What you need to know about the Ski Swap

What you need to know about the Ski Swap:

What it is:

Snow gear vendors from all over NM, and sometimes surrounding states come and bring all their snow gear to be sold in one place. This gives you the opportunity to buy everything you need for skiing and snowboarding in one place. 20% of your transaction goes to the Sandia Peak Ski Patrol. This swap is their annual fundraiser and how they function for the year when the mountain is open. They are volunteers and they work their butts off to pull this event off every year - and they do a great job. Ski area booths are set up in the middle of the main room and often offer discounted passes. This swap has been going on since 1967!! Their website HERE.

Common misconceptions:

The ski swap is not actually a swap, meaning you can't bring gear with you and expect to trade someone. All gear is entered in a database so you can buy from multiple vendors in one transaction. If you have gear to bring, it must be checked in Friday morning and picked up Sunday. The Ski Patrol will have specific information on times for you on their website which can be found here: https://www.nmskiswap.org/

The swap isn't usually discounted gear- there is used gear that is cheaper, but the majority of it is brand new and just came in weeks before this swap.  20% of the price gets taken from the vendor right off the top, and there's not much of a margin on most of the products- meaning that if it is discounted, the vendor is likely not making any money off the sale or even losing money. The value to you is being able to see everything in one place and pick and choose, while trying on clothing to see how it fits together.

When it is:

The Albuquerque Ski Swap always takes place around Halloween weekend. This year it's the weekend before, from October 21st-23rd 2022. 

Friday evening is the pre-sale, which costs around $20 entry but gives you access to see the gear first. In recent years this evening has been so popular that there's hardly any "good deals" left the rest of the weekend. So, if you really need gear, you need to be here and ready to buy on Friday.

Saturday is usually from 8-5pm and around $5 entry. Lots of time and gear left to look through, and booths from different ski areas selling discounted passes.

Sunday goes from 12-4pm and then everyone packs up for the the Santa Fe Ski Swap, which is similar in most ways, but much smaller than the one in Albuquerque. They get all our leftovers - so if you're in Santa Fe, it's worth it to come down to ABQ to check out the swap here.

Where it is:

EXPO NM at the State Fair Grounds

NOTES: 

Gear that we have left after both swaps will come back to the shop. At this point we usually restock products we need and sizes we're out of. HOWEVER, this year the industry is still having supply chain issues and the situation will be similar to last year. The companies only produced what was pre-ordered and there will probably not be any extra product to restock. We order all snow gear a YEAR IN ADVANCE so we don't have much wiggle room on this.

All our snow product will be at the swap during these dates - so none of it will be in the shop, however we will be open these dates as usual.

This year's Ski Swap in Santa Fe will be held at the Santa Fe Community Convention Center at 201 W. Marcy St. on November 18th & 19th.

If you need gear, don't wait!