Podcast #216: Treetops General Manager Barry Owens

Who

Barry Owens, General Manager of Treetops, Michigan

Recorded on

June 13, 2025

About Treetops

Click here for a mountain stats overview

Owned by: Treetops Acquisition Company LLC

Located in: Gaylord, Michigan

Year founded: 1954

Pass affiliations: Indy Pass, Indy+ Pass – 2 days

Closest neighboring ski areas: Otsego (:07), Boyne Mountain (:34), Hanson Hills (:39), Shanty Creek (:51), The Highlands (:58), Nub’s Nob (1:00)

Base elevation: 1,110 feet

Summit elevation: 1,333 feet

Vertical drop: 223 feet

Skiable acres: 80

Average annual snowfall: 140 inches

Trail count: 25 (30% beginner, 40% intermediate, 30% advanced)

Lift count: 5 (3 triples, 2 carpets – view Lift Blog’s inventory of Treetops’ lift fleet)

Why I interviewed him

The first 10 ski areas I ever skied, in order, were:

* Mott Mountain, Michigan

* Apple Mountain, Michigan

* Snow Snake, Michigan

* Caberfae, Michigan

* Crystal Mountain, Michigan

* Nub’s Nob, Michigan

* Skyline, Michigan

* Treetops, Michigan

* Sugar Loaf, Michigan

* Shanty Creek – Schuss Mountain, Michigan

And here are the first 10 ski areas I ever skied that are still open, with anything that didn’t make it crossed out:

* Mott Mountain, Michigan

* Apple Mountain, Michigan

* Snow Snake, Michigan

* Caberfae, Michigan

* Crystal Mountain, Michigan

* Nub’s Nob, Michigan

* Skyline, Michigan

* Treetops, Michigan

* Sugar Loaf, Michigan

* Shanty Creek – Schuss Mountain, Michigan

* Shanty Creek – Summit, Michigan

* Boyne Mountain, Michigan

* Searchmont, Ontario

* Nebraski, Nebraska

* Copper Mountain, Colorado

* Keystone, Colorado

Six of my first 16. Poof. That’s a failure rate of 37.5 percent. I’m no statistician, but I’d categorize that as “not good.”

Now, there’s some nuance to this list. I skied all of these between 1992 and 1995. Most had faded officially or functionally by 2000, around the time that America’s Great Ski Area Die-Off concluded (Summit lasted until around Covid, and could still re-open, resort officials tell me). Their causes of death are varied, some combination, usually, of incompetence, indifference, and failure to adapt. To climate change, yes, but more of the cultural kind of adaptation than the environmental sort.

The first dozen ski areas on this list are tightly bunched, geographically, in the upper half of Michigan’s Lower Peninsula. They draw from the same general population centers and suffer from the same stunted Midwest verticals. None are naturally or automatically great ski areas. None are or were particularly remote or tricky to access, and most sit alongside or near a major state or federal highway. And they (mostly) all benefit from the same Lake Michigan lake-effect snow machine, the output of which appears to be increasing as the Great Lakes freeze more slowly and less often (cold air flowing over warm water = lake-effect snow).

Had you presented this list of a dozen Michigan ski areas to me in 1995 and said, “five of these will drop dead in the next 30 years,” I would not have chosen those five, necessarily, to fail. These weren’t ropetow backwaters. All but Apple had chairlifts (and they soon installed one), and most sat close to cities or were attached to a larger resort.

Sugar Loaf, in particular, was one of Michigan’s better ski are