The ski town versus ski city spat is over.
Steamboat ski area — aka “Ski Town USA” — and Salt Lake City’s tourism bureau have settled
Visit Salt Lake, which in September joined four nearby ski areas in an urban-focused, touting the city’s proximity to skiing, has revised its national Ski City USA advertising “in a manner acceptable to all parties,” according to a statement released Friday.
Steamboat resort and the Steamboat Springs Winter Sports Club filed in Denver in October, arguing the Utah capital’s tourist-trawling push piggybacked Steamboat’s 55-year-old Ski Town USA brand.
“They are attempting to leverage our brand and our brand equity” Steamboat’s marketing chief Rob Perlman said last month.
Visit Salt Lake argued the new campaign actually spotlights the differences between the urban and rural ski experience.
“Just as each ski town has its individual traits and attributes, Ski City USA is unique. Ski City USA provides a distinct alternative to the ski town experience,” read a statement from Visit Salt Lake last month.
The city’s campaign emerged after a Utah Office of Tourism poll found more than half of survey respondents said they saw Denver when shown photos of Salt Lake City’s peak-hemmed skyline.
Eight of Utah’s 15 ski areas are within an hour’s drive from Salt Lake City. The state hosted 4.1 million skier visits last season, the state’s third-highest showing.
Visits to Colorado’s 25 ski areas jumped 10.5 percent in the 2013-14 season — the highest ever percentage gain — to set a record of 12.6 million skier visits. Utah’s visits climbed only 2.5 percent in the same period. The average annual growth in visitation for all U.S. ski areas in the Rocky Mountains was 6.6 percent in 2013-14, according to the .
The new Utah campaign was designed to entice skiers away from Colorado with a one-of-a-kind urban ski experience. The mixed clips of hoisted beers and boozy nightlife with powder shots and lonely slopes.
Details are the settlement were not released, only the vague promise of advertising adjustment. Steamboat’s lawsuit, which targeted resorts Brighton, Solitude, Snowbird and Alta as well as the tourism bureau, has been dismissed.
Perlman said he appreciated Visit Salt Lake’s swift response to the lawsuit.
“We went into it trying to protect our marks and it’s a small industry and we worked closely with Visit Salt Lake to reach this agreement,” he said.
Steamboat ski area over the years has sent “dozens” of cease-and-desist letters to individuals and groups who were infringing on the resort’s venerable Ski Town USA moniker, Perlman said. This was the first time the resort filed a complaint in federal court.
Visit Salt Lake chief Scott Beck said in a statement that his campaign will continue to highlight the distinct urban ski experience with an emphasis on restaurants, sports teams, cultural offerings and a variety of hotels. But the campaign will be tweaked to differentiate the city and from the town.
“Visit Salt Lake recognizes that towns like Steamboat Springs are iconic in what they offer to winter enthusiasts and is pleased to reach an agreement on this matter to further distinguish these two unique locations,” Beck said.
As of Friday morning, the tourism bureau’s beery, powdery “Ski City USA” video had been “slightly edited, updated,” Visit Salt Lake spokesman Shawn Stinson said. Also absent was the campaign’s tagline “Once you’ve stayed in Ski City, you’ll never stay in a ski town.”
“They have already revised their campaign,” Perlman said.
Jason Blevins: 303-954-1374, jblevins@denverpost.com or twitter.com/jasonblevins
