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Seven Springs president worked his way up the slopes
Friday, December 22, 2000 By Joyce Gannon, Post-Gazette Staff Writer
Scott Bender, the president of Seven Springs Mountain Resort, began working for the city of Greensburg's recreation department at age 14. So although he became an expert while relatively young in the business of managing skating rinks and swimming pools, Bender had no exposure to ski slopes.
That is, until a chance meeting in 1979 with one of the owners of Seven Springs -- the 5,500-acre ski and recreation complex in Somerset County.
Bender had tagged along with a friend to help repair the indoor pool at Seven Springs. At the time he was 24, managing Greensburg's Recreation Department and going to college part time. While he worked on a stuck valve at the Seven Springs pool, a man wandered by and asked how the job was going. They struck up a conversation about Bender's recreation background, and the man asked him if he thought it was feasible to make money on a skating rink at Seven Springs.
Bender agreed to give it a shot and shook hands with the man, who turned out to be Herman Dupre, a co-owner of the resort and son of its founders, Adolph and Helen Dupre.
Bender borrowed $35,000 to get a roller rink installed on top of a couple of indoor tennis courts at the resort and bought 300 pairs of skates.
The rink was an instant hit. Bender repaid his start-up loan within a year and operated the rink while continuing to work full time in Greensburg.
Four years later, in 1983, the resort's president, Jim McClure, offered him a full-time job at the resort as its public relations director.
Bender was working on a mechanical engineering degree at the University of Pittsburgh and admits he knew nothing about public relations, but took the job when McClure assured him, "We'll learn together." Thus a career in resort management was launched.
Bender eventually took on responsibilities for advertising, marketing and resort operations and in September succeeded McClure in the top job at Seven Springs, the largest ski facility in the state. It employs 800 full- and part-time workers in the off-season and 1,400 during the winter. With its conference and convention facilities, golf and other warm weather attractions, the resort attracts 1 million visitors a year.
Bender, now 45, never did complete that engineering degree. But he has few regrets.
"It's never held me back. There's no substitute for the right attitude and hard work."
Despite what he called "an incredible workload" at the resort that includes overseeing all day-to-day operations and long-term planning to keep Seven Springs competitive, Bender has found time to squeeze in classes and management seminars at Pitt's Katz Graduate School of Business.
Since he didn't study business in college, he said, "I'm always hungry for that kind of thing."
Bender considers his biggest accomplishments to include creation of the popular Autumnfest weekends, which now attract more than 100,000 visitors to the resort over the course of five weekends in September and October.
The event started in 1985 as Autumnfest Sundays. "A lot of people were here that time of year, looking at the foliage. But besides food, we didn't give them any reason to stay at Seven Springs."
So Bender recruited some entertainment and crafts booths to the resort, and the event took off.
"It's the largest nonskiing crowd that comes to Seven Springs," he said.
He's also proud of helping to get Seven Springs recognized among the Top 50 ski resorts in the nation in several ski industry publications.
For the last five years, Bender has worked closely on the $6.5 million expansion program that was unveiled when the resort opened for the season Nov. 22, the day before Thanksgiving.
The biggest component of the expansion is a new "skiers services" building where guests can buy lift tickets, rent equipment, schedule lessons and drop children at day care. The project also includes renovations to the existing ski lodge and a new ski trail, Giant Boulder.
"This is probably the most dramatic improvement project since 1974," said Bender.
Seven Springs didn't bank exclusively on its new facilities to attract skiers this year.
For the first time in its history, the resort offered a discount on season passes that were purchased before the season opened. It slashed the price from $600 to $299 per person and sold 7,500 passes, double the number sold a year ago, Bender said.
The move came after neighboring Hidden Valley Resort, Somerset, last year became the first local ski facility to offer discounted preseason passes.
Bender doesn't worry too much about the competition from Hidden Valley and the other ski facilities in the Laurel Highlands: Laurel Mountain near Ligonier in Westmoreland County; and Mystic Mountain at Nemacolin Woodlands Resort & Spa, Fayette County.
"I think it's modest competition; we all have our markets," said Bender. "I think we get more of a destination-type skiing crowd with the 400 hotel rooms, 20 chalets and 350 condominiums that we rent."
He also characterized Seven Springs' slopes as "more challenging terrain" than the others.
Those smaller facilities "teach people to ski and get people into the sport who have the ultimate goal of skiing at Seven Springs someday."
Despite a well-publicized ownership rift that surfaced when a Colorado company offered to buy Seven Springs a couple of years ago, Bender contends tensions between the three Dupre families that control the resort haven't had any negative impact on operations.
The offer from Booth Creek Ski Holdings Inc. of Vail, Colo., has been withdrawn, "And now there are no immediate plans to sell," he said.
Bender, who never skied until he started working at Seven Springs, likes to get onto the slopes about once a week during the season and plays golf when the weather's warm. He also is vice president of the Pennsylvania Ski Areas Association and serves on the board of the National Ski Areas Association.
Whatever time off he can squeeze into his schedule he spends at his Somerset home with his girlfriend and his 92-year-old grandmother.
For vacations, the ski resort executive travels West to relax at other people's resorts. His favorites are Vail and Park City, Utah.
After working for nearly two decades in middle management jobs before becoming Seven Springs' president, Bender claims he's busier than ever.
"Some people think it's easier at the top. I can verify that's not true. The workload is incredible but I love every minute of it."
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