Steamboat Resort's New President and COO Dave Hunter Discusses his Background, the Resort

Steamboat Resort vice president of mountain operations Dave Hunter was recently promoted to the role of president and chief operating officer for the resort.

Hunter has served as the interim resort lead since November following former president and COO Rob Perlman’s promotion to executive vice president of regional operations for Alterra Mountain Co.

While Hunter's rise through the industry has been somewhat meteoric, his humble beginnings are quite impressive.

His uncle Dave was was the vice president and general manager at Mt. Tom Ski Area in Holyoke, Massachusetts. But the young Hunter wasn’t going to get any kind of special treatment because of that relationship—no silver spoon here.

"I started cleaning bathrooms, bussing tables, cleaning lodges, and picking up trash,” he told Powder .

By his early twenties he was assistant general manager. But he always dreamed of moving west, and in 1997 he took a job that, well, frankly, dropped him down a few notches.

He took a seasonal job at Eldora, Colorado, near Boulder as the rental shop manager. The only problem was it was, well, seasonal and offered no benefits.

But, as they say, the only thing that overcomes hard luck is hard work. Two weeks after Hunter started at Eldora (in the middle of October), the snowmaking manager resigned.

"They looked at my resume, I got pulled into an office, 'we're in a pinch, you willing to learn our system and take this on?"

So Hunter became the head of snowmaking—but he kept the rental shop job. Then, in the spring of 1998, the group sales director left.

"I had done a ton of group sales with my uncle back in Massachusetts and I really learned a lot about that, and they said, 'hey, can you fill in here, too?' Before I knew it I was the snowmaking manager, I ran sales in the off seasons, and for awhile I kept the rental shop. In 2002 I became mountain operations director."

Wow.

Hunter credits some of the issues at Eldora—staffing challenges, sometimes fickle weather—made him a better person, adding "it was an amazing experience."

In 2013 he took a position with Prinoth as director of sales and operations for North America. It was a sea change, but a good one. He oversaw five huge regional distribution centers, in Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Hampshire, and Alberta.

In the summer of 2016, he got a call from Steamboat. The VP of mountain operations was retiring: was Hunter interested?

You bet, and he joined the Steamboat leadership team in 2017. That position grew and evolved so, he was, after several years, running the ski school as well. Fast forward a few years and this in late May the resort announced his new role.

Throughout his career, Hunter has made it a priority to serve his community. He currently serves as the president of Steamboat Mountain Village and is the vice chair on the Steering Committee for the Yampa River Fund in Steamboat.

He has also served as the chairman of the Colorado Ski Country USA Snowmaking Slope Maintenance Committee and currently serves as vice chair on the Colorado Passenger Safety Tramway Board.

What a ride.

“Dave has been around the ski business his entire life and for the past decade, Dave has worked for the world’s leading snowcat manufacturer based in heart of the Alps and then honed his leadership skills running resort operations at Steamboat while being a key contributor to our resort transformation with Full Steam Ahead,” said Rob Perlman who held Hunter’s position previously and is now executive vice president of regional operations for Alterra Mountain Company.

Full Steam Ahead is Steamboat's $200-million improvement and expansion that includes a new 10-seat gondola, a major mid-mountain learning center, expended snowmaking, and a terrain expansion, base area improvements, and other things.

“I am proud to continue to work with Dave in his new role, the Steamboat team and the Yampa Valley community on the next phase of the resort including the Gondola Transportation Center, regional transportation efforts and the mountain rail opportunity,” Perlman added.

While most of the components of Full Steam Ahead have already been implemented, Hunter is still excited by the changes.

"We have so much momentum right now," Hunter told Powder . "Full Steam Ahead was a game-changer for our resort, for our community, and really for the industry. Wild Blue Gondola providing seamless access from the base area up to Sunshine Peak, which is where our most sought after intermediate terrain is. Allowing guests at the end of the to download and not requiring them to avoid taking beginner runs and multiple chairlifts to get back to the base area. That used to be a long arduous process especially for families with young children, and then to top it off it's the fastest and longest 10-passenger gondola in North America. The other big thing about Wild Blue is that it increased our out-of-base capacity by 50 percent. We're a single-portal ski area so getting people out of the base is super important.

"Also, in regards to the Fish Creek Canyon and Mahogany Ridge expansion—we were always somewhat deficient in the double black diamond area. Mahogany Ridge is 300 acres of what Steamboat's famous for: tree skiing and riding. Meanwhile Fish Creek Canyon is really steep terrain. Taking that into our boundary and managing that has really put us on the map. And when I say on the map, it took us from being the fifth largest ski area in Colorado to being the second largest."

For you numbers fan, Steamboat is now at roughly 3,700 acres.

I must say, interviewing Dave Hunter was a real pleasure. He's eternally excited about the industry, his new position with Steamboat, and everything related to skiing and riding.

Why so psyched?

"The opportunity to make a difference." he said. "Our vision is to be the most welcoming resort on the planet."

Steamboat Ski Resort will host a community “Meet & Greet” with Dave Hunter and other resort leaders on the morning of June 21 at Library Hall from 8:45 to 9:45 am.

This will be a very informal affair—no presentation or anything, so community members can come and go at whatever time works for them.

This video is a few years old, and many of the upgrades envisioned here have already been implemented, but it's Dave Hunter at his old job and I couldn't resist.