The Crested Butte News Serving the Gunnison Valley since 1999
Notice more New York accents than usual this past week? New Yorkers love Telluride. Forbes Magazine last summer called Telluride “the Hamptons of the west.” Wealthy east coasters love our San Juan Mountains sister city — when the ski lifts are running. And the lifts weren’t running last weekend and at the start of the week because of a labor dispute between the ski resort and Telluride ski patrol. Fuhgeddaboutit!
I heard several Crested Butte locals say they ran into plenty of people who had booked Telluride for this busy holiday week, but since CB was relatively close, and more importantly open, they headed here. They checked into local hotel rooms, went to local restaurants, and got to experience the efficiency and charm of our local lift lines.
The Forbes article noted that some “Uber-rich are flocking to Telluride because they crave privacy (we can beat that with the CBMR Base Area after 5 p.m.), authenticity (try to cut the lift line in front of a crusty CB local, sucker!), adventure (slippery sidewalks on Elk Avenue are a real adventure!) and bespoke luxury (what the heck does that mean?).” Well welcome to Crested Butte, people!
Some of the biggest private jets I’ve ever seen were at the Gunnison Airport this past week. Coincidence? It is of course the holidays and there is no doubt more money finding its way into the valley and private jets are one marker signifying that. We’ve always had a handful of people here who have been able to afford such luxury but the ones I saw while recycling cans of Rotel and brown glass were big. Really big.
GUC airport manager Rick Lamport told me the GUC airport has definitely been busy and while it seems the private jets coming in are getting bigger, he explained that “a ramp full of planes is very typical each year during the winter and summer holidays.” He indicated that what I saw doesn’t seem out of the ordinary. Sometimes private planes need to be parked on the commercial ramp as the General Aviation ramp gets maxed out, so they stack up. This apparently is such a time. I guess it’s just another indication of the level of money finding its way here.
Or is it tied in part to Telluride?
One friend suggested that perhaps they were flying here because Telluride Resort’s billionaire owner Chuck Horning decided to close the resort during the current labor conflict. I don’t know much, but I do know ski patrollers are pretty important to ski resorts in these tricky Rocky Mountains. My cursory look at that strike indicates the fight right now is over breadcrumbs to the billionaire owner: reportedly, the financial gap between the two sides is about $112,000 in the first year and roughly $65,000 across the three-year contract.
As important to the patrollers as an increase in wages, is how the structure of the pay is organized. Ski patrollers say they want to be able to make patrolling a career in Telluride. Right on. That benefits everyone — the people, the resort and the community.
As another friend pointed out, Telluride is enough like Crested Butte that we can assume the general citizenry is standing behind the patrollers…but will they have that same attitude in a week or two when there is little business and there are fewer tourist dollars circulating through the town?
Another rumor has it that skiers in Telluride are being bussed to Crested Butte for a ski day. Camp CB! A bus may not be as luxurious as a private jet, but it is a scenic drive. Hopefully the buses take a little tour of the quaint downtown for people to see before rushing up to ski Peanut and Ice-ernational and check out the, shall say we say, charmingly muted Base Area. Actually, those brave souls venturing away from the glamour of 2025 T’ride get to have a flashback Telluride experience from the early 2000s in Crested Butte. Like Telluride, CB is a small former mining town with some old miner’s shacks but a little less flashy, a tad more basic (again, be careful on our slippery sidewalks!), and a lot more old-school. Telluride is probably 15 years ahead of us on the luxury meter, but I’d guess my realtor friends are hoping the temporary T’ride invasion opens some eyes to the bargains that are sitting here. “Only $12 million Tiffany?! Hand them the Black Card.”
I’m guessing that if some of those really big jets in Gunnison are owned by Telluride clients and the buses are running from T’ride to CB, the local Crested Butte and Mt. CB businesses are happy to stand behind the Telluride ski patroller’s strike demands until they get absolutely everything they want—even if it takes all season! Heck, they should be donating to the patrol’s GoFundMe account while the Chamber’s new motto might change to…United We Stand With the Telluride Patrollers — visit CB for real Authenticity and Adventure!
Welcome to Crested Butte!
—Mark Reaman
