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Dog business is good business, especially for ski resorts and hotels that cater to pets and their owners. Though it’s difficult to find hard numbers that link pet-friendly policies to an increase in human visits, many dog-friendly resorts unequivocally state that being pet-friendly is a sought-after, and appreciated, amenity for a large pool of guests.

To see what being dog friendly entails from a ski-resort perspective, we did a little digging, and turned up a variety of examples. From a particularly dog-friendly resort community, to hotels that actively welcome dogs, to a ski area that even allows pups on the mountain, resorts have found that hosting the entire family, four legs and all, is nothing to sniff at.


IT TAKES A VILLAGE
To attract people and their pets, it helps to have community-wide support. Like many mountain towns, Whistler is dog friendly. But in terms of truly accommodating dogs, and promoting that to visitors, Whistler is off-the-charts a dog’s BFF. As Tourism Whistler boasts on its website—which devotes an entire section to dogs—“Whistler is not only pet-friendly, it’s dog crazy!”

More than half the hotels are pet friendly, and four local parks offer off-leash areas. The Whistler Olympic Park offers some 5 km of dog-friendly trails for cross-country skiers and snowshoers. Even Whistler’s signature springtime event, the World Ski and Snowboard Festival, plays its part: it includes Dogfest, with a huge parade, dog-agility demos, and contests. Proceeds benefit the local animal shelter.

“It comes very naturally to welcome guests with their dogs, because so many of our residents have them—it’s incorporated into our DNA,” says Fiona Famulak, president of the Whistler Chamber of Commerce.

Pups strolling with their owners through Whistler Village will encounter plenty of water bowls outside businesses, pet-friendly patio dining, and stores that dole out biscuits.

One of the resort’s dog-friendly hotels, the Coast Blackcomb Suites at Whistler, welcomes “mid-size” dogs in designated rooms for $25 extra per night, and has been doing so for 16 years.

“To actually pinpoint whether or not it grows our business is challenging,” admits general manager Camille Keep. Nonetheless, she’s a fan of allowing dogs. Keep says the majority of guests traveling with their dogs visit in summer, when upward of 20 percent of rooms will have dogs in them on a busy weekend. Though the hotel regularly evaluates its pet regulations, there have been no significant changes in recent years.

For hotel operators considering a pet policy, Keep urges open-mindedness. “Families are traveling on vacation, and a pet is part of the family. That time away is that much more enjoyable if you have the opportunity to bring your pet along. It doesn’t have to have a negative impact on your other guests.”


BED AND BISCUIT
Dogs don’t have to overrun a ski area to enjoy a stay with their owners. By permitting dogs to bed down slopeside, and accommodating them in various ways throughout the day, Stowe Mountain Lodge is making life easier for some of its two-legged clientele. Owned by Stowe Mountain Resort and managed by Destination Resorts, the lodge has welcomed pets since opening in 2008. The 312-room luxury hotel charges $50 per visit for dogs up to 100 pounds to stay with their owners in designated pet-friendly rooms, where a dog bed, food and water bowls, and a bag of treats await.

“We want people to come to Stowe with their family, and dogs are a part of that,” says Leslie Kilgore, the lodge’s PR manager. Even guests without dogs may reap some benefits. “Most people love it,” she adds. “It fosters a great environment and energy.”

Like many pet-friendly hotels, the lodge does not permit dogs to be left unattended in the room, which can pose a problem for skiers. But the lodge does a great job of delivering pet-care options. The concierge can book a dog into one of the local doggie daycare facilities or even arrange for a hotel staffer to hike with a dog or keep tabs on it in the room.

When off the slopes, guests can bring their dogs on the lodge’s guided snowshoe tours (and summer hikes), says Kilgore, or visit nearby Notch Road, closed to vehicle traffic in winter and a popular spot for walking and cross-country skiing.

Back at the lodge, dogs are permitted in the upper lobby, where drinks and a bar menu are served, though dogs are not allowed in the restaurants. “You’ll see people with a plate of mussels by the fire, and their dog is lying right next to them,” says Kilgore.

