Vail Resorts today released the second generation of its celebrated EpicMix, the innovative application that allows the resort operator’s guests to track their ski day and post their feats in online outlets like Facebook.
The newest iteration of EpicMix elevates the business of vacation photography by having on-mountain photographers scan guest passes and day tickets and automatically send action and still shots to guests’ EpicMix accounts.
“We want to totally reinvent, from the bottom up, what the vacation photo is all about,” said Rob Katz, chieftain of the six-hill Vail Resorts.
The professional photographs will be delivered to accounts free of charge and guests can buy higher resolution shots for printing.
The idea is that guests will then post their snowy vacation pictures to social media outlets like Facebook, which estimates users upload as many as 250 million photographs a day.
Vail is eliminating all paper tickets for the 2011-12 ski season. Hard cards – like any season pass – imbedded with radio frequency enabled chips will be scanned for lift access. Photographers on the mountain will ask skiers if they want to be photographed and will then scan the passes tucked into parka pockets. After the photographs go through a screening process, they will be uploaded into the EpicMix accounts of everyone scanned.
Last year Vail saw 15 percent of Epic Pass holders sign up for EpicMix, a high usage for a social media application. The program, which saw skiers harvesting pins and charting their vertical feet skied, churned out 300,000 posts on Facebook, creating some 30 million social impressions.
The new EpicMix, by including all Vail Resorts passholders and day ticket users, is expected to quadruple the number of people who can access the EpicMix program.
