have:

1) The addition of the rubber mats in the walkway between the buildings next to the rental center was a brilliant idea. Walking with ski boots is so much safer now.

2) I realize it's hard to stay focused on the monotony of watching chairs unload on buttercup or loading on the carpet, but for the first timers on these items, I need the attendants not to get distracted training others and be there to prevent the falls boarding the carpet. And to see my signal to slow down the lift speed for my guests first dismount from their chair. When the lift opps person is looking elsewhere, the person has a frightening fall that is not necessary had the chair been slowed down.

3) I love the new food court options. However, I find the vegetarian oriental bowl very bland in flavor. Adding some sesame and/or chili oil, or Hungarian paprika would be helpful. This dish is a great idea, but needs some looking into. Leah's white food truck, by Tum a Lum Lumber in Hood River, does wonders with her vegan options. She is a great resource.

Also, each time I've had the thai chicken, the chicken was very tough and chewy. Not sure why on that one.

My daughter and I are dairy free and both are instructors. When we order a vegan burrito, it is filled primarily with rice, a few beans and nothing else. Making a full flavored vegetarian burrito is easy with the addition of lettuce, tomatoes, avocado and a pico de gallo. Two of the employees do s great job with it, but most of the time, it is bland and full of rice.

We have such great options for food now. But there is room for improvement on these items.

Thanks for caring about our opinions.

The ski racers make my life so unnecessarily more stressful and hard. I have spent the whole season getting yelled at by guests who don't want to wear masks and yet the ski racers are still the worst clientelle up here. They seem to firmly believe that they know more about the lift and lift operations than me and that I am bad at my job by not letting them break the rules. They all act like this mountain belongs to them and that I am simply their servant to serve them and do their bidding alone. Why does meadows support these people? If this behavior was coming from anyone else we would have pulled their passes and suspended them. How much money are we making off this group that we can justify the mistreatment of our team? They must be making a lot for the company to disregard their employees wellness. At the same time though, I know we are giving them a ton of free tickets which adds to their entitlement.

So which is it? Are we funding this group of guests at a financial cost to us and to the detriment of our team or is it that we are making an excessive amount of money off them that the company feels justifies the mistreatment of their employees?

I know a lot of upper management was ski racers and are biased towards this group despite their behavior. The entire group just feels like a group of bullies who are supported, encouraged and financed by Chris Kastner, Jeremy Riss, Tyler Barnes, etc.

Whats up with Matthew Drake never wearing a mask? I realize he is vaccinated as he has provided that as an excuse for not wearing one but it is still confusing when all of Meadows messaging is 'wear a mask' but Matthew is obstinate in using them. Getting lots of mixed messaging. Its kind of ridiculous getting in trouble for not wearing one when I am following the example set by our CEO.

It'll be fine, we'll make the best of the last days of operations but something I keep forgetting to mention... we had THE BEST coffee in our work area last season (pacific rim roasters). It tasted so good, the beans were so fresh, I was so productive because I couldn't stop drinking it. The change to dry/preground/gas station coffee in unsustainable individual plastic packages this season was a bummer amongst other bummers. I'm sorry I didn't mention it earlier but I had bigger beans to brew. It would be so nice if we could get good, locally roasted, sustainably sourced coffee for our work spaces AND our coffee shops again next season (or even better, this summer). Moby Roasters? Pacific Rim Roasters? Ten Speed? Just want that tasty, strong, hot bean water with hints of a hard working local coffee roaster's sweat back! And thank you, even for the gas station coffee, as it was better than no coffee but a demotion from the goods. With the challenges of this season, I think everyone deserves the high five that a hot mug of good coffee delivers.

Please put the slow signs back in the run at tripodial. When they’re in the trees like they are now nobody sees them and I had a close encounter on snowmobile because a skier was going wayyyyy to fast. Put them in the run patrol please it keeps us safe

I’ve chosen to keep this comment to myself through most of the season because I understand we are facing several mew challenges. However, at the end of the season, these issues should have found solutions by now. Food and beverage has been a colossal disappointment this season. Many of our employees have gotten sick after eating the food being served. We have begun filing near miss forms due to food borne illnesses coming from the lodge. Cooks have been witnessed sweeping the floor in a pair of gloves and then preparing and serving food wearing the same gloves used to clean.
Some cooks have prepared food bare handed.
Multiple days this season the grill has been out of propane and unable to run, while these circumstances happen and are understandable, no notice was given to employees about the closures. Employees on hill must go well out of their ways to reach the sahale lodge only to discover they are not open. This NEEDS to be communicated to the team.

Ski school spent most of the season operating under different mask guidelines, pretending that they have exceptions to the policy. This has been address multiple times and still persists as an issue, Despite Cody Howe having multiple conversations with their leadership.

The bus situation could have been done better. Many bus drivers do not use the reservation system, and do not stop at certain stops. During the worst weather of the season, our employees got absolutely soaked on the ride to work. Many of those employees then spent the entire day in the cold weather. WELLNESS IS A CORE VALUE. I understand the need to open windows. However, the drivers have gotten lazy and decided to tape them open, which results in every seat on the bus getting covered in half an inch of standing water before we are expected to sit on it for an hour on rainy days.

Finally, why did I have to remind Mathew drake, our CEO, to put his mask on in sahale lodge today, 4/16/21. According to reports from my department, it was the third time In just as many days that he has been reminded.

Spring at Cooper is great! We have a great team and I love that my manager is continually supportive and encouraging, consistently putting the team first.

Hang in there, team! I've heard a few "I'm done" comments from teammates. Not so fast. April will have days of sun, snow and fun still. we got this!! I for one am sad to see the end of the season! I'm using my skis this month. That silly bike can wait until May.

I think we should ban alcohol at the resort. It doesn't promote wellness, a core value here at Meadows. Alcohol slows reaction times and clouds judgment, and we are at a resort where people are doing extreme sports in dangerous terrain. I think everyone would be safer and Wellness would be better served if we didn't encourage people to drink and ride by selling and allowing alcohol at the resort.

Spring would be a perfect time to get a jump on making next season exceptional. Here’s some ideas:
Training Videos for guests: (For blog posts and maybe you could even make a longer video of all this info that you send to everyone when they buy a ticket)

How to load a lift. Why is the Load Here sign where it is? Does it matter if we load behind that point? What happens when your backpack strap gets caught on the chair? Why do you remove a foot from your bindings, or your poles from your wrists? Everyone is a beginner, and not every beginner will take a lesson that teaches them these things.

