Sleeping Giant, listed for sale in 2024, has found a buyer — but not one who plans a ski resort. Instead, the buyer is looking at he says will be unlike anything else for miles around.
Sleeping Giant Ski Area near Cody, Wyoming, has been closed the past three winters and was listed for sale in 2024.
The struggling ski area is now in the advanced stages of sale to a new owner, but, unfortunately for Cody-area skiers, it’s not likely to reopen as a ski resort any time soon.
The buyer is Dallas-based HMH Capital, which plans to reopen the resort as a summer recreational park in 2027.
Brent Hargrave, vice president of HMH Capital Group, said he’s looked at the numbers and doesn’t believe the area has what it needs for an economically feasible ski resort. But it does have outstanding numbers for a summer operation.
“Four million people are going to Yellowstone every year,” he told Cowboy State Daily. “Twenty-five percent of that population is under the age of 21 and one of the most popular questions, when I look at it is, ‘What else is there to do in Yellowstone other than Yellowstone, for the people who have children?’”
Hargrave isn’t throwing any shade on Yellowstone. It’s just that a kid is a kid, he explained. They’re looking for something else to do besides staring at nature’s beauty for three days’ straight, something “exhilarating."
And, with an average Yellowstone stay ranging between three to seven days, that works out to more than a million children looking for that something exhilarating.
Plenty of numbers to make a bang-up summer attraction economically feasible.
Unique Cultural Attraction
Hargrave plans to share more about HMH Capital's vision for Sleeping Giant during a public meet and greet Wednesday in the Cody area and wasn’t willing to “spoil the surprise” ahead of that meeting.
But he would say that the amenities he’s envisioning for Sleeping Giant will be something unique, something not already in the area. And the investment in those amenities will be substantial. Four million dollars for the first year, and $10 million over a five-year period.
“We’re not just going to be fixing up the lodge and have a place for people to hang out,” he said. “It’s more than that.”
It will be an outdoor cultural attraction, Hargrave said.
“But don’t think like iron rides everywhere and stuff like that,” he said. “We are a cultural attraction developer/operator. We like looking at places that can’t be replicated. And Sleeping Giant is a beautiful area that just cannot be replicated.”
Hargrave said the summer attractions at Sleeping Giant will be things that don’t already exist within at least a four-hour drive.
“There will be no competitors,” Hargrave said. “There will be things there that aren’t anywhere else.”
Skiing Not Off The Table
Hargrave does worry that members of the community will be disappointed that the ski resort isn’t reopening and stressed that it hasn’t been ruled out forever.
The company is going to keep it in the back of their mind with everything they are designing for Sleeping Giant.
“If we find that there’s a way we can do it in the future that’s profitable and popular, we’ll do it,” he said. “We’ll look at every way to make it happen. It’s just, we’re in the business to make a profit, and if we don’t feel like it’s going to do that, there’s really no point in looking into it.”
Hargrave feels there’s ample history showing that the area really struggles when it comes to being a viable ski resort. Part of that is the lack of snow, which requires a substantial amount of costly snowmaking.
But it’s also, lately, the weather. It’s been too warm, too late into the season.
“I think it’s 60 degrees up there right now,” Hargrave said. “It’s just proven many times that it doesn’t work as a ski resort. I wish it did. They’ve got Red Lodge up the way and a couple of other options, but it’s just gotten harder and harder to run ski resorts effectively. The ski industry has been hit hard, especially this year due to the weather, and it hasn’t gotten any cheaper to run a ski resort.”
History of Sleeping Giant
Sleeping Giant was first established in 1936 as the Red Star Camp in the Shoshone Forest. In 1938, it was renamed Sleeping Giant, and the owners ran it as a winter season amenity alongside their neighboring Shoshone Lodge.
Unfortunately, time took a toll on its older equipment. Some safety issues arose with the very old T-Bar that was still in use at the site and, when the owners couldn’t afford to bring that into compliance or replace it, the area was shuttered in 2004.
It was purchased in 2007 by local investors, who turned it over to a non-profit, Yellowstone Recreations Foundation. Locals contributed to an $800,000 Wake Up the Giant campaign to help raise the money needed to secure a $500,000 grant from the State Land Investment Board.
The money helped put in place a new and safer lift, as well as some snowmaking, electrical work, and other needed infrastructure.
The nonprofit didn’t have to try and make a profit and didn't. But as time went by, the ski area’s losses grew.
In 2019, the nonprofit announced that the ski area had been running an annual deficit of $200,000. There just weren’t enough skiers and snowboarders to support its ongoing operation anymore.
That’s when Cody investment banker Nick Piazza stepped in and bought the struggling ski area. He told Cowboy State Daily in 2020 that he just didn’t want to see his favorite ski area closing down.
For a time, it seemed that the ski area had turned a corner under Piazza’s ownership. But, in 2024, the ski resort announced it would not open due to lack of snow.
Later that same year it was listed for sale at $500,000 and hasn’t been open since. Piazza said then he was seeking a partner to take over its management, or to sell it outright.
Piazza has told Cowboy State Daily he’s put around $1.5 million into the ski area since buying it, including installing lights for night skiing, building a yurt, lift upgrades and other necessary maintenance.
For break-even, the mountain needs to sell 80 lift tickets a day, but it struggles to do that even in a good year.
Lack of snow has further hurt its chances at a break-even bottom line.
Lots Of Interest
Piazza’s 2024 listing for Sleeping Giant attracted a lot of interest across the skiing world, Piazza told Cowboy State Daily on Monday.
“The response was incredible,” he said. “I had like skier and snowboarder magazines and everyone contacting me. I felt like a pop star for about a week.”
There were 50 to 70 offers to consider in all, ranging from wealthy social media influencers to ranching families, and everything in between.
“That process took a long time because we had to sort out who was a good fit, who was a serious buyer, and who wasn’t,” Piazza said. “I think over the course of the next couple of months we had about six or seven left in the queue and we were looking for someone who wanted to continue outdoor recreation and things like that.”
The social media influencers were particularly interesting, at least at first, Piazza said.
“They seemed very gung-ho and I thought the idea was kind of cool,” he said. “I think they were going to do like YouTube videos of how they were restoring Sleeping Giant and kind of making money on the restoration.”
But their plan also involved creating more of a private club, which didn’t really fit Piazza’s vision of a community resource that supports tourism. The crew also didn’t have a lot of experience running a ski resort, which was worrisome as well.
“Their lack of experience wouldn’t be a good fit for the community,” Piazza said.
HMH Capital stood out from the crowd of contenders because it has experience running other unique cultural attractions.
“They own several similar properties,” Piazza said. “They even have a museum they run, so it seemed like a good fit and we decided to move forward with them. They kind of checked all the boxes.”
Piazza said he likes what he’s seen of the group’s plans for Sleeping Giant so far, which he characterized as “ambitious but doable.”
“Their focus is going to be, in the beginning, on the summer,” he said. “And they plan to add multiple new activities and do a lot of infrastructure work up there. I think it will be very good for Park County in terms of development and turning that more into a destination.”
Piazza said he believes the group is Sleeping Giant’s best chance at success for the future, even if it means not being a ski resort for a while.
“No one cares about Sleeping Giant more than us,” he said. “We want to see that asset succeed, and we know we’re doing our best to kind of find the next thing for it. We think this potential buyer is a good choice.”
Renée Jean can be reached at renee@cowboystatedaily.com.
