Department of Justice examines Alterra’s pending acquisition of Arapahoe Basin

Skiers wait in line to get on the lift at Arapahoe Basin Ski Area on Loveland Pass, Colorado on June 16, 2024.

Federal antitrust investigators are scrutinizing the Denver-based Alterra Mountain Company’s pending acquisition of Arapahoe Basin, one of Colorado’s last ski areas independent of corporate resort empires.

Alterra officials accounting it as a “customary” review that the US Department of Justice requires for large transactions.

The investigators have asked for business data on skiers at resorts across the Rocky Mountain region from the National Ski Areas Association.

Department of Justice officials were mum. “We will have no comment on any open investigation,” federal spokeswoman Melissa Brandon said.

The DOJ has requested financial and visitation data that the NSAA and its market research partner RRC Associates collect from ski areas. Federal investigators sent a Civil Investigative Demand, which is an administrative subpoena, and NSAA officials notified ski areas in a letter, according to the snowology website that first reported the demand.

“A filing with the DOJ was required, which is customary given the size of the transaction,” according to a statement from Alterra’s chief legal officer Karen Sanford. “We are working through the process,” the statement said, and “we cannot otherwise comment on the status of the ongoing review with the DOJ.”

NSAA officials, too, have cast the scrutiny as a routine review and on Friday declined to comment.

In the letter sent to ski areas last week, NSAA officials said DOJ investigators were looking into whether the proposed acquisition would stifle competition in the Rocky Mountain region. The letter said the feds were seeking survey data from 2023/2024 and the 2018/2019 ski season, when Alterra first introduced its Ikon Pass.