What goes into getting the mountain open? What does it take to open Cascade? What is happening behind the scenes? What about parking??

An introduction to the lifts, parks and the mountain terrain: With this I also suggest that an effort is placed on giving each lift it’s own identity/vibe. It exists, but if it’s your first time on the mountain will you know that? Will you feel that? Will you even know what lift you are on? A good home has a place for everyone, but everyone needs to know how to find that place.

Training Videos for the Team: We hire people and then throw them into their jobs during the busiest time of the season without adequate training time. It is the nature of the schedule, but early season exceptional performance can come with a much heavier emphasis on learning/retaining information and proper training via videos. Doing lift ops training in November with no snow is basically pointless. Having some videos that show proper ramps, what a bad ramp is and why and how it can be fixed -
How to shovel snow without getting hurt. What are and how do you use the tools of your job. Essentials of excellent customer service? How do you make an impact on the customer experience from your non-customer facing job? How about a simple new employee welcome - a tour of the facility including the mountain (if you only hire people who are mountain people, you will soon not be able to recruit a full workforce), riding the bus, sustainability, guest service from all vantage points... I could go on, but I think you get the idea. Let’s use the time now - and use those front line workers, their ideas, passion for their job to make these things happen. Don’t wait for the summer when it’s just full time employees doing the work to prepare for another season and hope that the work you do resonates with front line workers. Those doing the jobs are the best ones to work on projects like this.

Dial in the operations - I can only talk from my experience but everyone in their own position can most likely do the same for their position. Here’s my list: Before next year I would like to see a complete lift set up for what tools are needed at each lift. What does the maze at MHX look like? How many PVC’s are needed? Are PVC’s the best sustainable option? How much rope line is needed? Why do we use so much material that is breakable in a cold environment? (Rope reels, tools). Isn’t there a seat squeegee/ ice remover that is ergonomically correct, works and doesn’t break? If not, how about designing something in the off time. (And then prototype it and sell it to other resorts cause I’m sure every lifty out there would like to have a tool that actually works...talk about revenue generation....) Having only worked two seasons it does appear to me that we start over from scratch every year and it takes a LONG time to hit our stride. And we certainly don’t hit our stride during the busiest time of the year. That said, I know a LOT of work goes in over the off season by management, but it doesn’t have to be that way if the time is used now. (Instead of taking a ton of ride breaks).

Recruit for next season: I’ve got a few ideas bouncing around in my head about this, so if anyone cares they can reach out personally. I am a big believer that if you say “that’s how it is” than you’re going to always get it just “how it is” and how it is, at least in lift ops (and maybe other departments as well) a team that is never complete (still hiring???!!!!!!!!!!!), where call offs are often in the double digits (and this is NOT a Covid issue) and the number of people that work the entire season is an appalling percentage for a SEASONAL (meaning you’re not locked into working this job forever) job. Sorry to not be the queen of sunshine on this one, but this is a business that takes LOTS of people to make it work so we should put LOTS of attention on how to recruit, train and RETAIN an EXCEPTIONAL staff.

None - I've had a great season (despite stupid COVID) but I am looking forward to being done. Lots of cleanup in my yard and I'm itching to have the free time to get at it.

I'm ecstatic that we've been able to operate through the season. This seemed like a huge unknown going into the season, and have been really pleased with how MHM has handled operations during covid overall.

A couple small comments/suggestions:
1) the conditions page: the partial giraffe/stag/food truck is a weird way to give a visual for the snowpack. It seems like if we want a visual for it, we should pick something that is the same height/depth and show the whole image. The stag in particular seems very out of proportion.

2) Potstickers: the amount of potstickers is super inconsistent, ranging between 4-7. It would be nice to have a consistent number (it seems like 1 per dollar would make sense)...it's a bummer to grab some for lunch and discover that it is basically a half order to sustain you for the rest of the day.

I really miss the level three on the snow training

I love the Zoo. But everywhere else has LARGE features. How is someone who is ready to progress suppose to progress when the next option includes large? No small medium?

More importantly, its extremely dangerous for someone who is ready to upgrade from the zoo to drop into any of our parks with the large features. I feel like Meadows is just asking for injuries at this point.

On my days off I enjoy coming up and riding. I notice the "ambassadors" and friends get to cut the line on all the best powder days. It's getting out of control the entitlement to just cut everyone in line so they can get first tracks. Sure an early load on MHX in the morning they always do that and it's expected. But we were waiting for Cascade to open good powder day for a good 40min. Vikinglander and friends had no problem asserting themselves in front of the line, going behind the maze and RFID gates taking the first 6 chairs. There was a few hundred people patienly waiting and guests didn't take it well. Guests erupt yelling it's not a good look pissing a lot of guests off. Who is in charge of keeping tabs on our ambassadors on the hill? What is the policy for ambassadors cutting the lines? It seems like they get to do whatever they want unchecked.

This season has been surprisingly amazing. From IT getting all the Products on the websale page, to Marketing folks (Anna & Ben who absolutely ROCK) and are always responsive to any request---it's truly amazing how you can ask a completely stupid question and they still respond professionally and respectful!
Parking crew seemed happier and kinder. Offering drop offs this season feels more customer friendly and supportive to families and guests overall.
Also want to mention...rentals crew at the new Sahale lodge. They are always so welcoming and helpful. Raul-at the front desk, Mason, Michael, Dane, Brooke, KC----seriously quality individuals. I wouldn't be here working if it wasn't for them all because my job requires me to come in and hang out waiting for my guided tours.

I want to end with a special thank you to Chris Kastner for being such a wonderful person and boss. Even when we disagree, I know that he has my back and cares about the opportunities the Snowshoe Program offers our guests. Also thankful for David Macintosh for taking on the management of the Nordic Center and for Jeremy Riss support this season while Chris wasn't available.

After we got everything rolling at the beginning of the season, it felt like most people and staff were just happy to get outdoors and doing something regular. I feel so happy to be able to be a part of the team here at Meadows and to be able to work with all the quality people that work at our Mountain Home. Thanks!

The snow has been tough but still loving the job.

It would be awesome if the Grooming crew could leave fresh snow so the kids could play with it. Kids love to dig, build igloos or castle's, and make snowballs which is extremely hard to do if the snow is packed hard or groomed over breaking our hand shovels. Even if they could leave us a little "mound" of snow, would be so amazing.

Been feeling burnt out. Will there be employee ride day at season end?

Jeremy, the responses you’ve given in regards to when mask violation warnings need to be recorded, does not match the statement the company put out in the beginning of the year.

