Exactly. We will see. It was held up by fraud between 2008 and 2016 and then the Feds between 2016 and 2022.
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Jay Peak bombshell
- Thread starter VTKilarney
- Start date
drjeff
Well-known member
As I understand it, the Hockey Rink there is prety much booked up with tournaments year round (atleast on weekends) since the draw of the waterpark for after the tournament games are over for the day is very popular with the younger hockey players (and a few of their parents who I know have been to tournaments with their kids there in the past) , so it seems like those parts are sustainable.
I have yet to check out their golf course, but from a colleague of mine who owns a condo up at Jay as is a golfer, he tells me that it's a solid course, and not one that you just play once to say you've played it, but one that you want to come back and play many times, so that certainly is another thing to draw people there during the non ski season months
machski
Well-known member
Assuming they are not carrying a ton of debt (I recall the buyer did have to assume some level of debt at purchase) on the infrastructure, I believe the market can carry all of it. They have dialed up the sport tournaments for the ice rink and soccer fields, have a lot of summer music events and the golf course is superb (my BIL lives in St. Albans and takes a few trips to play Jay each year, including stays there. He says it is well played). We have been over to the water park from St. Albans off ski season too and it is fairly well utilized off season as well.
mbedle
Well-known member
Jay Peak had it most profitably year last season, so I would say that they are in really good shape financially going forward. Also, they have absolutely no debt in relation to all of the EB-5 projects or tram repairs. All of the subcontractors for that work have either settled or been paid. Given that they haven't had any major capital improvements in a while, I would assume the debt passed onto the new owner will be minimum.
machski
Well-known member
IIRC, the debt assumption by the buyer was either $5 or 6 million.
BenedictGomez
Well-known member
Tell me you know nothing about Jay Peak's history without telling me you know nothing about Jay Peak's history.
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BenedictGomez
Well-known member
It would be interesting to know how all the grift amenities of Jay Peak each do on their own two feet. The golf course is very nice, but I dont see it swamped either, so it would be interesting to know if it's profitable or just break even or so. The other thing with golf is if you're not decently profitable little things start to deteriorate over time (trap edge cutting, tee box maintenance, fertilizing, pest control) which can slowly begin to weigh. The hockey rink definitely seems to do a pretty good business & anecdotally I've heard does quite well with Canuck tournaments - makes sense given how close it is to Canada. As for the waterpark, I wonder, as I've noticed not everything is always open & they're often doing promos.
BodeMiller1
Well-known member
History is the past. How about this one. Sugar Loaf doesn't get snow until March and makes a good part of there money with people from Europe.
Did you know Mt Washington has only bee skied by one guy. Google is your enemy. It will lead you into error.
I challenge you to a ski - off.
Abubob
Well-known member
BodeMiller1
Well-known member
Attachments
KustyTheKlown
Well-known member
dont sell yourself short judge, you're a tremendous slouch
You can't really look at each of the amenities on it's own. The hockey is doing well because the water park makes it very attractable because it gives the kids something to do besides hockey. Hockey also books a lot of room in the hotels, which bring in money, no to mention the restaurants.
drjeff
Well-known member
One thing to consider with golf course operations, is for many courses, a "busy" day may be only 200 to 250 golfers ( figure with the typical 10 minute starting times intervals that you can get 24 people an hour out on a golf course) so it doesn't take 1000's of people a day to get the volume a course needs to stay profitable.
Additionally, from a maintenance staff standpoint, often a ski resort owned golf course will allow them to keep more staff emplyed year round, and often its the staff that make snow, run and maintain lifts, operate the cats/snow plows, etc, so that can make it an attractive thing for the resort to allow them to keep some employees on a year round basis who are serve highly needed rolls. And often the skill sets to perform these jobs have a bunch of cross over between operating large machinery, or working on and operating the irrigation system (large pumps moving pressurized water through miles of pipes)
Agree though that the cost to operate a course, and keep the turf in a healthy state, has certainly gone up this past year with what has happened to the cost of fertilizer in particuliar.
I know the superintendent of the course I belong to in CT, made an almost 30% increase in the line item for fertilizer costs for next season over this year in the preliminary budget he submitted to our board for next season
Abubob
Well-known member
Not that the courses themselves compare but I wonder. Under PMRI the course tanked at Ragged and is currently unused. That probably has more to do with the idea that nobody I’ve ever talked to about Ragged’s golf course had anything good to say. My question might be is it because it would have cost too much to fix Ragged’s course or PMRI’s disinterest in a golf course?
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drjeff
Well-known member
I actually played the Ragged golf course when I was open well over a decade ago. I like tough, funky golf courses, I really do. The one at Ragged was probably the funkiest that I have played in the 40+ years I have been a golfer. Just wasn't really sure what the architect was thinking with the layout of a majority of the holes with respect to making it fair and playable given how the majority of golfers games are. And it wasn't the type of course I got the feeling where if you played it a few more times and really got your target lines down that it would become more enjoyable. Just way too many things because of the design/layout that could have a good shot ending up as a lost ball out of bounds or in a hazard, that was very apparent
Secondly, Ragged's location, seemed to be a bit of a negative for the success of the golf course, as it's just far enough from the Concord area and just far enough from both Winnipesaukee and Sunapee that folks either living or vacationing in those area have to drive by numerous other courses. Jay seems to be much more of a destination resort than Ragged is, and therefore I am guessing will be able to keep a greater number of rounds played per year than Ragged could from what I understand.
NYDB
Well-known member
Golf is generally in a death spiral overall, despite the temporary bump in popularity during covid.
from 30 million participants in 2006 to 24 million in 2018. (USA only)
I've never played ragged but the weirdest golf course I've ever played was tater hill in VT. (now closed). the back 9 had some strange holes.
I can't beleive the Jay course makes a 'profit' in the traditional sense.
from 30 million participants in 2006 to 24 million in 2018. (USA only)
I've never played ragged but the weirdest golf course I've ever played was tater hill in VT. (now closed). the back 9 had some strange holes.
I can't beleive the Jay course makes a 'profit' in the traditional sense.
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VTKilarney
Well-known member
I’m worried that the new owners don’t understand the market.
Newpylong
Well-known member
The new owners would have had absolutely zero to do with this level of micromanagement.
I will tell you what they do at Ragged: "Erik, we approve your operating budget but aren't going to be able to fund all of the Cap Ex, split it up over 3 years".
It won't be any different up there, the details are trusted to management.
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