From April to June this year, the hotel offered “burgers, beer, and biscuits” nights on the patio several times each week, so guests could hang out with their dogs for dinner.

While Kilgore can’t say whether accepting dogs drives more business to the lodge, she offers this observation: “People will come here without realizing that we allow dogs, and then see dogs and say they want to bring theirs next time. That helps us get return guests.”


IT’S A DOG’S LIFE
The Nemacolin Woodlands Resort, a 2,000-acre spread in southwestern Pennsylvania, offers skiing at Mystic Mountain, multiple restaurants and bars, and a dizzying array of activities from golf to wildland safari tours to see lions and bears. But, until recently, there was one thing the resort didn’t have: dog-friendly accommodations.

In 2009, Nemacolin worked to rectify that. “We saw the trend, how many e-mails and phone calls we were getting from people wanting to travel with their pets,” says Zelma Kassimer, the resort’s long-time guest and media relations manager. “We’ve had years of learning how to take care of our guests, so who better to take care of their pets, too?”

Nemacolin now allows dogs up to 30 pounds in many of its rooms and townhomes for a $150 fee per visit. But, in typical Nemacolin fashion, the resort didn’t just leave it at that. Guests with larger dogs can board them at the Wooflands Pet Resort and Spa, a luxury on-site kennel and grooming facility. Dogs overnight in handpainted themed rooms with flat-screen TVs and webcams, or more standard “condos.” (Cats are welcome, too).

Pups can join their owners during the day to recreate on the resort grounds; paw-print icons on the resort map indicate pickup bag dispensers and receptacles, as well as doggie swimming holes. Wooflands also offers doggie daycare, a necessary option when owners ski or golf, since dogs can’t be left unattended in the room. And when guests visit the resort’s large spa, they can also book a Wooflands spa treatment for their dog.

At the same time it built the boarding facility, Nemacolin opened a comprehensive veterinary care center down the road. Both are open to the public.

Visitor response has been overwhelmingly positive, says Kassimer. “Some guests who have been coming for years are now thrilled that they don’t have to leave their dogs at home,” she says. “And a good 25 percent of the media inquiries I’ve received over the past few years have been in regard to traveling with pets.” Family travel to the resort has increased “exponentially” over the past few years, she adds. Nemacolin’s pet-friendly set-up can only feed that trend.


A NOVEL TERRAIN PARK
At Mount Bachelor, Ore., which offers skiing through May, it’s not unusual for dog owners from nearby Bend to bring their pets to the ski area, where easy access to the main West Village parking lot allows for doggie play breaks in between runs.

However, unleashed, uncontrolled dogs in the lot were becoming a problem. “People would pull up, open the doors, and the dogs would go running,” says Bend resident Patrick Kruse.

Instead of banning dogs from the parking area, Mount Bachelor executives proposed a solution during their spring 2011 planning sessions: a dedicated dog park in a corner of the parking lot where supervised dogs could romp leash free. The resort also reached out to Kruse’s dog-gear company, Ruffwear, to solicit donated toys.

As a result, the Ruffwear Dog Park opened in December 2011, encompassing between two and three groomed acres surrounded by snow berms and equipped with pickup bags, a waste can, and a bucket of toys.

“It’s a win-win for us, the owners, and the dogs,” says Andy Goggins, director of marketing and communications. “On a typical weekend morning, it’s common to see a dozen dogs running around in there.”

Moreover, notes Goggin, compliance has been great. “It’s exceeded our expectations,” he says. “In talking to the parking-lot staff, everyone has been very excited. And we’ve had a lot of positive feedback from our guests, a lot of appreciation and gratitude that there is an actual area to bring their dogs.”

Dogs are not permitted in other parts of the base area, and the resort asks owners to keep pets inside their cars in the parking lot, with open windows and fresh water, when not at the dog park.


