Industry Q&A: Robert Drake arrives at Gunstock with a bang

New Gunstock general manager Robert Drake. (Gunstock Mountain)

Starting at a new job is not always the easiest thing to do. You are tasked with learning about the new group of employees under your leadership, the expectations of customers you hope will continue to come to the mountain, and to quickly understand what needs to be done to make the experience better for guests and staff.

It was announced in July that Robert Drake would assume the role of president and general manager for the retiring Tom Day at Gunstock Mountain Resort in Gilford, N.H. Drake formally started his role on Aug. 5, in the middle of $4.8 million capital improvement project.

He arrived at Gunstock — owned by Belknap County — by way of Middlebury Snowbowl in Vermont, where he was the business operations general manager. Drake is definitely a rare breed, especially in New England, having grown up in Texas, learning to ski in New Mexico before spending most of his working years at nonprofit Bridger Bowl in Montana.

He might be an outsider, but his wife, Heather, is a New Englander, so while Drake might not be one of us, he totally understands us.

Note: The following interview has been edited for space and clarity.

New England Ski Journal: You’ve been on the job for about 10 weeks,. How has it been so far?

Robert Drake: It’s been fantastic, actually. Gunstock is a pretty amazing place. You know, obviously, I’ve had some big shoes to fill from Mr. Tom Day, but things have been going well.

NESJ: What has it been like to start in the middle of some pretty big projects?

Drake: We’ve put $4.8 million into capital improvements this summer. A lot of those projects are being wrapped up right now. We’ve spent a significant amount of time working on a couple of our signature runs, but also adding some snowmaking that’ll make a big difference here.

We have a trail, Upper Ramrod, that had an odd kind of exit. If you came down that run, you had to basically kind of hike out on your skis if you didn’t have enough speed to get over (a ledge), up the work road, essentially. It was a few days after I started, they were setting up all the blasting on that run to remove the ledge and drop it down so that it flows properly into Trigger. It looks amazing.

NESJ: So you came in with a bang?

Drake: Yeah, literally. It’s pretty amazing. There’s probably 15 to 18 feet of ledge that was blown out over a section of that run and it’s made a significant difference there. I think there’s probably about 25 feet of fill that’s gone across there to level all that out and connect it to the next run.

It was pretty exciting to be on the end of that line and be able to push that button. Of course, Tom got the first round, but I got the next round. It was really fun to be a part of that and to see it all happen.

NESJ: What words of advice has Tom given you?

Drake: He’s still around finishing out these projects, so we talk quite often. I think the best words of advice that that I got from him was, “Hey, you’ve got a great group of people here. The team really is dialed in and just build good relationships with them. The first six months of your role here is to get to know all those folks really well.” I think that that that piece of advice is really important as you’re rolling into a really well-established team. Luckily, I’m fortunate enough to inherit a well-established team.

NESJ: Your previous two stops, Middlebury Snowbowl and Bridger Bowl, one is run by a college and one is a nonprofit. How do they help you here at a county-owned facility?

Drake: I think it’s an interesting mix of oddities in the ski industry. Those two prior locations really set me up to be successful here. You know, essentially the county commission, we’re reporting to a board of directors in every sense of the word.

Being at Bridger, obviously we reported to a board of directors. At Middlebury, it was a little different. We reported to the finance department, but we also had a task force in place that we worked with, and there was a group of about 12 people on that task force. So, we were meeting once a month and talking about what’s next for the ski area.

I think the parallels between Gunstock and Bridger Bowl are pretty close. The community involvement here at Gunstock and the stoke for skiing is very similar to Bridger Bowl. I think all those things have set me up to be the right guy for this role.

NESJ: What appealed to you about Gunstock?

Drake: It was a number of things, actually. I listened to Tom’s podcasts when I got a call that there was a position open here. So I listened to his podcast and that really kind of piqued my interest. Obviously being in the ski industry, the whole ski industry was fully aware of what took place here — national industry news without question.

I was driving with my wife listening to him, and she looked at me and she said, “I hear a lot of parallels. I really think you need to talk to these folks.” I’d already had an interview set up, but I set up the time to come over.

When I got here and saw what they’ve done with this facility, hanging on to the history of this place, not losing the essence of what Gunstock is, I was really impressed. And then when I met everybody, that was kind of, that was my moment of, if I get this offer, I’m taking this. So the people had a lot to do with my desire to come here. But it’s hard to walk around this facility and not see the care and love that people have put into this place and they’re really passionate about it, and that’s the kind of people that I want to be around.

NESJ: What kind of snowmaking upgrades were made?

Drake: The snowmaking upgrades that we’ve done this summer will put us at 98 percent of the mountain having snowmaking on it. We added top-to-bottom snowmaking on Hot Shot, one of our expert trails. I’m actually really excited to ski that one. I’ve hiked the whole thing up and down. I know people around town are excited about being able to ski that more consistently.

We also added top-to-bottom snowmaking on Upper Ramrod. That’s really going to be a game-changer to relieve some of that pressure over on that side with the intermediate trails coming down.

We’ve also upgraded a lot of our snowmaking heads that’ll be more efficient on some of our lower mountain trails as well. All of those upgrades will make it easier for us to put snow on the hill, which is what we need to be focused on here in New England.

We increased our capacity by 72 snow guns with 46 new permanent units and 26 mobile units.

NESJ: What did you think of the base lodge when you first saw it?

Drake: When I walk into that main hall, I can’t help but think about Old Faithful Inn at Yellowstone, having been from that area for the past nearly 30 years. It has the same features as that lodge on a smaller scale, but it’s absolutely fantastic and there’s a lot of really good history here.

All these timbers and all of that stone that’s in this lodge came off of this property, so that’s an amazing thing to be able to talk about.

NESJ: Gunstock isn’t on any sort of megapass. Could that change in the near future?

Drake: We are fiercely independent, and we will remain that way.