To quote Cody Howe in the video that the company released to the public “if your given a reminder and you are polite and put your mask up, we will simply make a note of it on your profile and that will be the end of the interaction. If further issues occur or If your rude or argue at all your pass will be suspended for two weeks”

Can you clarify at which point this policy changed to only putting comments on profiles of people who don’t immediately comply?

This presents a situation where a guest can blatantly violate our policy in multiple areas and face no repercussions because they respond politely every time. It creates an opportunity to abuse the system.

This seems highly ineffective to implement the policy in this fashion.

And furthermore, I have been extremely disappointed in many of the executive team in their “free interpretation” of our policies. You have not been consistent. Mathew drake himself has had to be given mask reminders in the lift lines. I find this to be absolutely unacceptable.

And lastly, I would like to thank a few members of the leadership team who I feel actually align themselves with the policies and values of the company.
Thank you Mel toney, Cody Howe, Greg pack, Matt troskey, Lenore perconti. You all do a wonderful job and I appreciate all that you do for our team.

Please mark out or send messages about what new features are introduced into the park directly under easy rider lift line? Almost sent it right off of the quarter pipe last week while doing line check when it's pitch black and dark out. I've managed to see the darkness where my headlights didn't shine and steered my sled around it after checking tower 5 and 6.

Please send out some sort of email about what is going on, just something as a heads up considering it's a route we ride up every morning in the dark.

PS: Admin road has got some pretty nasty holes in it, not sure if anyone else has noticed or not.

As instructors we work hard (enjoyable hard work) for our teaching hours and when we earn our work a day vouchers, I think its a great reward for our extra effort. I have earned several this season, however being our season is rapidly coming to a close and of course its April now. Its hard to find people to hand those vouchers to. Would it be at all possible to extend our validation of our hard earned vouchers to the first three weeks of operation next season. Even when our extension for our previous years vouchers I had a hard time finding enough people to use them. I really hate to see these go to waste and it would be greatly appreciated if management could extend the validity of our vouchers to the first three weeks of next season. When I give out my vouchers many times it to people that has never skied at our mountain home, I think its great advertisement for our home as always tell the guest how great our home is compared to our neighbors on the mountain!

Jeremy, the responses you’ve given in regards to when mask violation warnings need to be recorded, does not match the statement the company put out in the beginning of the year.

To quote Cody Howe in the video that the company released to the public “if your given a reminder and you are polite and put your mask up, we will simply make a note of it on your profile and that will be the end of the interaction. If further issues occur or If your rude or argue at all your pass will be suspended for two weeks”

Can you clarify at which point this policy changed to only putting comments on profiles of people who don’t immediately comply?

This presents a situation where a guest can blatantly violate our policy in multiple areas and face no repercussions because they respond politely every time. It creates an opportunity to abuse the system.

This seems highly ineffective to implement the policy in this fashion.

And furthermore, I have been extremely disappointed in many of the executive team in their “free interpretation” of our policies. You have not been consistent. Mathew drake himself has had to be given mask reminders in the lift lines. I find this to be absolutely unacceptable.

And lastly, I would like to thank a few members of the leadership team who I feel actually align themselves with the policies and values of the company.
Thank you Mel toney, Cody Howe, Greg pack, Matt troskey, Lenore perconti. You all do a wonderful job and I appreciate all that you do for our team.

It would be nice if uniforms were enforced on everyone and not just the obvious favorites. A certain someone is always in green bibs and another oic was in gray bibs at star today.

I am happy we have made it through the peak season and we are winding down to the spring season riding now! I would like to thank all of the employees that have endured many angry customer comments. I know some days we can say I only got yelled at by 3 people today, and we know that was a good day! Our guest services team gets put through a lot and I am very proud of all the employees that have endured the season so far! Great job guys!! 🙂 I hope to be working with many of your next season as well.
I know it would tough without the mountain exchange and the MHM perks that were limited. I know I missed the acupuncture, Muscle stretching guys, and exchange letters when they were down. I had to cancel a vacation because of it, but luckily I got my money back. I hope next time they do not limit any perks because that make working here so much more enjoyable and we look forward to coming when we know we have those things available to us.
The outhouses outside need to be cleaned more often than they do. There are multiple complaints about the outhouses not being cleaned and lack of toilet paper.
Sometimes I feel the building is too cold, I know we don't want it too hot in the building because most guests are in snow gear, but I shouldn't have to feel the need to wear snow pants and a coat all day. It gets a little uncomfortable as I shiver all day. I know we are on a mountain and I do dress in base layers, etc. Then were struggling when the power was out and that was understandable, but anyways...
Other than those minor things work has been enjoyable. From what I can tell the cafe's have been wonderful, I love when the schuss is open but wish they would fill the soups up more than 1" from the top. I love eating at the new Sahale Grill. I love the way it is set up and organized. I have tried about 1/2 the menu so far and have stuck with my favorites. The RIB is to die for!! Keep up the excellent work F&B your team is doing a great job feeding us all.

Can we provide guests with a lift status board at the bottom of Shooting Star like the ones we have at MHX and HRM?

Thanks for the employee tune up special!

It's awesome the Cooper Spur Ski Season was extended. Thank you!

Lift Ops is nearly always understaffed on weekends/peak days. Skeleton crews on each lift, and the smallest number of supervisors possible. Marshal is left with the absolute bare minimum and from where I stand, he receives little to no praise for all the hard work he puts in.
You rock Marshal, and I know I'm not the only one that thinks it.
Weekday Lift Ops crews are fully staffed, with extra supervisors on hand even. Seems a little backward that our Peak Day crew is hanging on by the thread and yet we're fully staffed throughout the week? It's unfortunate to see that the Manager of the department leaves his teammates with so little when he is gone, but makes certain to set himself up for success throughout the week. Cody is not fostering a healthy working environment, not supporting his leadership team, and definitely not focusing on team member retention... Which we know is vital to running a healthy and efficient department.

I know lifties are questioning whether or not to come back next season, even questioning finishing out this season. I hate to see awesome teammates feel unsupported by their leader, so much so they feel they need to look for employment elsewhere. They don't get paid enough, and this season they haven't been supported enough.

Whens the end of nights party??!

It would be amazing if breakfast sandwich options were available in Sahale. Sourdough bread, fried egg, sausage or bacon, with cheese or even french toast on occassion with a side of potatoes and scrambled eggs maybe a sprinkle of chives.

