Mountain Capital Partners, LLC

You know, the businesses that we are working with, they're pretty flush with cash.

Mountain Capital Partners, they're over a billion dollar company and they have 17 ski resorts.

So even with a bad season this past year, most of those resorts are a dual kind of hospitality.

So they also have great summer offerings as well.

Could Lee Canyon, Nevada build a lift adding nearly 2000 vertical feet to their mountain? The West Bowl expansion is set to open at Lee Canyon this winter.

And even after a poor Western winter, power pass sales are up across Mountain Capital Partners portfolio.

Pretty amazing.

We will get into all of that today.

So Josh said something really interesting.

that PowerPass sales are up.

And so if you're not familiar with PowerPass, it is the season pass for all of Mountain Capital Partners Mountains, which is Arizona Snow Bowl in, obviously, Arizona.

Pajarito, Sipapu, and Sandia Peak in New Mexico.

We have some less extreme examples.

Sandia Peak in New Mexico was shuttered for two years from 2021-22 to 2022-23, reopened for the 23-24 season after Mountain Capital Partners, which owns a bunch of ski areas, including two others in New Mexico, Powerito and Sipapu, purchased Sandia Peak, and they are upgrading that.

They purchased that from the Abruzzo family, longtime owners of Ski Santa Fe right up the road.

And then we have more dramatic examples.

And they are doing an expansion this year.

It's their second expansion in just a few years.

And the other day I spoke with Dave Rathbun, the president of Purgatory, also a Mountain Capital Partners owned mountain.

So they're co-owned, which is also launching an expansion this year.

Lots of steep trails, and I'll get into that with Dave, so I don't wanna talk about it too much, but a tr- a long triple chair serving that.

Actually one of two expansions that Mountain Capital Partners, the owner of Purgatory, is doing this year.

The other is West Bowl at Lee Canyon, so that is that rapidly growing ski area actually within the Las Vegas city limits.

Very beautiful area.

My guest today is the CEO of Purgatory Resort Holdings.

Purgatory delivers a 2,072-foot vertical drop over 1,635 skiable acres served by 12 lifts, including a brand-new triple chair for winter 2026, '27.

Since 2015, Purgatory has been owned by Mountain Capital Partners, which operates 11 active ski areas in the United States and Chile.

Prior to his promotion to the CEO role last year, he was Purgatory's general manager for eight seasons.

I love all ski areas, and I'm sorry I've not given more love to New Mexico in the past, though I have done a couple of Taos podcasts.

So the Power Pass, for those who don't know what Gary's talking about, is Mountain Capital Partners owns about a dozen ski areas, including two down in Chile.

And...

The Power Pass is basically their epic pass, right? It's the unlimited pass at all of their mountains, not unlimited at the Chilean ones, but you can see all the footnotes on their website.

So I've never talked about Pajarito on the podcast directly before, but Pajarito, as many of you know, is part of a much larger portfolio.

In fact, the third largest ski area operator in the country, behind Vail Resorts with their 42 ski areas and Alterra with their 20 ski areas, is Mountain Capital Partners.

And MCP, they're a little bit harder to count, uh, only because a couple of their mountains are not currently active.

Uh, w- which is not necessarily a bad thing, and I'll explain why.

It's a very small ski area.

It has, uh, only, if any, chairlifts, one chairlift, uh, but it hasn't been operational in years and years.

And, and Hesperus in Colorado, which Mountain Capital Partners acquired in 2016, uh, that ski area has not been operational since, I believe, 2023.

Uh, because, [chuckles] the, their, the main lift had a big problem.