Sugar Bowl Terminates Affiliation with Powder Alliance
According to its website, California’s Sugar Bowl has terminated its relationship with Powder Alliance, a reciprocal season pass program, for the 2021-22 season. The resort has published the following statement:
We're committed to offering the best possible experience to our own passholders and those who purchase a lift ticket at Sugar Bowl. Unfortunately, far too many passholders from other resorts were taking advantage of Sugar Bowl’s iconic terrain, meanwhile very few Sugar Bowl passholders have utilized the Powder Alliance benefits. For this reason, we have decided to discontinue the Powder Alliance program so that we can stay focused on providing an exceptional experience for our paid guests.
As a result of this decision, Sugar Bowl passholders will lose access to two days of skiing at 15 resorts in North America and Japan—and will have no partner benefits next season.
Our Take
When joining the Powder Alliance in the first place back in 2018, Sugar Bowl likely intended to use the new benefits to attract more people to purchase the pass. However, the resort’s message on usage suggests this effort was not ultimately successful. Given the high number of passholders from other Powder Alliance resorts visiting Sugar Bowl, we imagine the resort also experienced increased operational costs and frustration from paying guests over the increased crowds.
This is unfortunate news for those who planned to use their Powder Alliance-affiliated pass to ski a few days at Sugar Bowl. The pass-exchange program was most useful for swapping days with nearby Sierra-at-Tahoe, another Tahoe-area resort—and passholders from both resorts will lose out on a convenient partner next season. That being said, most Sugar Bowl passholders shouldn’t miss the other partner accesses, all of which were already too far away to make sense for a short trip.
Considering a trip to Sugar Bowl next winter? Read our comprehensive mountain review here. Additionally, check out our Lake Tahoe rankings.