COVID has killed this season for me. The last thing I want to do is ski/ride with crowds so I come to work, I do my job and I go home. I'm envious of all the people who are comfortable with lift lines right now but I'm not. It is demoralizing to constantly have to remind my co-workers to stand 6' away. Now that people are starting to get vaccinated I keep hearing "but I'm vaccinated" when asking people to step back or when someone asks to carpool with me and it's exhausting. I understand this is out of the company's control but it would be so nice if people received some sort of guidance when getting vaccinated that explains how to act post vaccination. Folks I've talked to have just gotten a shot and been sent home, no information. Vaccinated folks are acting like they are invincible and don't seem to care about those of us who still have months to wait and families at home that could get COVID from them. Thankful to be working and thankful that the company has worked hard to keep us healthy but I'm running out of "just keep swimming" attitude. It's been a hard week.

I’m just confused why Meadows thinks it’s okay to hire a bunch of seasonal workers and then not give them a livable wage? If you have to exploit your workers to stay open, is it really worth it to stay open? Every time I see someone bring this up, leadership replies with: then quit. Well guess what leadership, you need us to stay open. And if we demands higher wages, it’s obviously for a reason. How much more $ do you make than us? And why? Do you think you deserve a livable wage and we don’t? We clearly need a workers union so that we can actually be listened to and not be told to “get off the bus” if we disagree with our unlivable wages

I’m just confused why Meadows thinks it’s okay to hire a bunch of seasonal workers and then not give them a livable wage? If you have to exploit your workers to stay open, is it really worth it to stay open? Every time I see someone bring this up, leadership replies with: then quit. Well guess what leadership, you need us to stay open. And if we demands higher wages, it’s obviously for a reason. How much more $ do you make than us? And why? Do you think you deserve a livable wage and we don’t? We clearly need a workers union so that we can actually be listened to and not be told to “get off the bus” if we disagree with our unlivable wages

Kelly Howler is doing a great job coordinating and communicating training opportunities! She's delivering stoke and keeping everyone motivated and will informed about training to take advantage of. Thanks Kelly!

Get everyone a COVID vaccination!

Please don't let guests park in admin, myself and others on nights almost were not able to come to work because admin was full and it was a bunch of guests or people on days off. We were barely able to squeeze my car in. Also I know this has nothing to do with Meadows but we had some awesome employees that had to leave because they live in vans and the forest service has banned them from parking in snowparks yet they let thousands of random people come every weekend. The employees were great and were deeply saddened about leaving "our mountain home" to cater to tourists. Maybe somebody could work something out with the forest service? Especially since we're all forced to buy parking permits to come to work.

I do want to commend Meadows for being strict about Covid-19 face masks. Other resorts have not been as good about this, and I really appreciate the efforts management has gone through to keep us safe AND open. Even the strict policies regarding travel, I think are warranted, and I thank y'all for doing the hard work. We are coming across the anniversary of that Sunday we closed and what a morbid time...

Also, the Team Space has been a GREAT resource for the team. I hope that even after Covid is done, we have a good, clean, open space for our staff to escape to and away from the public. The previous break room was not a place I wanted to "relax" in.

Thank you for making things happen when/where you are able to make changes in. They do not go unseen, but maybe more often unthanked....

Thanks to all my team members for being such a well working machine in these troubled times. We are doing such a great job, for a safe and open season!!
Thank you.

Ops: thanks for the weekly updates on the operational calendar. My staff would support a continued ski season if we can drum up the business - so many guests have found the opportunity to recreate reasonably safely here a life saver in this pandemic and that is unlikely to change too quickly.

F&B: Glad to see pizza boxes back in Sahalie, and recent wrapping of sandwiches there have kept the fries less soggy.
I'm wondering if the wrapping on sandos in the Schuss should go metallic wrap inside? the white paper sticks to the food items often, FYI.

HR: I feel like the staff are very appreciative of efforts to make employment here satisfying. The word is getting out and the actions are following the theory. We cannot stop the increasing pressure of the rising cost of living, that has soared even further in the last year, and we must continue to raise wages to keep essential staff. The cost of turnover is difficult to quantify but as a manager, it is real in $$ and in employee satisfaction of those that remain and must pick up the pieces and train new folks.

I love my job in lift ops and I love the mountain life. Sadly Im going to end up having to cut my season short because of a number of things.

First; The cap. Or lack there of. Y'all lied to us, told us that you were going to put us first and not overload capacity. It's greedy and there's not a good excuse that you can give us.

Second; instead of saving for expansion maybe pay us a little bit more? like many of my co-workers I live in my car. Because I don't have a plumbing system I'm not allowed to camp in the parking lot which means I often have to wander around to find a place which by the way never has a bathroom. And I've looked around but can't afford any of the gym memberships around the area nor the gas to make the trip frequently.
Do you folks know what it's like being a lifty shoveling all of your snow for your lifts and not showering that often? It's not sustainable or good for wellness.
Maybe if you paid us a little bit more I could afford to move out of my car.
At the very least let us camp in the parking lot and put up a pop-up shower-bathroom so people like me with bills and student loans can maybe scrape by without going into debt to buy groceries

Third; everybody who works in lift ops or mountain ops for that matter knows that they're geared deteriorates at a exceptional rate in just one season. Yes we have incredible pro deals but there's some gear that frankly should just be provided. Helmets and gloves, required PPE, do you have any idea how much money I spend getting ready for every year or throughout the year from various gear that gets broken from the wear and tear of this job?

Fourth; The amount of times that I've hurt myself; stepping on a piece of ice and being hit by a chair, or just slipping in general and falling, whatever it may be. It's entirely asinine that there's no benefits in place for physical therapy or general physicians appointments. We work in a hazardous zone and yet Y'all just assumed that there's going to be more young lefties to fill the ranks when one of us gets hurt It's ridiculous. It's not sustainable. It doesn't make us feel valued.

Anywho my thumbs are tired now too. I'm done.

I love my job in lift ops and I love the mountain life. Sadly Im going to end up having to cut my season short because of a number of things.

First; The cap. Or lack there of. Y'all lied to us, told us that you were going to put us first and not overload capacity. It's greedy and there's not a good excuse that you can give us.

Second; instead of saving for expansion maybe pay us a little bit more? like many of my co-workers I live in my car. Because I don't have a plumbing system I'm not allowed to camp in the parking lot which means I often have to wander around to find a place which by the way never has a bathroom. And I've looked around but can't afford any of the gym memberships around the area nor the gas to make the trip frequently.
Do you folks know what it's like being a lifty shoveling all of your snow for your lifts and not showering that often? It's not sustainable or good for wellness.
Maybe if you paid us a little bit more I could afford to move out of my car.
At the very least let us camp in the parking lot and put up a pop-up shower-bathroom so people like me with bills and student loans can maybe scrape by without going into debt to buy groceries

Third; everybody who works in lift ops or mountain ops for that matter knows that they're geared deteriorates at a exceptional rate in just one season. Yes we have incredible pro deals but there's some gear that frankly should just be provided. Helmets and gloves, required PPE, do you have any idea how much money I spend getting ready for every year or throughout the year from various gear that gets broken from the wear and tear of this job?

