Doppelmayr/Garaventa Group

Um, and we've got, we've got a pretty stout lift now that's gonna go up this pretty rugged face.

So, so while we're on the, the list- lifts topic here, Dave, a, a blog post from earlier in this last spring or this spring had mentioned a, an upgrade to the Purgatory Express, which, uh, for the listeners, is a 2000 Doppelmayr six-pack with the latest control system.

Do you have any update on that, and, and why it was time, and what that will achieve?

Yeah, and we chose to do that early.

So right after we closed, um, you know, we put in all the new low-voltage controls for that lift.

Mm-hmm.

So again, that era lift, that was pre-Doppelmayr, so it's still a CTEC lift, but it, it is a bomber lift.

It just was showing its age from its drive components-

You know, it's a great lift.

It's a Doppelmayr and a great piece of machinery.

Of course, like everything, you know, technology continues to improve.

The six-pack aspect, I mean...

Certainly the long-tenured people in the industry, I think, respect that.

Tom Sanford and I have been friends for decades, and he's an outstanding guy.

And he's done a lot of impressive things in this industry, including being the Eastern rep for Doppelmayr for a long, long time.

Tom still does some consulting and work.

I mean, these lifts are not that old.

It's a 1996 Garaventa C-Tech.

It's 1,322 vert, 5,370 feet long.

It will be only the second six-pack... ever retired or taken out of its original location in the United States.

I haven't been in the machine room.

I don't know.

But the Eagle is a 1993 Garaventa C-Tech Triple with 1,155 feet of vert, 2,500 feet long.

Eaglet is just a little bit younger.

It was pretty exhausting, but I think it's worth it, because if you see the interior, it's very clear and clean.

And finally, the Swiss producer, CVA, which is from Doppelmayr Group, they told me that they never did such a detailed interior as this.

And I was like, oh my God, it's a big compliment for me.

So I was very happy that they saw that the energy which Jesus put in, it was really worth it.

And when they replaced the Palawichini double chair, I think in 2020, they just repla- it was a 1970s lift.

They replaced it with a brand-new double chair that was made, I think, by Doppelmayr.

Same exact specs, it w- it's just a new machine.

The other example is Alta, which if you go back to the '90s, had a bunch of double chairs just all over the mountain, have consolidated most of those to one line and replaced them, almost all but Wildcat double, with high-speed chairs.

At the time, I thought he might be referring to equipment like snow guns and groomers.

It seems to me both on the Lyft manufacturer side, Doppelmayr Garaventa and Leitner Poma, and the grooming side, Piston Bully and Preenoth, the industry has a very expensive duopoly of vendors.

Do you know of any resorts exploring alternatives to either of these in a serious way? We have seen Chinese manufacturers disrupt other sectors.

Curious, have you ever heard any rumblings in skiing? So the best real world example is if you look at Waterville Valley in New Hampshire, which has purchased three lifts from MND, which is a European company over the past, I don't know, decade or so, probably less.

... um, to modernize that lift.

Uh, it has, essentially Doppelmayr came in and put in an entire new, uh, minus the, uh, minus the, uh, um, uh, the terminals and the, um, [clicks tongue] uh, and the structure itself.

Um, essentially all new components, all new electrical-

Mm-hmm

I think we recognize it's a workhorse.

Um, it's key to accessing some really, um, fantastic terrain for us.

Um, and that modernization project with Doppelmay- in con- in, in, um, partnership with Doppelmayr that was done in the summer and fall of 2025-

Mm-hmm