No snow job, Unclaimed Baggage’s annual Ski Sale Event to be largest ever

SCOTTSBORO — It’ll soon be time to hit the slopes and a trip to Scottsboro should be on the itinerary.

Not for schussing, though, but for the latest gear and apparel for those downhill runs and, of course, après ski.

Unclaimed Baggage, the country’s only retailer of unclaimed and lost airline baggage, is set to have its 43rd annual Ski Sale Event. The 50,000-square-foot store will feature thousands of sought-after winter items (and ski gear).

The event in Scottsboro has steadily grown in popularity and expanded since the first sale in 1981.

“It began because the Unclaimed Baggage team realized that they had quite a bit of ski and winter inventory on hand and just decided to see how it went,” said Public Relations Manager Sonni Hood. “They rolled it out on the first Saturday of November just to see how it would go, and it was such a huge hit, they decided to do it the next year and then the next year and then eventually that first Saturday of November, there would be this huge line of people outside waiting to get in.”

Hood said gear and apparel have been stored and saved just for the Ski Sale Event.

“Any name brand new coat, ski, snowboard, anything like that,” she said. “It’s held back until that first Saturday of November. So people just have this anticipation to go and kind of get that first glimpse of all this awesome ski wear in winter wear at a great price.”

The winter bash also includes music, food trucks, winter treats, and a camp-out tonight outside the store, Hood said.

“It started with a line forming early in the morning and grew to a line so long people wanted to make sure they were in line so they started bringing tents several years ago, we just leaned into that, and we have fun with it,” Hood said. “So we give pizza. We have fire pits. You can roast s’mores. We play games during the night.

“The night before is a lot of fun as well.”