Fourth; The amount of times that I've hurt myself; stepping on a piece of ice and being hit by a chair, or just slipping in general and falling, whatever it may be. It's entirely asinine that there's no benefits in place for physical therapy or general physicians appointments. We work in a hazardous zone and yet Y'all just assumed that there's going to be more young lefties to fill the ranks when one of us gets hurt It's ridiculous. It's not sustainable. It doesn't make us feel valued.

Anywho my thumbs are tired now too. I'm done.

Awesome

I wish that upper management would actually listen to us when we say things like “we need help enforcing the mask policy because inside departments are not putting mask warning notices on pass profiles”
The response to this from Jeremy riss has been “well I’ve seen people giving warnings”
Warnings are useless if we don’t document those warnings and THAT is what I am asking for. A guest can be warned at the front steps, and then inside the main lodge. Then again at sahale,. And then at mount hood express where a liftie will finally put a comment on the profile, but at that point the guest has potentially been warned several times already.
This creates an environment where guests feel they can abuse the system simply by being friendly when getting a reminder.
Inside departments need to be given the tools to actually do this correctly.

We are getting so much pressure put on us to do this, and then when we do, you are not supporting us. Saying that we are too confrontational when giving warnings.
I propose this scenario. A guest with no mask gets warned to put it up by three employees around the lodge, none of which ask for his pass.

Finally when a liftie doing their job properly asks for their pass, the simple act of asking for the pass becomes “aggression” in the eyes of the guest because three other employees didn’t do their job fully.
Partial enforcement puts the team in danger, it makes the job harder, and it accomplishes nothing. Please stop dismissing these pleas for help. We are asking you for help. We are asking for help. I don’t know how else to say it. We need help. Stop saying “I see it happening” because we wouldn’t be asking for help if we didn’t need it.

This season has been exhausting. I'm looking forward to the end of the season. Seasonal workers do not get paid enough or compensated correctly for the work that we do. I wish there were health insurance/dental insurance options. Please start a workers union. With how the executive team has treated seasonal workers, I don't want to come back next year.

We have the employee ticket exchange and classes to Yoga-which is great. But is there some type of groupon discount we could get on vehicle accessories(wiper blades, light bulbs, fluid, etc...) and/or car repairs. A list of a couple shops that would give discount(or even priority) to Meadows employees.

Please offer another side besides French fries with the burgers and sandwiches. As someone who is trying to reduce carbs, it is frustrating to only have Fries offered. Soup? Salad-and not pasta salad. As for the salads-what happened? starchy and carb loaded grain and noodle salad is what available. A creaser salad is my only option if i want to stand in line. No spinach? arugula? feta? gorgonzola?

The food is also always cold. I have to reheat everything- the soup is served luke warm and i don't even leave the lodge and walk far enough to have it to have time to cool off.
and what is up with that really gross citrus chicken. really WTF? so gross. teeny tiny pieces of shred chicken with large pieces of slimy chewy tough skin. I thought i got bad plate, asked for a replacement. Same thing. Everyone i have spoke to about this has had the same experience.

I love the direction Meadows has taken with Pre-emptive closing with nasty weather. So many years i have worked here and the- open no mater what attitude- has done damage to employee moral on several levels.
Thank You Greg for make the right call. your leadership has been quite refreshing.

Back to employee appreciation...i started in 2002 and Meadows and the Drake family have always looked out for their employees. But in the last couple years HR has really stepped up the game. Thank You. Any employee love for folks with bad teeth? the power bars are a little tough.
Lots of Love
Keep it going!

Communicating with the management is incredibly frustrating. Everything I ask takes about a month to get resolved. Anything seems to require an in person visit to someone (moving target who, fingers pointed to who that is) but that makes the assumption your schedules will cross.

Shades in the Bullwheel bar.

Shades in the Bullwheel bar.

I simply want to express deep and utter gratitude for meadow's response both internally and externally after losing three team members. I felt above and beyond supported on so many fronts and after speaking with the families, I know they did as well. Thank you for putting people above the bottom line in such tangible ways.

More snow!!!

Just so exhausting dealing with rude people who think they don't need
to wear their masks and follow other guidelines

More snow!!!

Sahale Grill's Tacos are great! Could be even better if double wrapped (2 tortillas), like all street tacos. Would serve to keep our uniforms cleaner.

Also offer choice of flour or corn tortillas. Having the corn gluten- free option could expand the market for the product.

Consider labeling all gluten free menu offerings as GF.

More snow!!!

The rental team is great I feel very taken car of as a employee in that department. There are a lot of issues with flow due to lack of space in the shop and this makes busy days extra stressful. This season with covid I feel that we are being to casual about safety. Every weekend there are way to many people in the Sahale lodge and the capacity signs are ignored. Unfortunately this might require less rentals given out or we need to be more strict with the amount of people inside. Guests also seem to forget about covid in that space and never wear their masks correctly.

Nearly every time I see Mark Fellows he's in a terrible mood and most of the time being rude to someone, whether it be a guest or a team member. I've witnessed him actually screaming at guests on the patio before. Not sure what he's got going on, but that guy needs to take a chill pill. I avoid him at all costs because I never know when he's going to explode.

Are we getting Adidas employee store passes this year? I always get exited about that every year but this year I’m getting kinda worried we might not.

How about Nike employee store passes too some people like both or just one but me personally both would be absolutely great

The heater in outer limits is always blowing cold air! And it makes our store freezing! For the workers and guests! We should fix that, also put more “ no cash “ signs so guests don’t get frustrated.

I really miss the Town Hall meetings. I understand everyone can't always attend but it was nice to stop and take a breath of fresh air, put a face to a name of folks in management. There really is something to be said of having "face time" even if over Zoom.

The heater in outer limits is always blowing cold air! And it makes our store freezing! For the workers and guests! We should fix that, also put more “ no cash “ signs so guests don’t get frustrated.

I often feel like the night crew,all departments, is the stepchild of this company

20 years here and same problems with operations exist and get worse, no real job training opportunities, always given bs excuses why I can't have that training while younger less experienced patrollers get their training and advances, old team players get treated talked to like we're children.

