Several business owners said they have written off this winter as a loss and are looking ahead to better days.

It’s been so bad the governors of both Michigan and Wisconsin are encouraging small businesses affected by the lack of snow to apply for Economic Injury Disaster Loans made available through the U.S. Small Business Administration. The loans are for businesses unable to meet their obligations and pay ordinary and necessary operating expenses. The purpose is to provide working capital to help them survive until normal operations resume.

Ken Hein, the owner of Thermal Chaos in Dunbar, Wis., said business is way off from past years. A trail that runs in front of the tavern that normally would be busy with snowmobilers trying to enjoy the waning days of the season has already been closed for seven weeks.

Hein says they rely on the yearly snowmobile traffic for more than 25% of yearly revenue.

ONLY HALF OF the hill at Pine Mountain Ski Resort was able to open this year due to conditions, said Brock Verdegan, director of ski operations. (Jim Paul/Daily News photo)

“The trails had 12 days of grooming all year. A big storm came on a Friday night, so they opened up on Saturday and we had a few snowmobiles, I think 12,” Hein said. “The next weekend the trails were open and we had a few, but there was so much snow down south that everybody was riding closer to home.”

With not much business coming in, Hein says he has had to cancel some events. Thermal Chaos often hosts bands when the bar was full of patrons, but has gone without entertainment the past two weekends.

He was forced to lay off one employee and didn’t use help normally brought in for the winter rush. Thermal Chaos also temporarily cut back the number of days they are open to two, Friday and Saturday. He hasn’t decided yet whether to apply for an Injury Disaster Loan.

Hein is hoping the extremely early spring thaw will mean that the county will open up the trails to ATV/UTV traffic earlier than normal.

“Last year the trails didn’t open (to ATV traffic) until May 14, we had a totally different winter last year,” he said. “If Marinette County opens the trails here in the next two or three weeks, we figure we will be able to probably make up the winter loss.”

Hein also operates a food truck in the warmer months and he is hoping to get an earlier start with that as well. Thermal Chaos will celebrate the seventh anniversary of the barbecue part of the business March 23 with the band Cash O’Riley.

UP Cycle & Sport Manager Mike Rock said they usually count on snowmobiles for 40% of their annual sales, with half of those occurring during the winter season. This winter, sales at Iron Mountain snowmobile and ATV dealership are down more than 30%.

In 30 years the family-owned business has never endured a worse year, he said.

“In October, November and December we sold a lot of sleds, but then everything became extremely slow at the end of December,” Rock said.

UP Cycle & Sport also felt the pinch in the service department, fixing and maintaining the snowmobiles, and sales of snowmobile apparel, Rock said.

His customers got very little use of their snowmobiles this year, he added. Whenever a trail did open, it soon became unusable due to everyone rushing to get in a ride. Some local snowmobilers traveled as far away as Minnesota and the Dakotas to find snow, Rock said.

Even though sales and service of snowmobiles are down significantly, the Rock family has promised their employees no one will be laid off because of the slowdown.

The showroom floor has already been cleared of most snowmobiles and now features side-by-side vehicles. Many owners are starting to get their machines serviced in anticipation of spring and summer.

UP Cycle & Sport is currently running several promotions on snowmobiles — $3,000 off all new snowmobiles 2024 and older, $2,000 off used inventory and clothing rebates of up to 75% off.

Director of Ski Operations Brock Verdegan said in his years at Pine Mountain Ski Resort he has never dealt with a winter this poor, even the year the hill shut down because of COVID-19.

“I have never seen anything like it. I mean we struggled to get snow on the hill; everything out there is man-made. I don’t know if Iron Mountain got an actual foot of snow this year,” Verdegan said.

The hill was not able to open until the beginning of January, compared with early December most years, and even then could only get half of the hill in shape.

With the right temperatures, Verdegan said they could have made enough snow to open the whole hill but those temperatures never lasted for long.

“We have continued to make snow, but it is going back onto what we already had open, just to keep the base there,” Verdegan said. “So we have only ran our first two lifts and we never got our far lift open this season.”

With only half the hill open, the crowds have been smaller, which in turn had a negative effect on other parts of the business such as lodging and dining.

As with the other businesses, Verdegan did see one potential silver lining to the warm weather and lack of snow — perhaps the TimberStone Golf Course can open earlier to make up some of the loss. But he acknowledged the hit skiing took this year will be hard to recoup.

Verdegan said the annual Slush Cup — an event in which competitors try to ski or snowboard across a manmade slush pond — has been canceled and the King and Queen of the Hill was moved up a week to this weekend to make sure it happens. Skiing at Pine Mountain is limited to Fridays through Sundays, with 10 runs currently open.

Looking to the future, Verdegan said the Pine Mountain will expand its snow-making capabilities by putting in a new well, adding more electrical to the hill and purchasing more snow-making guns so they can cover more area at once when conditions are right.