>>reporter: last winter, helped by healthy snowfall, the ski resort of st lary in the french pyrenees sold 600 thousand ski passes bringing in around 16 million dollars. not bad for a small resort, but the industry is on a tricky slope. hiking the price of lift passes, already close to 40 dollars a day, in these tight economic times is not an option. the solution - make the most of the resort in the summer. >>bockman: just 10% of western europeans go skiing each year and in fact that number is going down.so right now ski resorts have to look for new business opportunities elsewhere. >>reporter: the local authorities have invested close to 80 million dollars here over the past decade. the lifts are a large fixed cost that have to be maintained, so it makes sense to use that assetin the off season. >>bernia: (in french) being open all year is a necessity for us because we have an economy to keepbusy. shops need to be able to stay open all year around, the local population especially the ski staffneed to have a future. its always difficult for seasonal staff to work for just the ski seas