I have worked at Meadows for 10+ years in the MLC (previously known as Ski School). I would like to give feedback to this season’s operations from a little different prospective. I’m a part time instructor who also happens to own a small company that also employs people during these unprecedented times. I can’t fathom the amount of time and money it’s taken for our employer to keep this place open while providing a safe place to enhance our guest’s lives as well as our own. I have personally used the Exchange Program perk almost every year of employment and miss it, however this season is different. No employer wants to be associated with the transfer of this virus from one place of work to another. Please look around when you go to our Mountain Home at all the things that have been done to make team members jobs safe and rewarding. I’m going to point out just one of the little things for which I’m grateful, (sorry you got to be glass half full during these times) while our guests are eating in their vehicles and attempting to get warm, we have a warm safe place to take a break with hot coco and Cliff Bars no less.
I’m not trying to start a flame war, this is just my opinion, your mileage my vary.

EQUAL EMPLOYMENT at MHM. We pride ourselves as a company that is equal to all. I have to say that it appears to be an unequal stranded for identifying male and identifying female employee with the stranded of uniforms. For identifying male employees MHM issued uniforms are the only option. Yet in many departments female employees are allowed to wear what ever street close that they want. And in those same departments males just have the option of a MHM uniform. i understand that not all department have the same requirements. But it has become clear that if you identify as male all rules apply and if I identify is female then no rules apply. How is this equal. If we are trying to look like a family or even a cohesive unit every employee should be in a meadows issued uniforms so that we can be seen. AND have that name tag on! If our CEO and CFO and all other O's can wear a uniforms why can't all of use? Or lets use all wear what every want as long as we have our name tag on.

Love it!

Just so exhausting dealing with rude people who think they don't need
to wear their masks and follow other guidelines

It would make sense to get more patrollers snow mobile certifications. We need to have a lot of us capable of doing base area tows and night shifts are thin on patrollers that are allowed to drive them due to new rules.

I’ve been stoked this last month. Having fun teaching

More free hot chocolate and sandwiches! Those brighten my day up immensely

A couple of us liftees were sitting around and were curious about putting windmills somewhere on the mountain to power parts of the resort, like putting 1 above EZ rider to help heat the top shack since the heater is usually empty.

Why is it that we don’t allow truck campers/ small RVs in the parking lot that don’t take up more than one space? We’re asking people to bring their own lodge this yr. but we’re discriminating for reasons guest don’t understand. Again, these vehicles don’t take up more than one space. Please help us understand so we can pass it along the guest.

The only job I've ever had where I come into work to have fun on my day off!

Everyone should be extremely proud that it is February and we are still open! Shout outs to everyone. We really are doing this! That said, we can always improve. From my perspective this is what I see: young first time, or nearly first time workers who are still learning how to be a human, much less learning how to work for the first time, a very large staff of workers who care more about riding & skiing than enriching lives, everyone struggling in some way with the challenges of the pandemic, team lounges & lift shacks that are dirty, comments on this survey that are belittling, a bus reservation system that is still a rocky mess two months in, leadership that believes we should all just be lucky we have a job, and team members using the newfound backing from management against abusive behavior by guests as a way to get retribution for all the years working in service and being treated badly and in turn treating guests badly.. My answer to all of this: Team Mom. Or Dad. Or Elder. Or Coach. Or whatever you want to call it. The person who’s job is it to make sure that every team member is uplifted, supported, taught the proper behavior, mentored, nurtured and cared for, and reminded that they are worthy and valuable. If your answer to this is that is the role of Lead, Supervisor, Asst Manager, Manager, Director, VP..... my question becomes who is that for them? And if that is the case why is it not happening? Why do team members not know how, why or the consequences of making a simple bus reservation? Why isn’t there someone on staff that you can really talk to about how you’re feeling? Why is nobody giving morning pep talks that actually serve to make us better each day, or just glad to be alive? It does not have to be a stand alone job. It can be part time. I volunteer.

I appreciate the ability to communicate my suggestions, comments and give gratitude. Thank you for listening and occasionally responding. May I suggest we offer an alternative to writing? Writing does not always provide the most complete communication, isn’t easy for everyone and makes it easy for people to make comments they would never make face to face. Why not offer the ability to take the survey as a video or an audio file? This is a digital world where that is possible. I imagine the quality of conversation from both sides would greatly improve.

-Would it be possible to get a new/functioning toaster for bagels? Bagels taking a while to toast has been an issue for several seasons, and I struggle to understand why it takes so much longer than in the cheap toasters most of us have at home.

-It would be awesome to see bagels/smoothies available somewhere during the week with Fresh tracks closed this season and Higher Grounds not open m-th.

-It also seems like breakfast could be served later at the grill-maybe until 11? I've gone up multiple times at the very end of the breakfast time range to be one of several people turned away for breakfast as a bunch of hamburger patties were just thrown on the grill. This seems more notable on weekdays when there aren't other light non-packaged food options.

I have been at Meadows as an instructor since 1997. It has continued to get better every year. I have a small business with 29 employees and it has been a super stressful year. I have to admit that I sympathize with Matthew Drake. Stress in keeping your business alive and functioning is not unique to the employees. As an owner or the person in charge, you have so much more to lose. You try to support people and provide jobs and try to be as generous as you can be and yet people criticize you. I see great effort from management in trying to make things work and support us. I see them on the ground every weekend I am up there. They are not idle. My 30 years of experience with employees has shown me that if someone is not happy and then it is best for them to leave because being disgruntled is like a cancer. You can only do so much to keep people happy and I do see Meadows trying a lot.
The added discount has goaded me into sampling the offerings in Sahale. I want to offer Kudos to those guys working there and to say the food was excellent. I had a guest that I was teaching from Arizona and she stated it was some of the best food she had ever had at a ski resort.
I love teaching first time lessons, I just wish we had more terrain for that and lift service. I often times look at the area at the bottom of stadium and imagine a much wider area that could have a carpet. Unfortunately it would be a long walk. Perhaps there are other areas under consideration.

More gravel! For the last couple of weeks the parking lot has been iced over. That's ok as long as people walk between vehicles and have something to hold onto. But once they have to traverse the big open space between front row and the big berm in front of the lodge it's a slip and slide fest with kids and equipment flying any which way. It would be great if we had gravel not just for the car traffic lanes but also the loading area.

