Business Commentary and OutlookRobert Katz, chief executive officer, commented, “I am pleased with ourresults for fiscal 2008, which were achieved despite challenging early seasonconditions and overall deterioration in the macro-economic environment.Results for our seasonally low fourth quarter were as expected for our Resortbusiness, while our real estate results were impacted by a timing shift ofhaving one of The Lodge at Vail Chalets (’Chalets’) close in August, justafter our fiscal year-end, as opposed to in the fiscal fourth quarter. We setnew records for our fiscal 2008 Mountain, Resort and Real Estate revenue;Mountain, Resort and Real Estate Reported EBITDA and net income. Our Mountainsegment revenue for fiscal 2008 grew 3.0% on a ’same store’ basis withapproximately 64% of the ’same store’ revenue growth flowing through toMountain Reported EBITDA, driving a 100 basis point increase in MountainReported EBITDA margin to 32.2%. Our total skier visits were down 0.4% forthe season; however, excluding the early season period from the beginning ofthe ski season until December 23, 2007, our total skier visits were up 4.1%,including the impact of season passholders who skied on average 9.7 days overthe course of the season, up 0.4 days per passholder from the previous season.The favorable Mountain results were also driven by a 5.6% increase ineffective ticket price (’ETP’) and a 7.7% increase in season pass revenue.Twenty six percent of lift ticket revenue was derived from season passrevenue, which continues to provide stability to our Mountain revenue. Inaddition, our overall performance was positively impacted by an estimated 26%growth in international guest visitation. The growth in ETP, season passrevenue and international visitors mitigated the impact of the U.S. economicweakness we began to see in the second half of the season.”