WHO LET THE DOGS OUT?
Snowmass, Colo., has an unusual pet policy among ski resorts: Winter uphill hikers—on snowshoes or hiking boots with traction devices—can bring their dogs, provided the dog is leashed and both parties stay on the side of the ski runs.

The policy has been in effect as long as anyone can remember, according to Snowmass general manager Steve Sewell, and it works because of the mountain’s wide runs and good compliance by hikers. Most hikers with dogs are locals—“this is not a business-driving tool,” Sewell acknowledges.

Enforcement is not heavy-handed. “If a patroller sees someone with a dog off leash, they’ll stop and explain, and usually the person has a leash in their pocket anyway,” says Sewell. “But most people realize it’s a privilege, so they’re pretty good about it.”

He does have one pet peeve: Owners who clean up after their dogs but then leave the waste baggie on the trail. “Nothing drives me crazier than to see those plastic bags out there,” Sewell says. Snowmass has not added bag dispensers for hikers, relying on dog owners to tote their own.

Unless compliance drops or the dogs become a safety issue, there are no plans to change the policy, though Sewell monitors uphill traffic in general, which spiked this past winter.


BLUEGRASS WITH BOWSER
Even if it’s not feasible for a resort to roll out the doggie welcome mat in winter, it can implement ways to attract more people and their pets at other times. Take Squaw Valley, Calif., for example. During the ski season, the resort isn’t more pet friendly than your average ski area; in fact, it may be less so. Other than a nearby boutique hotel, there’s no pet-friendly lodging at the base.

Come summer, however, dogs are frequent visitors, attending the free festivals held almost weekly in the base village and riding the aerial tram to hike with their owners. In fact, Squaw (along with some other ski areas) even sells novelty pet photo passes, with proceeds going to the local Humane Society.

During the last weekend of August, Squaw pulls out all the stops for its four-legged friends with the annual Peaks and Paws festival. The weekend-long event includes dog-centric activities like the tennis-ball fetching contest, Mutt Strutt fun run, and guided hikes, as well as (for humans, mostly) live music, pet-themed art and other wares, and wine and beer tasting. The only rules—dogs must be well behaved, and on leash.

A reincarnation of a previous dog event, Peaks and Paws celebrates its third anniversary in 2012 and has grown each year. Last year, organizers added more dog activities, the concerts—six bands over the two days—and wine tasting.

Caroline Ross, executive director of the Squaw Valley Neighbourhood Company that manages the base village and helps produce events, makes no bones about the fest’s origins: “It was created to capture the dog-loving demographic.”

As part of a mission to “drive heads in beds,” Ross and other event organizers work with nearby dog-friendly hotels to provide lodging specials during Peaks and Paws, as Squaw’s summer marketing extends to the Bay Area and Sacramento region. Base-village businesses invite visitors to shop and dine with their dogs on restaurant patios. The resort’s year-round retail outlet, Squaw Dogs, holds a sale during Peaks and Paws.

The 2011 festival drew about 1,500 people (plus dogs) per day, says Ross. This year, she expects attendance to jump significantly, especially if the goal of booking some national music acts is achieved.

“We had a great turnout last year, and we were blown away by how many dogs participated in the Fetch Fest, which was new,” says Sean Kristl, who works in Squaw Valley’s events department. “We were hoping for maybe 20 entrants, and we ended up with 60. There was also a whole heap of dogs on the guided hikes.”

Peaks and Paws fosters community involvement, too. Proceeds from beer and wine sales and entry fees for a few of the dog activities are donated to the Humane Society of Truckee-Tahoe; last year’s festival raised $7,000. Partnering with the nonprofit also helps staff the event, says Ross, as the Humane Society provides 20 to 30 volunteers per day.

Thanks to well-mannered owners, Squaw sees no reason to limit dogs during festival season. Ross, entering her 11th summer with the event, says, “I can count on one hand the issues we’ve had with dogs. People are pretty respectful.” As are, we imagine, the dogs.