Christy Sports, the Colorado retailer that has done the most in recent years to preserve the tradition of Labor Day ski and snowboard sales, will cut a different line this year by shifting those sales to a primarily online format.
For the past 13 years, Powder Daze lured Front Range skiers and snowboarders during the summer heat to its Littleton store, which would be crammed with last year’s skis, boards and boots at clearance prices. Powder Daze continued a Colorado skier ritual that began in the 1950s when Gart Bros. invented the Labor Day ski sale. Just last year, Christy’s director of brand marketing, Randy England, was touting an expanded Powder Daze at the Littleton store that was a combination winter gear kickoff sale and snow sports expo.
Not this year, though. The Littleton store and other Front Range Christy locations will have summer inventory on their floors — primarily, patio furniture — when Powder Daze begins Friday as an online ski and snowboard sale. Summer goods in Christy stores will be on sale for up to 50% off, while ski and snowboard gear online will be on sale for up to 60% off. A limited amount of last season’s ski gear will be available in Littleton and some Colorado mountain stores.
England is calling it an “End of Summer Event,” while hinting that in-store ski and snowboard sales are coming in October.
“We want to meet the guests where they are now, in season, and not try to anticipate what they may want on a promotional level in the off-season,” England said. “If we think back to the old days of the (Gart Bros.) Sports Castle downtown in Denver, and people standing around in 98-degree parking lots, it’s hard to get excited about putting on a ski jacket when you’re about to pass out.”
Rival Epic Mountain Gear will begin its Epic Drop sale on Friday, which marks a shift for the company. The past two years, Epic didn’t begin its ski and snowboard discount extravaganza until Labor Day weekend.
“We know what our friends next door are doing,” England said of Epic. “It’s great for them. I hope they’re wildly successful on that shift.”
Christy Sports, meanwhile, is focused on moving summer goods now and pushing ski sales closer to ski season.
“We loved our times in the legacy of what Gart started,” England said. “But we want to operate our business in-season and give our guests things they can use now. We’re happy to sell skis, we have them available year-round, but I’d rather get you excited about something you can walk out the door and use right away.”
England said the decision also is related to trends and marketing pressures in the outdoor industry as a whole following COVID.
“The outdoor industry saw a huge boom,” England said. “That boom did not continue, as booms generally do not, because consumers had gear and the industry was trying to catch up with supply-chain challenges to the point where there was a glut of inventory. In the last year or two, as you can see from all the big players, from REI to everybody else, everyone is making an adjustment to get back to a level baseline.”
For Christy, with 35 stores in four states, each store is focused on moving summer inventory, which varies in type depending on the region. In resort locations that can mean bikes or mountain apparel. In the Pacific Northwest, it’s gear related to water sports. In Denver it means patio furniture.
Epic Mountain Gear is offering discounts of up to 60% on skis, snowboards, bikes, accessories and apparel. The Epic Drop sale will run from Friday through Sept. 22. The purchase of any new bicycle from participating Epic Mountain Gear shops — excluding the Frisco store — entitles the buyer to free annual tune-ups with 25-point safety checks and standard adjustments.
Through Epic Mountain Gear’s Junior Trade program, parents can buy new or used gear for their kids during the Epic Drop sale at discounted prices. When their kids outgrow that set of gear, parents can trade it in for new gear and get a credit worth 50% of the original purchase price. Junior Trade prices will increase in October. Appointments are highly recommended.
