As good as can be expected - Ski Instructor Vail Resorts Employee Review

4.0
26 June 2015
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

Professional and customer focused with great working colleagues in the main. The work is seasonal and typical of any ski resort but they try hard within constraints of making money in a tough industry.

Cons

Pay is lousy and so the turnover reflects that. Old timers get priority for lessons and the middle management is patchy.

avatar
Vail Resorts Response
10y
We appreciate your feedback. We are glad that you enjoyed your season and would recommend working here! We often here that the people we work with everyday are what make our culture stand out. It’s amazing what an aligned passion can do to truly make where you work enjoyable. We announced this year, a $10.00 Vail Resorts Minimum Wage across all lines of business (retail, mountain, hospitality, transportation, etc.) across the eight states in which we operate to better the employee experience, starting with our entry level workers. This is a long-term plan that we believe will make a positive impact on retention. Within the past few seasons we have also launched a variety of development opportunities to help build our middle management staff. We know that one of the milestones we face as a large company is having as much of the employee experience as consistent as possible, which hinges on our managers being successful.

Explore other reviews about Vail Resorts

5.0
12 June 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

The managers were really cool and the work was fun. Pretty relaxed environment.

Cons

It was cold sometimes and long hours standing but that was all in the job description and we got jackets.

2.0
14 May 2026
Recommend
CEO approval
Business outlook

Pros

- Most people are smart, passionate, and enjoyable to work with and be around. - Fairly frequent opportunities for development and advancement through the internal job board. - Nice perks if you're into skiing or riding.

Cons

- There's an unspoken expectation to regularly work significantly more hours because the majority of employees are very passionate about the ski and ride industry, which isn't great for work life balance. There's not much down time either; you're either hustling in season or hustling to prepare for the next season. - Climate change poses a significant threat to the future of the company. The season pass model mitigates some of the impacts, but not as much as senior leadership asserts. And, since bonuses are tied to company results, you can end up working super hard all year and still end up getting half of your bonus target due to uncontrollable weather conditions. - The culture has taken a serious hit since enterprise transformation work began. Lots of people are constantly stressed out and the atmosphere in the office is depressing. - Most of the time, it feels like senior leadership makes decisions in a vacuum without consulting any of the people that would be responsible for the downstream work associated with the decision. For example, I've seen senior leaders decide on a savings target multiple times without consulting the experts, who then have to scramble to figure out how to make it work. It creates chaos and negatively impacts morale. - This organization has a wordsmithing problem. I've never worked at a company that spends such an inordinate amount of time on the framing of a message compared to the actual substance of the message.

4
See reviews by: Helpful|Rating|Date|All