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Show V 1 V" V ' " v" r m THE PARK RECORD www.parkrecord.com WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1999 .Business. B-ll BUSINESS EDITOR: Bruce Lewis 649-9014 ext 1 13 3 A ds Hop io Opening curtain Chip Shots lira IPaD ,1 by Bruc Lewi OF THE RECORD STAFF Let the shopping games begin! I just dont get it. It's probably a guy thing. I mean, this fascination with shopping shop-ping is completely puzzling to me. Going to work Friday morning the day after Thanksgiving, the biggest shopping day of the year I see people lined-up outside stores before 8 a.m. Less than an hour later it's like a scene from "Jaws," as autos prowl the lots in search of a parking space. Like huge predators prowling the ocean's surface, cars follow package-laden shoppers down the aisles, ready to pounce as soon as the trunk opened, the packages disappeared and backup lights appeared. My wife saw a television commercial commer-cial the other night, talking about "hunting for bargains." "You see?" she said. "Women are hunters, too." No. Sorry, Dear, I think it may be the difference between hunters and gatherers it's in the basic make-up of each sex. You just cant quite match the single-minded purpose of a man on the hunt in the retail jungle. The scenario's the same whether it's that gallon of milk or that loaf of bread you asked us to pick up on the way home: Both the dairy and bakery departments depart-ments in the average grocery store are at the furthest points away from the entrance the marketers tell us that is so our senses can be assaulted for the length of the store, trying to trigger that impiilse-buyjng gene,.., , ,, , . ",. Men are deficient in possessing that gene; or, at least, a lot of men are. we enter the store, go to the thing we are going to buy; come back to the register, pay for it, and leave. It's the hunting thing: in and out, quick and sweet a surgical strike. Having the gathering gene in their chromosonal chain, women in the same situation will return to the regis ter with several items more than what was on the list. And it's worse if a child is involved. Especially if the parent makes the mis take of taking the kid down the candy aisle or the cereal aisle. . I defy a parent to take a normal, healthy five-year-old down the cereal aisle (no mind-altering drugs, please!) and emerge on the other end without the kid clutching at least one box of something or other or screaming that he wasn't allowed to have a box of the flavor-of-the-day. That s for grocery stores. Hardware stores are a different matter for men... maybe they are our downfall. Send a man into a grocery store tor one item and he returns to the car with that one item, usually in only a minute or so more time than the check-out line is long. Send a man into a hardware store and you might not see him for hours. Send mm in tor a tube ot caulk and he returns perhaps hours later with a new power drill, replacement down spouts for the house, concrete Please see Hunters vs. gatherers, B-12 Where Can You Own Cheaper Than Renting? Park City is a great place to live and it comes at a price. Anyone lucky enough or smart enough to have bought a home or condo here and has had it for more than a few years, is probably sitting on some nice equity that was driven by a hot market. mar-ket. Things are a little different now. Even though the Park City Board of Realtors is poised to post another very good year of sales volume, vol-ume, resale properties have slowed with a recent downward trend. This is possibly due to the fact that many of these properties are showing signs of age and thus not competitive with brand new properties. It is presenting some new opportunities for ownership. Until recently the lowest priced 1 bdrm condo available in Park City had a selling price of $75,000. With resale properties moving a little sloW some sellers get motivated. In this case there is a 1 bedroom condo inside the city limits with the asking price reduced to $70,000. Eric Miller at Pinnacle Mortgage has 95 financing for qualified buyers that makes, ownership possible with only $3500 down. The monthly payment for principal and interest would be $546. for 30 years with an APR of 9. 1 . Want to get out of the rental drain? Contact Tom Ward of Jess Reid Real Estate at 800 647-3727 or wardusa.neL There's more to starting-up a ski area than Just showing up and turning on the lifts, as this action photo taken last week at Deer Valley Resort's Silver Lake area shows. Communications cables must be Installed, as Tyson Thomas Is doing In the foreground for the newly upgraded Homestake chair-llft. chair-llft. The lift must also be load-tested to ensure it can handle the anticipated antici-pated load of skiers. Deer Valley fills large trash cans with water to simulate the load; several can be seen at the right. Further In the background, workers assemble chairs which will be attached to the newly upgraded Silver Lake Express. Evidence of the snowmakers' art can be seen drifting Into the photo from the left. Deer Valley recently reconfirmed recon-firmed Its scheduled Dec. 4 opening open-ing date. BRUCE LEWISRAflK RECORD Room at the inn: groups look for Olympic lodging Owners' horizon not out to February 2002 by Bruce Lewis OF THE RECORD STAFF Kelly Miller has a request for 60 lodging rooms a night for a three-week period. "It's really a no-brainer request. There is no food and beverage involved, no meeting meet-ing facilities just the sleeping rooms said the Park City ChamberBureau's manager man-ager of corporate sales. "This is an easy piece of business for 1,260 room-nights." The problem is. Miller said, is that the request is for Feb. 8 - 24, 2002, during the Winter Olympic Games, and Miller cant find anyone willing to commit that