Pool Sci Italia, a consortium that represents ski equipment producers making up 90 percent of the Italian market, presented its sell-in results for the 2007-08 ski season at the Skipass show in Modena a week ago. The season was a big blow to producers, as the previous one had been too warm and snow in Italy had been scarce. As a result retailers found themselves with large quantities of unsold merchandise. This, in turn, led them to make significantly lower reorders for the 2007-08 season, following also a general slowdown of consumption over the previous years.
Pool Sci Italia’s members delivered just 220,178 pairs of skis, 220,806 pairs of bindings and 232,331 pairs of boots in 2007-08. This represented declines in quantities of 33 percent, 30 percent and 26 percent respectively. The total sell-in revenues before VAT from all these categories were down to €64,388,348 from €89,856,527, a drop of about 28 percent.
The average sell-in prices of these three product categories remained more or less stable. The mean price for skis had a minor decrease, going from €142.78 to €140.26. Bindings’ prices were slightly higher than for the previous collection, up to €57.82 from €52.40, while boots’ mean value remained flat at about €84.
Pool Sci Italia is optimistic about the next season and the future, even if at the moment it seems there won’t be a substantial change in the quantities of deliveries for the present season. Ski equipment producers and retailers, who strongly depend on weather conditions and snowfall, already have to deal with slowly decreasing Italian participation levels on the slopes. But the new season will be an even bigger challenge for them, as the consequences of the economic crisis of 2008 on those who practice winter sports and on consumers in general are still uncertain.
