About Dan Ski & Build
Climate. Community. Comeback.
There used to be more than 2,000 ski areas in America. Today, fewer than 500 are still spinning lifts. Two companies own most of the marquee mountains. The towns that built modern skiing can no longer afford the people who run it. And the snow is becoming less reliable every year.
This is the moment American skiing gets reimagined — or it doesn't.
Dan Ski & Build exists to make sure it does.
What We Do
Dan Ski & Build is an independent platform for ideas, projects, and capital at the intersection of the ski industry, real estate, and investing. We acquire and reposition underperforming or dormant ski areas. We design new mountain communities from the ground up — built for the climate of 2050, not 1995. And we publish original analysis, founder essays, and deal-by-deal commentary on what's happening across the industry, so the operators, investors, builders, and skiers shaping the next era of the sport can compare notes in public.
We're not a corporation. We're a perspective with projects attached.
Why Now
Skiing has spent the last twenty years consolidating, financializing, and pricing out the people who made it culturally relevant in the first place. That cycle is reaching its limits — economically, environmentally, and politically. At the same time, the conditions for renewal are unusually strong:
The Forest Service has rewritten its ski-area permit rule, opening the door to four-season operations on public lands. A new generation of independent operators is buying back small mountains and proving the model works. Climate-aware capital is moving into resilient mountain regions. Towns are rewriting their housing codes to keep workers nearby. Hundreds of dormant ski areas still have lift footings, lodges, and snowmaking bones in the ground — waiting for someone with vision and capital to bring them back.
The window to rebuild American skiing — smarter, more independent, more affordable, more durable — is wide open right now. We're walking through it.
Our Principles
Workforce-first. No project moves forward without housing for the people who will run it. The lift operator and the line cook get the keys before the second-home buyer.
Climate-honest. Every site is evaluated against the snow reality of 2050, not 1995. We design for less natural snow, longer shoulder seasons, and four-season relevance.
Community-rooted. The soul of a mountain belongs to the people who actually ski it. Locals get a real seat at the table — financial, operational, and cultural.
Independent by design. We don't sell to the duopoly. The whole point is to keep these mountains out of the megapass funnel.
Quality over scale. A few great projects, done right, beat a portfolio of mediocre ones. We'd rather build five mountains worth loving than fifty worth tolerating.
About the Founder
Dan Ski & Build is led by Daniel Kaufman — a builder by trade, a skier for life, and a writer about the future of the sport. Daniel spent his career on the construction site and in the deal room, and now he's bringing both to the chairlift. He writes the essays, leads the projects, and answers the email himself.
What's Next
We're currently advancing several projects across multiple regions — some acquisitions of existing ski areas, some clean-sheet developments. Locations and partners will be announced in the coming months. Until then, we're building in public through our writing, our investor briefings, and direct conversations with skiers, operators, and mountain-town leaders.
If you're a skier with strong opinions, an operator looking for a thought partner, an investor interested in resilient real assets, a town that wants its mountain back, or a journalist covering the industry — we want to hear from you.
Reach us: danskiandbuild.com · @danskiandbuild
Climate. Community. Comeback.
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