Snow means spin for the ski industry.

Mountain folk long have chided ski companies for overestimating accumulations and hyping snowfall.

Take, for example, the October storm on the Front Range when Vail Resorts eagerly announced that it shut down its headquarters because the heavy snow was so terrific. What the company didn’t mention is that its offices are in low country in Broomfield, 75 miles from its closest slopes, where it was warm and sunny that day.

“I sometimes wonder whether the ski industry wouldn’t benefit more from being completely transparent about weather and snowfall with its customers,” wrote veteran mountain reporter Bob Berwyn in a Nov. 19 column in the Summit Daily News. “But when snow = money, perhaps that’s expecting too much.”

The controversy since has snowballed.

As Berwyn tells it, Vail Resorts chief executive Rob Katz phoned immediately to complain. As a major advertiser, the company went on to cancel ads for its resorts at Keystone and Breckenridge, at least temporarily. Berwyn says publisher Jim Morgan told him he had “a lot of groveling to do.”

Berwyn — who’s no groveler — stood by his column, even though he says his bosses told him his job was at risk.

“I’m a skier. I love snow,” he says. “I think people should tell the truth about snowfall.”

Within two weeks, Morgan had fired him after 12 years intermittently with the paper.

That decision is chilling not only for journalism in Colorado, but also for Summit County readers.

“It’s unfortunate but, especially in this economy, some advertisers feel like they can flex their muscles when there’s commentary that they don’t like,” says Ed Otte of the Colorado Press Association. “Newspapers need to withstand these kinds of threats.”

“It’s hugely damaging for the credibility of a paper that’s the single source of local news in this community,” adds Breckenridge Councilman Dave Rossi. “It also makes us wonder — is Vail Resorts really that sensitive that it can’t handle any kind of informed criticism?”

The company counters that publications often print “things we don’t like, but that in no way affects our advertising policy with them.” It adds that Katz had no part in Berwyn’s firing but “simply expressed disappointment in how the paper handled the issue,” and took umbrage with allegations that the company misleads customers about snowfall.

Vail Resorts also refutes a New York Times report this week that it threatened to pull its advertising in Ski Magazine after the publication posted that a teenager died last month while skiing at Breckenridge. As the Times’ story goes, the editor “advised the staff that they might want to avoid stories about fatal skiing accidents,” as if such postings somehow aren’t newsworthy in a journal about skiing.

“It would have been completely tasteless and disrespectful to the family of the victim for us to run an ad about one of our season pass products or resorts adjacent to the story,” the company says about why it pulled its ad.

Berwyn, who has freelanced for The Denver Post, is now looking for a full-time reporting gig.

Meanwhile, back at the spineless Summit Daily, Morgan and editor Alex Miller — who edited Berwyn’s column — refused to comment about his firing and their apparent willingness to let an advertiser make editorial and staffing decisions.

“Are you really doing a story on this?” Miller asked.

I suppose his paper’s piece on raccoon encounters Wednesday was worthier of newsprint.

Susan Greene writes Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. Reach her at 303-954-1989 or greene@denverpost.com.