Alterra Mountain Co. is buying Arapahoe Basin from its Canadian owner, marking a new chapter for the 1,428-acre ski area known as The Legend.
Alan Henceroth, Arapahoe Basin’s chief operating officer who has worked for the ski area for 36 years, will continue to run Arapahoe Basin. A news release announcing the sale said capital improvement plans include expanded parking and snowmaking.
“A-Basin has a long-time and loyal following among skiers and riders in Colorado and we care deeply about the culture of A-Basin that brings them back,” Henceroth said in a statement. “We have worked with Alterra Mountain Company since 2019 when we joined the Ikon Pass community, and we have every faith that Alterra is committed to helping us maintain A-Basin’s authenticity.”
There are no planned changes to Alterra Mountain Co.’s Ikon Pass for the rest of the 2023-24 season.
Arapahoe Basin, which opened in 1946, marks the 18th year-round mountain destination for Alterra Mountain Co., which formed in 2017 when the owners of Aspen Skiing Co. and private equity firm KSL Capital Partners joined to purchase a struggling Intrawest Corp. for $1.5 billion. The partners then acquired Mammoth Resorts in California and Utah’s Deer Valley in 2019 and launched the Ikon Pass as a rival to Vail Resorts’ Epic Pass.
The privately held company — which owns Steamboat ski area and operates Denver-owned Winter Park — does not release any details of its annual financial information.
Alterra Mountain Co. has invested $1.4 billion into its 16 ski resorts and the world’s largest heli-skiing operation. The Ikon Pass offers access to more than 50 resorts on five continents. It’s partnering with a New York City developer on a $3.2 billion expansion of Deer Valley.
Last week KSL Capital Partners announced it had closed on a “single-asset continuation vehicle” for Alterra Mountain Co. with investors and partners providing $3 billion to the company.
The financial tool allows partners to retain longer-than-planned ownership of assets and return capital to initial investors while enrolling new investors. A statement from KSL Capital Partners, which manages $21 billion in assets and 165 travel and leisure companies, said the new investors in Alterra Mountain Co. include “a diverse group of state and county pension funds, corporate pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, endowments, foundations and insurance companies.”
Last year, Alterra Mountain Co. secured two $500 million loans due in 2028 and 2030.
Vail Resorts once owned Arapahoe Basin for a hot minute. But the U.S. Department of Justice in 1997 forced the company to sell the ski area near the summit of Loveland Pass, citing antitrust issues after Vail Resorts acquired Summit County ski areas Breckenridge, Keystone and Arapahoe Basin from Ralston Resorts.
Vail Resorts sold Arapahoe Basin in 1997 to Dundee Real Estate, a trust that eventually became Canadian real estate investment trust Dream Unlimited Corp.
From 1998 through the 2018-19 ski season, Arapahoe Basin was part of a Vail Resorts pass program. But Epic Pass crowds buried Arapahoe Basin parking lots and Henceroth pulled the plug on the Vail Resorts pass partnership in 2019-20. The partnership fueled record investment for Arapahoe Basin, with the resort spending $40 million over 15 years on new lifts and terrain, including a 468-acre expansion into the Beavers and Steep Gullies in 2018-19.
For the 2019-20 ski season, Arapahoe Basin joined the Ikon Pass, with a limit of 5-7 days.
Dream Unlimited manages $24 billion in assets and counted Arapahoe Basin as its only ski area. For the first nine months of 2023, Dream reported Arapahoe Basin generating $9.5 million in revenue, down from $13.8 million in the same nine months of 2022.
Dream Unlimited reported 2022 as Arapahoe Basin’s best year ever, with the ski area generating $43.4 million in revenue and earning $12.6 million in earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization. In 2021, the ski season generated $33.4 million and earned $10.7 million.
Terms of the sale to Alterra Mountain Co. were not released.