Podcast #225: Waterville Valley President & GM Tim Smith

WhoTim Smith, President and General Manager of Waterville Valley, New HampshireRecorded onNovember 12, 2025About Waterville ValleyClick here for a mountain stats overviewOwned by: The Sununu FamilyLocated in: Waterville Valley, New HampshireYear founded: 1966Pass affiliations:* Indy Pass, Indy+ Pass: 2 days, no blackouts* White Mountain Super Pass: unlimited, no blackouts* Indy Learn-to-Turn: 3 days, includes rentals, lesson, lift ticket; limited lift access* Ski New Hampshire Kids Passport: 1 day with holiday blackouts* Uphill New England: no lift accessBase elevation: 1,984 feet (highest in New Hampshire, 3rd in New England)Summit elevation: 4,004 feet (2nd-highest in New Hampshire, 5th in New England)Vertical drop: 2,020 feet (4th-highest in New Hampshire, 14th in New England)Skiable acres: 265Average annual snowfall: 148 inchesTrail count: 62 (14% novice, 64% intermediate, 22% advanced)Lift count: 10 (1 six-pack, 1 high-speed quad, 2 triples, 2 doubles, 2 T-bars, 2 carpets)Why I interviewed himWell no one wants to hear this but we got to $300 lift tickets the same way we got to $80,000 pickup trucks. We’re Americans Goddamnit and we just can’t do stickshifts and we sure as s**t ain’t standin’ up on our skis to ride back up the mountain. It’s pure agony you see. We need us a nine-pack chairlift with a bubble and a breakroom and a minibar and surround sound and Lazy-Boy seats and hell no we ain’t ridin’ it with eight strangers we’ll hold back and take a whole chair to our ownselves. And it needs to move fast, Son. Like embarrass-the-Concord fast because God help us we spend more than 90 seconds with our own thoughts.I’m not aiming to get kicked out of America here, but if I may submit a few requests regarding our self-inflicted false price floors. I would like the option of purchasing a brand-new car with a manual transmission and windows rolled up and down with a hand-crank. I would like to keep pedaling my bicycle. I would like to cut the number of holidays with commercial mandates by 80 percent. I would prefer that we not set the air-conditioners to 60 when it’s 65 degrees outside. This doesn’t mean I want to get rid of all the air-conditioners but could we maybe take it easy on the frostbite-in-July overkill of it all?My Heretic Wishlist for American Skiing includes but is not limited to: more surface lifts, especially to serve terrain parks, high-altitude exposed terrain, and expert pods; on-resort lodging that does not still require a commute-by-personal-vehicle to reach the lifts; and thoughtful terrain management that retains ungroomed sections for skiers who like things about skiing other than going fast.Waterville Valley is doing all of these things. It is perhaps the only major American ski area in decades to replace a chairlift with a surface lift on a non-beginner terrain pod, and the only one to build two new T-bars this century. A planned gondola would connect Waterville Valley the town with Waterville Valley the ski area, correcting an only-in-America setup that separates these inseparable places by two miles of road. The glade network grows annually in both subtle and obvious ways.This is not a ski area going in reverse. Waterville is modern and keeps modernizing. The four-year-old Tecumseh bubble six-pack, though bookended with T-bars, is one of the nicest chairlifts in America. Skiers still go groomer-kaboom on morning cord. Suburban office-park dads with interstate commutes and a habit of lecturing the Facebook Commons about the virtues of snow tires can still park their 42-wheel-drive Abrams-Caterpillar-F-15,000 Tanktruck in sub-parking lot 42Z and walk uphill to the lifts. But Waterville Valley is one of a handful of American ski areas, along with Killington and <a target="_blan