Laurent Vasilescu: Very helpful. Thank you for all the color.
Operator: Our next question comes from Jeff Stantial, Stifel.
Jeff Stantial: Kirsten and Angela, thanks for taking our questions. Starting off here, I was hoping just to follow up on Shaun’s question earlier. So, it sounds like two things really sort of driving that expansion in the spread between units and dollars, that’s new pass holders coming in and leaning into the higher-priced products as well as you’re now anniversarying the launch of the Epic Day Limited in the prior season. Focusing on that first cohort, I recognize you’re limited in the data available, but is there anything you can add or any sense you have regarding the complexion of kind of these new pass holders that seem to be leaning into the full pass? Are they coming from other passes? Were they previously lift ticket buyers? Just do you have any sort of sense on these customers and their sort of characteristics?
Kirsten Lynch: Thanks, Jeff. I think there’s a couple of dynamics to highlight overall, and then we can talk some more about the price pass-through. I mean I think important to note that we grew in destination, local and international and really importantly, that loyalty, which is renewals, were the driver of the growth, which is really critical — a critical part of our business model and great to see, because the loyalty and the renewals driving the growth is — really speaks to the strength and the compelling value proposition of the pass, but also the experience we deliver at our resorts. Another interesting dynamic we saw on the new side. So, when we think of new, it’s composed of a couple of different segments. It’s comprised of people that are lapsed pass holders, meaning they might have been pass holders last — prior years, five years ago, seven years ago, and they were not a pass holder yet last year and then coming back to us.
It also includes list ticket purchasers. And then it includes people who are brand new to our database and so have not actually shown up at any of our resorts in the past. And one really strong dynamic that we saw in addition to the loyalty and the renewals is very strong growth and return of prior pass holders, what I would call lapsed pass holders. So, these are people who were pass holders with us in the past, but not last year, and we’ve gained them back again, which, again, I think, speaks to the strength of our pass program and the experience at our resorts. So, I was really pleased to see that. In terms of the new pass holders and that — well, the price differential, we can talk about, I think the strength of renewals this year and the fact that we grew across all the product segments, including Epic and Epic Local, certainly helped the price pass-through and the net migration among our renewing pass holders improving year-over-year.
And just a reminder, net migration is defined as the — we measure that as the difference between trade up and trade down among our renewing pass holders. So, some of the dynamics — the growth of renewals, the dynamics within renewal certainly contributed. And then when you look at new pass holders coming into the program at higher price point relative to prior years, we’re always striving to trade people up, but also acquire guests into the pass products that is most suitable for them. And I’m really encouraged to see that we were able to get pass holders coming into higher-priced products. And as I noted, in Shaun’s question, important to note that we did have a new product launch last year that drove new acquisition late in the season because that is typically when new people come in late in the selling cycle.
And that was a product that was very specifically designed to increase our penetration in some of those eastern geographies as the access is spent very specifically to some of those local geographies. So, overall, when I look at the underlying dynamics, the health of the business, I’m very pleased as I think all of those kind of movements within the business, who’s renewing, who we’re acquiring are actually very strong indicators for the business.
Jeff Stantial: Great. That is both really helpful commentary as well as encouraging as it relates to forward indicators heading into the season. For my follow-up, I was hoping to turn to your commentary on lodging bookings, specifically just in the release, you used the term generally consistent with prior-year levels. I was hoping you might just expand upon a bit what was meant by sort of the term generally? Were you trying to refer to perhaps some geographic dispersion more so than what you typically see? Just any thoughts there? And if I’m reading into verbiage too much as well that’s fine as well, but any thoughts there would be helpful. Thanks.
Kirsten Lynch: Sure. I think it’s important, just as a reminder, our lodging bookings represent a small portion of the overall lodging inventory around our resorts. And we see variance by months, by geography. I would say, like overall, when I look at the bookings right now, here’s what I’m seeing at our properties is we’re seeing solid holiday and spring bookings and some softness in between holiday and spring break. And I would actually say also, it’s still relatively early, and we will continue to monitor this as we go into the season. Pass sales is a critical indicator. And overall, when I look at the lodging booking trends, yeah, generally consistent with prior-year levels with it looking pretty solid for holiday and spring. That’s for our lodging bookings.
Jeff Stantial: Okay, great. That’s really helpful. Thanks very much.
Kirsten Lynch: Okay. Thanks, Jeff.
Operator: Our next question comes from Matthew Boss, JPMorgan.
Matthew Boss: Great, thanks. So Kirsten, on maybe real-time customer behavior, any notable trends to call out on the ancillary front so far this ski season? And can you elaborate on the opportunity you see from My Epic Gear? And then, Angela, on the margin front, could you maybe just speak to the multi-year opportunity you see from the workforce management initiative?
Kirsten Lynch: So, real time on other ancillary businesses, Matthew, I would say it’s a bit too early to really have any indicators. So, lodging, I just gave an overview to Jeff on that. In terms of other ancillary sales or bookings, it’s a bit too early in the cycle. I think we’ll have more insights once we get further into the season. My Epic Gear, we are very excited about. It is just a pilot in this coming season, and we hope to learn a lot about the sort of logistical delivery of the guest experience. But when you think about gear as part of the ancillary business, and obviously, we have a very strong gear business, everyone needs gear to participate in this sport. There are a lot of people who ski and snowboard in North America.
