CALGARY – Organizers of a massive ski and winter gear sale on at the Max Bell Centre had to deal with long lineups after windy weather ended up knocking out power to the facility late Friday.
The Calgary New and Used Ski Sale, which takes place all this weekend, opened up to customers looking to outfit their entire family for the upcoming ski season.
Unfortunately, when the sales started ringing up, officials say the power was knocked out to the entire facility.
"We were having a fabulous sale. We were ahead of last year, good attendance, good sales, and the power went down," said Geoff Scotton, a spokesperson for the sale.
He adds they went around to all the customers still waiting in line with their purchases to tell them about the situation and many have been patient with the unforeseen delay.
Scotton says he's been told by ENMAX the arena is a priority one call for them but, unfortunately, power was not restored to the building before the sale had to close for the day.
The weather was an issue for the sale even before it began, he says.
"Earlier in the day, we changed our entrance protocol, we had a bunch of people waiting outside and it was cold and rainy and stuff, so we actually brought them inside, 500 of them inside to our side corridor before we opened the doors."
This is the 57th year the sale has taken place in the city and the profits from the sale of new and gently used items help support the Calgary Ski Club, the Lake Louise Ski Club and the Canadian Ski Patrol.
It runs until 9 p.m. on Friday and then from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday and 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Sunday.
Because of the power outage, staff at the sale are looking at the possibility of extending the hours of the sale on one of the days. Updates can be found on their website or their Facebook page.
ENMAX told CTV News the windy weather ended up knocking out power to hundreds of customers on Friday night.
