Vail buys Peak

Z wrote

coincidentally the investor advisory service that I use that had a buy in MTN changed it to a sell last Friday - sold it for a nice gain yesterday

I'm still holding on to it. It's anybody's guess what will happen. Your sell was likely a good move. I'm already up quite a bit, so other than a catastrophic drop, I'm good to go.

JasonWx wrote

Well Hunter/Vail did the right thing...

They are offering 3 anytime tkts for 150$.. that's a good deal

Apparently existed at Hunter in 2017.  Difference is that the PA locations owned by Peak are included in the deal too.  Presumably more to get people who were skied Liberty, Roundtop, and Whitetail to consider checking out Hunter.  However, they will still be paying more than under Snowtime.  So still plenty of grumbling about Peak for 2019-20.

Limited to two 3-packs per purchaser.

Hunter used to have a frequent user card, but switched to the 3 pack when Peak bought the place...
3 tickets are enough...struggled to use them all last year..

It was the Big Lift Card.

Peak Resorts filed documentation stating that the Special Meeting shareholder vote happened today and the merger was approved.  Closing expected by 9/24/19.

https://sec.report/Document/0001144204-19-045464/

First article I found was in the St. Louis Post Dispatch.  The SEC document includes a Press Release as an Exhibit.

https://www.stltoday.com/business/local/peak-resorts-acquisition-approved-by-shareholders-expected-to-close-next/article_82831c3c-dc6f-547a-a2de-d6c66858c093.html

"The acquisition of Wildwood-based Peak Resorts has been approved by shareholders and is expected to close around Sept. 24, the company announced Friday.
. . ."

Made news in Vernon, CT too.  Guess there are a lot of Mt. Snow regulars in that part of CT.

https://patch.com/connecticut/vernon/mount-snow-parent-shareholders-ok-vail-resorts-acquisition

Peak shareholders should be pleased, as the share price is up 134% YTD.

The deal has closed.  VR sent out a press release today saying "With this acquisition, Vail Resorts has added 17 U.S. ski areas to its network of world-class resorts, bringing its total number of owned and operated resorts to 37 worldwide."

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/vail-resorts-closes-its-acquisition-of-peak-resorts-adds-17-us-ski-areas-near-major-metropolitan-areas-to-portfolio-300924366.html


There is a detailed FAQ on the Epic website about how to convert a Peak Pass for those people who would like to get access to VR locations this season.

https://www.epicpass.com/info/peak-resorts-faq.aspx

Now that the deal is done, OpenSnow is on the ball and has added the Peak locations to the Epic and Epic Local passes.  I like the OpenSnow map option for seeing snow reports for multi-resort passes like Epic and Ikon/MCP.

Looking at the map for Epic with Peak added for the northeast, mid-Atlantic, and midwest makes the strategy very clear.  Merging in Peak Resorts added locations for NYC/NJ and Boston.  Makes a big move for people in Philadelphia, Washington DC and northern VA.  Covers more midwest metropolitan areas in OH (Cleveland, Columbus, Cinn.), IN (Indiannapolis), and MO (St. Louis).  The VR's Urban Division is composed of all the locations in the midwest, from WI, MN, MI in the north, south to MO, IN, and east to OH.  Used to seem a little silly to have a VP for a Division with three small ski areas, although the potential markets are large (Chicago, Minn./St. Paul, Detroit/Ann Arbor).

My friends in DC who used to have Snowtime passes (Whitetail, Liberty, Roundtop in PA) seem a lot happier with VR than Peak Resorts.  They are much more interested in flying west to an Epic destination than driving north to Hunter or Mt. Snow.  Although some were hoping Snowtime would sell to Alterra when the sale to Peak Resorts was announced.

Impact of VR financial clout as the new owner of Mt. Snow probably made a difference in the recent auction of 41 sncwguns from the Hermitage bankruptcy.  There were three bidders, Alterra, VR, and Seven Springs (near Pittsburgh).  7S had the highest bid before VR entered the picture.  VR won for $353,750.

10/29/19
https://www.reformer.com/stories/mt-snow-parent-company-gets-hermitage-snowguns,588735
" . . .
Last week, Alterra offered $310,000 for the equipment and Seven Springs offered $315,000. The process had been initiated by Vail Holdings, which was referred to as the "stalking horse" bidder in court documents.
. . ."

marznc wrote

Hermitage bankruptcy

Hadn't thought about that place since I posted this five years ago.

marznc wrote

Impact of VR financial clout as the new owner of Mt. Snow probably made a difference in the recent auction of 41 sncwguns from the Hermitage bankruptcy.  There were three bidders, Alterra, VR, and Seven Springs (near Pittsburgh).  7S had the highest bid before VR entered the picture.  VR won for $353,750.

10/29/19
https://www.reformer.com/stories/mt-snow-parent-company-gets-hermitage-snowguns,588735
" . . .
Last week, Alterra offered $310,000 for the equipment and Seven Springs offered $315,000. The process had been initiated by Vail Holdings, which was referred to as the "stalking horse" bidder in court documents.
. . ."

Hermitage has also filed paperwork to change the name of the place to Big Tupper East.