A combination of a low unemployment rate and high housing costs in the Park City area can make filling open positions a challenge for Summit County employers.
Add the COVID-19 pandemic and international travel restrictions to the mix and it gets even harder, especially when ski season begins.
“Because of COVID, a lot of workers have left the tourism industry because it does involve a lot of working in-person,” said Jennifer Wesselhoff, president and CEO of the Park City Chamber/Bureau.
On top of that, the need to provide home schooling for their children and the cost of child care has led a lot of women to leave the workforce, she said.
But there are some advantages for area businesses, including proximity to the Salt Lake Valley, Wesselhoff said. It’s not ideal for workers to commute every day, especially when a snowstorm comes in, but it does position greater Park City a little better than ski communities such as Aspen and Breckenridge in Colorado that don’t have access to a larger workforce or a larger urban area just 30 minutes away, she said.
Once employers have staff members in place, they focus on retention, Wesselhoff said. Wages are a big part of the effort but benefits, stipends and flexibility in the workplace also are tools to encourage employees to stay, she said.
Emily Summers, senior communications manager for Deer Valley Resort, said in an email that the resort held numerous pre-season job fairs and raised its minimum wage to $15 an hour for non-tipped positions and $18 for housekeepers to staff for the winter. In addition, Deer Valley offers employee housing at four properties, which is now full, she said.
Parts of the resort’s operations still have numerous openings but the number of jobs left to fill isn’t abnormal for this time of year, Summers added.
“Our recruiting team will continue to work to fill these jobs throughout the season,” she said.
Park City Mountain Resort is dealing with staffing shortages and focuses its staff “where we can maximize our operations while keeping guest safety as our top priority,” according to Jessica Miller, senior manager of communications.
To attract and retain employees, the resort recently announced a major investment in wages and benefits as the company heads into the coming season, Miller said.
“We also announced that starting this season we’ll be offering paid sick time off to all seasonal full-time employees who are not already eligible, in addition to COVID-19 Emergency Sick Leave (ESL),” she said in an email. “All of these employee investments are also bolstered by our comprehensive benefits and perks, including our Epic Wellness program, employee and dependent passes, and discounts on F&B, lodging, and retail.”
The resort also is offering a one-time December bonus to eligible employees who commit to working 38-plus hours a week during the December holiday period, Miller said.
The ski resorts aren’t the only employers scrambling to find help. Mike Holm, who owns The Market at Park City, said it can be difficult to find people who want to work in the service industry because tech jobs are a bigger draw.
As he ramped up for the holidays and the winter season, Holm used word-of-mouth to help fill open positions, with his employees helping spread the word that there were good jobs available. He also has made changes in operating hours.
Grocery store employees are considered essential workers and The Market has remained open throughout the pandemic but now closes at 10 p.m. instead of an hour later “because nobody wants to work until 11 at night,” Holm said. He is evaluating whether the store should continue to open at 6 a.m. or at a later time.
Holm also tries to accommodate his workers’ needs, sometimes paying them after they have worked just two or three days.
“Some people can’t wait two weeks for their first paycheck,” he said. “They need it right away.”
Customers have helped the situation, with quite a few tipping his workers. The extra cash was appreciated by the staff, Holm said.
“We can’t thank our customer base enough for being so hospitable, gracious and kind,” he said. “They recognized it was just a tough go at times.”
John Oswald, owner of The Cabin, also adjusted operating hours because of a worker shortage. The bar and live music venue at 427 Main St. had been open seven days a week after the coronavirus shutdown ended last year but closed Mondays and Tuesdays beginning this past summer because Oswald didn’t have enough employees, he said.
The business went back to its regular seven-day-a-week operations a few weeks ago after Oswald was able to bring more staff onboard, but he’s still looking for more employees and the labor force is extremely tight, he said. He attributes that to the high price of housing in Park City, as well as the lack of 24-hour bus service and limited parking on Main Street.
“There’s a slew of issues that go into it,” Oswald said. “The pandemic definitely didn’t help anything.”
Working in his favor is the desirability of living in the Park City area, he said.
“People want to be in Park City because they love it and they like the activities with biking in the summer or hiking or fishing or camping or snowboarding or skiing in the winter,” Oswald said. “If they want to be here, then they know they have to work.”