Dayforce. When no work is available can you change the color of the day from blue to, say, red on the opening screen that reads Next Scheduled Shift, and the Calendar page for the day that no work is available, and the Scheduled Shift window. I find it a pain and occasionally forget to click through two screens and a scroll to check work status. Or, alternatively have DF push message an alert to SMS. There should be a macro for that.

Why did we install benches in the lobby of Sahale? All that did is put extra work on employees to keep guests from lounging there!

And can we put a reminder on the conditions page that the buildings do not open before 7:30am? Even if you have to potty.... the buildings are closed. please?

and maybe we take photos of guests wearing proper masks and post those on the website or blog? Everyone likes to see their photos.....maybe that would encourage good mask wearing? Just a random thought

I want to start off by thanking you for taking the time out of your busy schedule to read this. I think it is safe to say that the entire Mt. Hood meadows team works really hard to ensure that all guests have a great visit. In fact, a lot of employees often go the extra mile to ensure that the guests needs are met and that they leave feeling happier than when they first got to the resort.

As presidents day slowly approaches, the employees food discount is slowly beginning to teetertot back the original employee discount. The employees will thus have to spend more money to get the same amount of food they have grown accustomed to. With colder weather coming just over the horizon and more money being taken from the employees spending budget, I am worried about the mental health of my fellow colleagues. A common symptom of poor mental health is separation from friends and family. In years past employees would often take advantage of the PNW resort passes that would allow them to try out other resorts in the region. However, being that we are combating a pandemic the idea of opening up the pass to far off resorts is far fetched. A fantastic way to combat this mental health crisis would be giving more buddy vouchers to the employees. The company would still make money and the employees would be able to mentally escape from the day-to-day operations with close friends/family. If the employees are happy, everyone is happy.

I hope you take the time to think over giving the employees more vouchers. Such a small gesture can often go a long way.

People are not getting sick from COVID by going skiing. Please open up the Mountain Exchange program. This is a primary benefit for employees and one of the main reasons I like working at Meadows. Thank you!

Breakfast sandwiches all day in the cold cases at Sahale grill or Wildflowers that can be microwaved. Higher grounds has them, but they aren’t open many days.

Thank you for focusing on employee well being.

It's been a great season so far. I hope it will continue to be so and we stay open. I am loving it. It's kinda weird to say this but there has been a number of positive changes this year because of COVID in regards to MLC. I do hope that we can and will continue to keep these positive changes in the future. Here are few notable ones.

1) New employee lounge is a huge success: With the number of instructors + other employees, we definitely need that much space with or without covid if I have to be quite honest. There was never enough space in the basement. We had to squeeze in the lounge or just squeeze in with other guests in the restaurant sitting area while trying hard to hide the green jacket. 🙂

2) Morning lesson time of 9:30 AM: This is a great change and I hope we keep it the same going forward. Previously the lesson used to start @ 10 and the late starters would run well into 12:30's leaving no lunchtime at all in order to make it to the 12:45 lineup. We now have 1.5 hours in between the shifts which is great. We now have some time to eat even if the lesson started and ended late.

3) Reservation system for lessons: This has been a huge success. It adds so much certainty to all the instructors before they even show up in the mountain. I hope we can keep this reservation system and cutoff time. This will save our gas money by avoiding the trip to the mountain. I know non of the MLC instructors are doing this job for the money. It's our pure passion. My only expectation is that the money we make covers the gas of my truck and I at least break even. If we don't get lessons, we are in the negative. Hence I would love if we can keep the reservation system and cutoff time intact for next season too.

Thank you

Better Covid regulations

Happy to be working here.
I thought that the virtual company meeting was great. We could hear every word, the beverage line was really short, the food was great, (Please note that the food is always great) now that it has been done once it should be easy to repeat, cost-effective, no hydrocarbons burned (many electrons were inconvenienced though).
Only downside...not visiting with good friends as per usual.

Off and on this season, I have gotten to the bottom of MHX to find a large pile of snow right in the middle of the path that patrollers usually take to onto the chairlift from the South side of the ramp. I assume the groomers push the snow there for lift ops to use for ramp maintenance, with is fine most of the time . . . except when one of us patrollers has to lap load a toboggan on the chair.

Flipping 65-pound plus toboggans onto our thighs and skating onto the load ramp is already one of the more cumbersome, unpleasant and potentially back-tweaky parts of our job, and the pile of snow in the middle of our point of entry onto the ramp makes the whole ordeal about twice as hard.

Can this pile of snow move, please?

I feel safe at work. People are following the protocols required. I feel supported by management and coworkers both.

The Sandy 12:25 bus driver left before the scheduled time, leaving two of us stranded. We tried to catch the bus in a few stops and arrived at thriftway before the bus was scheduled to arrive and it had already passed the stop. Despite notifying transportation that there are people who were left behind and asking them to inform the bus driver and wait at the next stop, the bus never waited. I called twice - once at the sandy stop and again at the thriftway stop. I arrived at the thriftway stop at 12:48, a full two minutes before the bus is scheduled to depart (12:50) and it was no where in sight. When I called guest services to contact the transportation manager, Ben responded that he has asked the driver to wait at the rhododendron stop. The bus had already left by the time I drove there. Speaking with other people this has happened multiple times. This is extremely frustrating because the bus driver’s sole job is to get people to Meadows reliably; leaving before scheduled departure time is unprofessional and not team-oriented. Please address this issue with the Sandy afternoon bus driver.

I'm only a seasonal employee for the lift maintenance team. Seems like every year we are dealing with alot of the same issues. Faulty electrical panels/ breakers. Not only an electrical fire issue but also risk shock and death. These panels are alot of times outside in our harsh Meadows environment therefore they need a little more attention periodically. Over time water,snow,ice and wind beat these things up pretty bad. Our team works through the issues but it's stressful and frustrating for our manager,supervisors and crew.

Thank you management and team for doing the best you can during this difficult season. It's my first year teaching, but so far I feel like a part of the family. Have worked several jobs through a variety of industries and very few come close to delivering the kind of supportive and personable experience you do.

I personally love Mt Hood Meadows. 

It is truly an enriching job, instructing students young and old how to ski. The feeling of fulfillment and accomplishment of seeing seeing make their first turn is something that sticks with u for days and weeks afterwards. 

I feel like, after reading the comments, the majority of which are negative., Mr Drakes reply was appropriate.

If you don't like it, or have such extreme issues, GET OFF THE BUS!! There are millions of people who would love to instructor students, and enrich the lives of others. 

GREAT JOB TO ALL MANAGEMENT, SUPERVISORS, AND TEAM MEMBERS FOR MAKJNG THIS SEASON POSSIBLE!

