On deposits, commitment and who ends up in your group
The biggest camp on this mountain will hold your place for ninety dollars. It is a genuinely clever piece of marketing and it fills sessions fast. It also tells you something important about who you will be riding with.
Our deposit is —. Here is the argument for that.
The mechanic
Ninety dollars locks a price, gets a name into a CRM and makes cancelling almost painless. From the camp’s side that is excellent business. From your side, it means a meaningful share of the people holding places in your session have not really decided to come.
Why that matters to you specifically
Places held cheaply get released late, which means groups get rebuilt in the final fortnight rather than planned properly.
A week is shaped by whether the people in it have organised their year around being there. Ninety dollars does not require anyone to do that.
“Nearly sold out” means something different when a place costs ninety dollars to hold.
What we do instead
Our deposit is meaningful on purpose. It is also the most flexible part of our terms, because asking for genuine commitment obliges us to behave well in return.
Side by side
| TB SNOW CAMPS | THE BIG MT. HOOD CAMPS | |
|---|---|---|
| Deposit to hold a place | — | — |
| What it buys | A planned place in a group of four | A locked price in a session of 20–40 |
| Transfers | Once, free, subject to space | See their published policy |
| Risk on day one | Full-week refund if Monday disappoints | See their published policy |
Competitor figures taken from their public 2027 registration pages, August 2026. We’ll update this table whenever theirs changes.
We are not characterising their refund terms — read them yourself on their site. We are only stating ours.
And what the commitment is actually for
A deposit is only worth anything if the week behind it is. Here is the five-stage loop your money is holding a place in.
Summer glacier corn is the most forgiving surface in snowboarding. Falling stops hurting, so your body stops bracing.
Four campers per coach. Your coach knows your name, your leak and your goal by Monday lunch.
Timberline's airbag lets you try the scary version twenty times with no landing consequence.
Every evening we put your footage on the screen and find the one thing to change tomorrow.
You wake up and do it again — 7 days back to back. That repetition is the part winter can never give you.
Risk
Ride with us Monday. If by Monday night you don’t believe this is the best coaching you have ever paid for, tell your coach at dinner. We refund the entire week on the spot — including the nights you have already slept in the house. You risk one day. We risk the whole thing.
Sessions
Exact calendar dates are confirmed with Timberline each spring and announced to deposit holders first. Both sessions run Monday through Sunday between June 20 and July 30, 2027.
“I was able to progress my riding, and at the same time, I felt safe because I knew I had great coaches I could trust. Morning exercises on the mountain and video feedback were super valuable… Riding Mount Hood in the summer, meeting new friends, seeing old friends, watching pros ride, and getting coached by the best is super special.”Jimmy Rivas · RN, 37, Chicago
“I was nervous about it being my first year snowboarding and possibly holding people back since I didn’t have a lot of park experience, but the coaches were great at breaking things down into stages for me to try and build my confidence and progress at a pace I was comfortable with. My riding improved so much.”Chris Rosa
Deposit moves once, free · full terms before payment