The second annual Snow Industry Summit, presented by SIA, TransWorld Media and Mountain Sports Media, kicked off Tuesday evening with a bevy of industry veterans on hand. A welcome reception, sponsored by Intrawest Corporation and Copper Mountain, jump started the evening followed by a keynote presentation by Frank Prince, president of Unleash Your Mind and a movie trailer for First Descent courtesy of Pepsi-Cola, Co.

Over 200 people from the snow sports industry are in attendance for the Summit, the optimal event to welcome all factions of the industry together to learn, network and log some final slope time. Mother Nature has continued to be quite friendly to the Colorado Mountains with continuous snowfall making for some great spring skiing/riding conditions.

Prince provided attendees helpful hints on how to better understand customer buying patterns utilizing three key stimuli including auditory, visual and kinesiology. He explained that people in general provide cues as to what motivates them to buy. If they request verbal information about product, they are auditory driven; if they want to see the product in full detail, they are visually driven; and if they want to examine features of the product and what it provides, they are driven by feel and touch (kinesiology). The evening capped off with the movie trailer, presented by John Galloway, vice president sports and media for Pepsi-Cola, Co. The movie in its entirety will depict the story of the snowboarding revolution in a documentary format. Filming is currently underway, and a Fall 2005 release is scheduled. Following the movie preview was a party sponsored by the movie, First Descent and Pepsi-Cola, Co.

On tap for the first full day of the Summit are educational sessions on diversity in the snow sports market which will speak to examining practices to diversify the snow sports industry; Target Marketing and the “More Factor”; What Drives Customers Decisions; Grassroots Marketing & Guerilla Tactics; Harnessing the Power of the Active Adult Population; culminating with a keynote presentation by Glen Hiemstra, founder of Futurist.com.