BABBITT — Winter can’t quite decide if it’s over or not. While Mother Nature tries to make up her mind, snowmobilers are trying to make up theirs: Is it time to put away the sled?
Most state trails are closed or in poor condition, with just a few in the far northern reaches sporting a good snowpack.
Trails are still open until the end of the month, but this is the second winter in a row that much of the state has little to no snow in early March.
Climate change is shortening the winter recreation season. At the same time, and perhaps relatedly, the power sports industry is changing.
Derek Lossing, general manager of Lossing’s Power Sports in Babbitt, said 20 years ago, around when his father started the business, snowmobiles accounted for some 70-80% of revenue.
Lossing’s started as an Arctic Cat dealer but switched to BRP, the manufacturer of Ski-Doo and Can-Am, a few years ago. It appears to have been the right move, with Arctic Cat’s parent company announcing late last year it would close its Thief River Falls and St. Cloud manufacturing facilities indefinitely amid financial struggles.
Over the years, all-terrain vehicles have evolved from four-wheelers to side-by-sides, becoming much more popular. Lossing said now, ATVs generate two-thirds of their revenue.
“The purpose of an ATV 20 years ago people would put a plow on it and plow their driveway, they’d do work around the cabin, they’d use it for hauling firewood,” Lossing said. “Now, people are buying side-by-sides for the sole purpose of having fun.”
They can ride the trails, go up to Ely or Tower for lunch, much like snowmobilers do in the winters, Lossing explained.
Now that ATVs are more advanced and versatile, Lossing said their growing sales may be partially driven by customers having to make a choice.
"If you have $30,000 in your pocket, you can have one of each. But if you only have $15,000 in your pockets, you can probably use the ATV for more months of the year than you can for the snowmobile," he said.
The day after a few inches of snow, Lossing's will have several sales calls come in. But just as a blanket of white can drive sales, the opposite can dry them up.
"Like last winter, Christmas Day and the grass is brown," Lossing said. "Not a lot of excitement to go to a dealership and spend $12,000 or $15,000 on [a snowmobile]."
The University of Minnesota Extension and St. Louis, Lake and Koochiching counties’ ATV Joint Powers Board commissioned a study on the economic impact of ATV riders on the region that was published in January. It found ATV riders contributed $36.1 million to the local economy in 2023, supporting businesses like hotels, gas stations and equipment shops.
Ron Potter is a nonvoting member of the joint powers board, the president of ATV Minnesota and was the Department of Natural Resources' first off-highway vehicle coordinator. He said he was surprised by the length of trips ATVers take to the region, an average of four days or more.
“It shouldn't be surprising because we're a ways away from most of the population,” he said. “But you know, I think a lot of areas it's a weekend ride or they run out there for the day. But when they come up here, they come for a longer time and therefore probably spend more money than the other riders would.”
The study highlighted the importance of the area’s trail system. Minnesota boasts an impressive 2,500 miles of ATV trail, mostly concentrated in the Arrowhead.
But that number is dwarfed in comparison to the state’s 22,000 miles of snowmobile trails. Unlike the scattered ATV trail networks, snowmobile trails are also interconnected, allowing riders to travel from Grand Marais to Luverne or Winona to Hallock.
Potter acknowledged ATVs will never reach the mileage that snowmobile trails have because of the swamps and farmland that are only accessible by sleds. And he said they don’t want to replace snowmobiles in northeastern Minnesota.
But that doesn’t mean they don’t want more interconnected trails.
“We are fortunate enough in the northern part of the state to have a lot of public land between county and state and federal forest. I think there's an opportunity to have a pretty extensive trail system in the northern part of the state,” Potter said.
“One of our retired legislators said that his dream was to have a trail from Grand Marais to International Falls. We're just about there on that, but I think the bigger dream is to be able to go from Grand Marais over to Crookston.”
Potter noted an extensive trail system would be a challenge in southern Minnesota because of the acres of farmland.
ATV riders told Extension that a broader network of trails would get them to ride more in northeastern Minnesota.
“But I also think in a way that is forcing that conversation to stop thinking of these as discrete activities,” said Brigid Tuck, lead researcher on the ATV study.
“... Thinking about opportunities, both from a business perspective and a community perspective, that will be able to appeal to either side so that you're sort of ready for whichever activity. If we get a great year, and there's tons of snow and the snowmobilers are so happy, and they're out in droves. Or if we get a quiet year like this, maybe the ATVers can be out a little bit more.”
Funding for this environmental story was provided by the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resources Trust Fund as recommended by the Legislative-Citizen Commission on Minnesota Resources (LCCMR).
