Tweaking Targhee
December 20th, 2009Posted in Skiing in the Tetons
Grand Targhee is a pretty small ski resort. You’d think it would be difficult to hide something important from the public at a small resort wouldn’t you? But for the past twenty years or so Targhee has managed to cram its only ski shop, yeah its only SKI SHOP!- at a ski resort!, into a small and narrow space almost completely hidden from view from the natural traffic patterns of its skiing visitors. If Targhee was a mall the location of its ski shop would be the last space to find a willing tenant and only then at a deeply discounted rent.
Finally this year, someone has seen the light and reconfigured the resort’s space allocations so now the ski shop is front and center and very obvious on the plaza as skiers arrive. It has also been expanded in size and has incorporated Targhee’s more gift oriented shop into its merchandise mix. The shop looks modern, spacious and inviting when one enters it. In the past one had to sidle through clothing racks in the front of the old narrow store and work slowly way back in the store to finally reach the ski gear. A half dozen shoppers made for a big crowd in the old store and business had to suffer because of the inefficient space and the poor location.
As someone who has had some involvement in various aspects of retailing for many years, Targhee’s approach to retailing has certainly had me mystified for years. They’ve always had pre-qualified customers, enthusiastic ones no less, with money in their pockets and they made it hard for them to spend on things they needed or wanted to buy.
Last year’s new offering of a kids only ski and clothing shop made me wonder if the new management was going to be any more adept at retailing than the old, but that shop has disappeared now and the new ski shop gives me hope that success is finally within their grasp. Kudos to the new Targhee team for their smart moves this summer. Their next challenge will be a harder one- making their food and beverage space allocations more logical and efficient. Kitchens don’t move easily!
How ironic it is that Targhee’s cramped and awkward retailing and food service environments were caused by the resort’s owner in the 1980’s and 90’s -and he was himself an architect. His design for the lodge created the problems and he won awards for the design! To his credit he had to come up with a design in a hurry after an arsonist burned down the existing base lodge, and he tried to be efficient by building on the footprint of the old structures, but he definitely sacrificed efficiency and a guest friendly design for a design that looked attractive and photographed well.
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