number of rooms this far out. The company seeking the rooms will use them as incentives and to entertain clients. The phone isn't exactly ringing off the hook yet Miller has fielded three such calls so far but she is concerned that groups who dont receive an immediate response from Park City lodging operations opera-tions will find their rooms elsewhere. "I am aware that there are companies and groups out there, calling around to property managers, trying to cut deals on StOCk PGrformanCG Data for con?Panies Name 1129 1126 Name 1129 1126 Name 1129 1128 Name 1129 1126 ALPNET 2.13 2.06 DAWTECH .56 .63 FRNKCOVEY 7.44 7.38 MERKTMED 6.75 6.38 AMERSKI 4.00 3.94 DELTAAIR 48.63 49.88 GENVSTL .34 .34 MITYLITE 17.38 16.13 ALBERTSON 35.75 36.44 DIGICOUR 7.66 8.19 GENTNER 12.19 13.19 NATRSUN 8.75 8.25 ANESTACP 14.25 13.88 DYNATEC 1.00 1.00 ILINK 3.00 2.63 NOVELL 20.69 21.06 KIMBERLYCLK 65.38 66.25 DYNATRON .78 .81 INTLAUTS 1.53 1.53 NUSKIN 11.75 11.88 BAXTER 67.94 67.50 EFIELEC 1.00 1.00 IOMED 3.75 4.00 NUTRACEUT 4.31 4.38 BIMUNE NEW .88 .88 EQUITYOL 1.06 1.31 IOMEGACP 4.00 3.75 QUESTAR 17.06 16.44 CROWNENG .44 .38 EVANSSUT 12.88 13.50 JPREALTY 17.00 17.06 SOSSTAFF 4.75 4 63 CORDANT 28.44 29.06 FXENER 2.91 2.97 KROGER 22.94 23.13 SIMONTRK 5.25 5.25 COVOLTEC 1.06 1.25 FIRSECCP 26.94 27.38 LARDAVIS 12.13 10.38 SKYWEST 25.19 26.25 CYCL03PS .15 .15 . FLEXSENSOR 4.00 4.00 MARKERIN .46 .42 SOWSTAIR 16.44 16 25 This Utah stock You arc ill 1 - , i VMS II If , --5ILrJ Vs. tUi 4; ' 1 ' rooms for the Olympics," said Vicki Gabe, Marketing director for Resort Property Management, adding that she has been contacted by more than one such group. The problem, Gabe says, is that not many owners of condominiums have committed-cither Way-i-to the 17-day period " 'dUrihg the12002"Winter Olympic .Games. ' Hotels in Park City arent an alternative for groups or individuals seeking a place to stay during that period, Miller explained, since 80 percent of the local rooms have already been put under contract by the Salt Lake Organizing Committee (SLOC). The other 20 percent are being held by the hotels to comply with most chains' requirements require-ments to have a portion of rooms available for chain-level reservation booking. "We arent even talking with the full-service full-service hotels at this point. We know they are booked solid," Miller said, adding that she is working with ski-visitor-oriented condo operations for the first time as a corporate cor-porate sales person. J.F. Lanvers, Marketing manager with East West Resorts' Park City operation, says that 2002 isnt even on the typical con-Please con-Please see Groups seek, B-13 report is provided by Derrell Reeves of FINE ART CordkJv livitcd fo attend the Opening Reception for OIL PAINTING IN THE ROUND An Exhibition of Uiiquc Gourd Paiiting Please Joh us For Opening Reception Frklav. December 3. 1999 530 to &30 m Artist wl be present This ExhMion Continues Unti DcccmbCT 17th ..... -, . I ' If t l . 1 i Snowboarding makes gains in popularity at U.S. resorts Numbers forecast to stabilize in next five years by Bruce Lewis OF THE RECORD STAFF Snowboarders' numbers continue to increase at U.S. resorts which allow their Eresence, according to a survey conducted y SNOWboarding Business magazine and the National Ski Areas Association, and the sport is generally responsible for softening the financial blow of declining alpine skier participation. Surprising, however, is a forecast that the number of snowboarders will stabilize in most areas of the U.S. within the next five years. The End-Of-Season Resort Survey was sent to 509 resorts and 151 responded to the survey, giving a 30-perccnt response rate. Locally, only Park City Mountain Resort, Snowbird, Sundance and Brighton responded. respond-ed. Overall, responding resorts represent more than 44 percent of the country's skier visits, since larger resorts were more likely to respond. Resorts report that, on average, 27.1 percent per-cent of their 1998-99 season visitors were snowboarders. During the 1997-98 season, 22.1 percent of visitors snowboarded, a 22.6- f interest to Utah investors, November 26 - 29, 1 999 Paulson Investment Co., Park City. A Perfect Way to Start Your Day "The Best Breakfast in Park City" the Mountain Times If wu mm . ... -m T percent increase. Last year numbers were 41.8 percent higher when compared to the 1996-97 survey. The Pacific West region reflected the largest growth percentage. Of the 509 resorts in the United States, only six continue to maintain a no-snow-boarder policy, including Deer Valley and Alta locally. Also continuing to prohibit snowboarders are Aspen Mountain in Colorado; Mad River Glen in Vermont; Perfect North Slopes in Indiana and Taos Ski Valley in New Mexico, An additional three percent of the resorts responding to the survey have restrictions on when or where snowboarders can ride. Generally, these take the form of restricting snowboarders from a few of the resort's runs. "Snowboarding is allowed on all of the mountain except two runs," replied one resort. Snowboarders are becoming a greater percentage per-centage of resort visitors The Pacific West continued to lead the way in the percentage of snowboarders compared to skiers, but every region showed growth compared to last year. Projected number of snowboarders holding steady Responding resorts predicted that, in five years, 34 percent of their visitors will be Please see Snowboarders, B-13 kWltaMlMsl Name utdpkmin UTAHMED WEIDERNUT ZIONBKCP 1129 29.25 6.75 3.31 61.81 1126 29.38 6.81 3.13 62.88 f Dow Jones Averages 30 INDUS 10,947.02 11,008.17 20 TRANS 2,900.19 2,923.93 15 UTILS 276.94 283.20 (F aWAOINI CAFE 'BAKERY Serving Breakfast & Lunch Breakfast 7am - 1 1am Lunch 1 1:30 - 2:30 pm Mon. thru Fri. 1782 Prospector Ave 649-6478 wwwXldproperty.coa ropv |