In the days following the biggest gift-giving day of the year, I’m reminded of a phrase I’ve heard time and again from an old friend. He liked to say, “Feedback is a gift.” And it truly is. Though we especially welcome positive feedback in the form of compliments and sentiments of thanks, constructive criticism is extremely valuable, and a way for us to take a hard look at what we can do better at Gunstock.

One way we proactively seek our guests’ feedback is through weekly email surveys. We send an email to skiers and riders who have visited Gunstock each week throughout the season. While guest satisfaction surveys have been around for decades, and can offer valuable information, Gunstock is most interested in measuring loyalty and the likelihood of our guests to recommend Gunstock to a friend or family member. 

Prior to the start of the winter season, Gunstock’s managers establish score goals for their teams. The scores are based on previous years’ performance and the average score of our competitive set factors into that goal too. The information we gather from our visitor surveys is assessed and analyzed each week. Scores are assigned to the responses we receive and reported to our managers on a regular basis so they can know how their teams are performing along the way – not just at the end of the season. These scores are called Net Promoter Scores, and we use them in many ways. We can identify areas where we can improve the experience for our guests through better guest service and infrastructure upgrades. We also use the scores to incentivize department managers as well as the staff as a whole.

So, when you receive an email inviting you to complete one of our surveys, we hope you’ll take the time to tell us about your experience. As a token of our gratitude for completing a survey, you will be entered to win two Winter Prime Season Passes for the 2024/2025 winter season.

Of course we love to receive comments the old-fashioned way too – via letters and emails. Here’s a feedback “gift” we received from a season passholder a few days ago:

“Wow, its 11:30 p.m. Friday night Dec 22, 2023, and I just checked the Webcams and the Snow conditions for Gunstock. It blew my mind how much work got done so there can be night skiing and tubing starting tomorrow Saturday and hopefully the weather will hold up through the Christmas break. Six chair lifts and 20 trails opening for Saturday and more to come. I just wanted to take this time to write, and please see Mr. Tom Day and his staff see this. You and your team Tom got this done with the worst Nov and Dec weather we could ever imagine occurring this time of the year. Hats off to you all and all of you should be proud of this Herculean effort.  Most of all thank-you all!”