With snow on the way, representatives of Maine’s ski resorts said Thursday they are optimistic that pandemic-era interest in the sport will continue this winter season.

“Our pre-season numbers are tracking ahead of where they were a year ago, which is encouraging and exciting,” said P.J. McSparran, chief revenue officer for Saddleback Mountain in Rangeley. “Obviously natural snow in the forecast is going to set us up well for the season.”

Over at Sugarloaf in Carrabassett Valley, visitors returned to the mountain last year when COVID-19 restrictions eased, said Ethan Austin, marketing director of Sugarloaf.

“The ski industry was an unwitting beneficiary of the COVID situation,” he said during the monthly breakfast meeting of the Portland Regional Chamber of Commerce. “People were looking to get outside and skiing was one of the things they could do.”

Nationally, the ski industry grew from 462 to 473 ski areas last year, said Dirk Gouwens, executive director of the Ski Maine Association. 

In Maine, Saddleback is one of the areas that reopened two years ago after a five-year shut down.

McSparran said the improvements include $500,000 in work to the ski lodge, replacing or adding four lifts, and work on a mid-mountain lodge that should open this season. In addition, a workforce housing project is near completion.

Austin said at Sugarloaf, they are in the early stages of developing plans for 10-12 new trails over several years on the West Mountain for intermediate skiers.

And at Sunday River, which is owned by the same company as Sugarloaf, the mountain is getting ready to open an eight-person chair lift with heated seats.

“It’s a really cool time to be involved in the ski industry,” Austin said. “In the late 90s and early 2000s, the financial situation for a lot of resorts was a lot different. Now things are just moving so fast, there’s so much going on.”

One of the challenges is staffing, with Sugarloaf in need of about 900 workers during the ski season, Austin said. Last year, they got by with about 725 employees, but things have improved this year and they are “much closer to the fully staffed number.”

To address the workforce housing shortage, Sugarloaf purchased the Herbert Hotel in Kingfield, which will house 40-60 seasonal staff when renovations are completed, he said.

Gouwens said the Ski Maine Mountain Pass, which gives entry to 18 ski areas across the state, is sold out for the season. He encouraged people to visit some of the state’s smaller ski areas.

He said Nordic skiing enjoyed a surge in popularity during the pandemic as well, and said the coming snowfall will help more trails open.

“Forecasts for this winter are for a snowy winter,” he said. “We’ve been waiting and waiting and waiting.”