Though the message Mathew replied to was a bit accusatory and mildly harsh, it's obvious this person is venting their frustration.

To "fill in the blank" i would go with: unempathetic and childish

I expect more from a leader.

For several weeks I have inquired about our future plans regarding electric vehicles for transportation. There has been no response yet.
Regarding our Patrol, this year appears to be very strong. People are covering for others who are reacting to their 2nd covid shots. I am particularly grateful to be able to work outside instead of indoors even on windy days.

Please we need more healthy food options! We miss fresh tracks. I suggest fresh salads, wraps, rice bowls, fresh veggies!! Wellness is a core value. Prove it meadows!!!

More working clocks at lifts. Also a sign letting guest know that buttercup is our beginner lift where Daisy, Mt Hood Express, Stadium our Intermediate lifts. It would be great to have a information board digital telling guests what lifts are open at the base maybe above the ticket booth. I have guests telling me that they saw on the website video all the restaurants available to eat at while Shahale is the only place to buy lunch. Personally I think the food at Shahale is better than the shush.
The groomers and the parks are the best I’ve skied at Meadows great Job Park crew and Grooming!!!

I’m very appreciative of MLC offering weekly virtual movement analysis clinics on Monday evenings. This virtual coaching increases access for those that have not been able to attend in person MA in Hood River or Portland. THANK YOU!

-Would it be possible to get a new/functioning toaster for bagels? Bagels taking a while to toast has been an issue for several seasons, and I struggle to understand why it takes so much longer than in the cheap toasters most of us have at home.

-It would be awesome to see bagels/smoothies available somewhere during the week with Fresh tracks closed this season and Higher Grounds not open m-th.

-It also seems like breakfast could be served later at the grill-maybe until 11? I've gone up multiple times at the very end of the breakfast time range to be one of several people turned away for breakfast as a bunch of hamburger patties were just thrown on the grill. This seems more notable on weekdays when there aren't other light non-packaged food options.

Each of the changes this year make the experience of instructor & instructee better. Online signups, 24 hour notice, smaller class size- should be permanent.

Additional Customer Service Training for parking lot crew.

Having a great season!

So once again I bring up the road to admin and no response from our management team. I’m tired of having to get my alignment done every 3-4 months and recently have my u joints replaced because of this road. It’s hard to see the craters in the road at 5am. Is there any fix that’s planned or hoped for?

So once again I bring up the road to admin and no response from our management team. I’m tired of having to get my alignment done every 3-4 months and recently have my u joints replaced because of this road. It’s hard to see the craters in the road at 5am. Is there any fix that’s planned or hoped for?

As employee's we are all charged with following and enforcing our COVID-19 Mask Policy. I have seen the morale starting to drop somewhat in many departments, as only dealing with violations can wear on you. If we could empower employees with the ability to reward and or re-enforce those guests who are making the efforts to follow our policy, morale will improve. Something like being able to give guests some sort of discount vouchers, stickers, anything really. I feel once word spread we were rewarding positive behavior it may also lesson the burden on already over worked team members!

If lift ops would help enforce masks up! Hand out mask to propel that don’t have one. Even small children they need to wear a mask too age doesn’t matter!!

Great lift ops crew. Wife and I were free skiing this week. Wonderful lift crew remembered us each time we lapped thru. Really nice to see a smile in someone’s eyes! Thank you.

In the mornings before I start my shift I always look through the sky bridge and take a look at the lifts and there is NO 6 feet apart at all when customers are in line for a lift. So if we get a Covid outbreak you know why.

Please we need more healthy food options! We miss fresh tracks. I suggest fresh salads, wraps, rice bowls, fresh veggies!! Wellness is a core value. Prove it meadows!!!

Loving working here! Great environment! One suggestion I have is regarding the parking lot, I often have trouble finding my car (mostly on busy days). Maybe putting numbers at the end of each row or colored flags etc to know which row you are parked in.

Continue to make the website more user friendly for the nordic skiers; and thank you for staying on top of the porta pottie situation in the HRM parking lot!

It would be great if we could see other departments enforcing the mask policies as well. We’ve been instructed to put comments on guest pass profiles for mask warnings, but I don’t see any other department taking the same steps to enforce these rules. The stress this puts on the lift operations department is beginning to take its toll on our employees. We see the majority of these issues, yet we constantly see other departments walking around not bothering to take charge of areas other than their immediate work areas. Not enforcing it in the base areas, near the ski school staging areas, the decks, etc.
we need everyone on board. Partial enforcement is not going to keep us open.
Better enforcement of these policies in our base areas will take a huge load off of the operators, as people will often make it all the way to the lift before someone has given them a mask warning. The entire team needs to work together on this.

I put money down on accommodations to take advantage of our Mtn Exchange and it gets put on hold right before my trip. I understand Covid issues were the reason but Meadows could have enforced employee quarantine after travel instead of cutting a major benefit totally. The reason I'm pissed is that I went on the trip (with mask!) and met several Meadows Passholders there using the tickets to the other area included with their pass with no problem. So it seems Meadows cares less about their employees than they do for season passholders. Maybe you'll say you can't restrict them after the pass is sold, but you could've easily tracked employee Exchange trips and insisted on quarantine upon return instead of cutting benefit completely. Bad mngmt decision, cost me a lot more than planned.

I love Meadows and the low rating isn’t a reflection of the company. COVID and everything that’s come with it have just turned life and work into a 3 right now. Here’s looking to brighter days on the horizon. Thanks to everyone who’s been working so hard to make this season possible, to everyone who’s worn their mask and made sacrifices that have helped to keep us and our families healthy. Shout out to the departments who are working so hard behind the scenes but often don’t get the recognition that our guest facing teams do. We couldn’t do any of this without you (you know who you are). And shout out to guest facing teams. You all are killing it! Thankful to be wading through this pandemic with a bunch of great people in a beautiful place and hope we can take the waders off soon.

I’ve had a great time teaching snowboarding and greeting/working rental check in the times I’ve worked em this week!

Clock in the Wheel Bar logo on the new lodge. It would be nice to just glance and see a clock like when on the lifts. Also, a clock above the MHM Trail Map this again would be good to see especially to help people time out there day who have to go to the lower HRM parking lot.

I appreciate what the Ride/Ski School staff has done to support the Covid effort to keep the resort successfully operational. And management too, they’ve done alright.

So are we going to try and fix admin road this summer, or are we going to let us play Mario cart every morning? Just curious because it’s a little ridiculous.

Love sharing this passion with others!! I have had some of the best lessons ever this season!! Yahoo!!