PARK CITY — Reputation is still king when it comes to pricing luxury ski resorts, which means developers hoping to attract high-end clients have to be at their creative best to engage in successful one-upmanship.
Deer Crest Associates is seeing notable success in the way it has configured a new luxury hotel and condominium resort under construction at Deer Valley.
Unique positioning includes a full-amenity ski-in, ski-out complex inside a gated community that features a Swiss-built funicular railway and solid branding with management through the St. Regis brand of Starwood Hotels and Resorts Worldwide Inc.
Park City is still climbing the ladder in the international community of luxury ski resorts, which for investors means a home that would cost $2.7 million in Aspen is a bargain at $1.7 million, the Park City Board of Realtors noted in November. Branding with five-star hotelier St. Regis likely will help close that gap, both for the new Deer Crest development and the Park City area generally, believes Matt Green, president of the Park City Board of Realtors.
"The St. Regis, along with a couple of other big new developments, opens up a segment we have not tapped into before," Green said. "The name recognition carries a lot of clout. People that participate in other markets that are familiar with that brand at other resorts are excited.
"We definitely see some interest garnished from that reputation."
In the Park City area generally, "it gives that much more credibility and that much more strength to our market as a national resort destination," Green said. Development of the St. Regis Resort, Deer Crest, "drives traffic to the Park City/Deer Creek valley area, beyond the scope of the St. Regis."
The resort is scheduled for completion in 2008.
The development site's geography is also a significant asset, said St. Regis project manager Greg Griffin.
"I think if you just look at the general siting of this hotel and the way it sits, nestled above Snow Park in Deer Valley, it's close to everything and it has a feeling that it's remote and removed from Snow Park and that it sits up on the mountain almost like a classic European ski setting," Griffin said. "You look to the north down towards Park City and Deer Valley. To the east you see the Jordanelle Valley."
The St. Regis, Deer Crest, includes 24 private residences, 67 condominium hotel suites and additional luxury guest rooms and suites. The residences range in size from a little more than 2,000 square feet to about 6,500 square feet in 12 different unit models on the top four levels of the hotel. They range in price from $2.5 million to more than $7 million. About 60 percent are presold.
The residences are distinguished from the resort's one- to four-bedroom condominium section in that the condos have bedrooms that can be separated from a main unit and used as independent hotel rooms, bringing the total possible hotel room units at the resort to 181, Griffin said. Condo owners can decide whether to make their property available for hotel room rentals. The condos range in size from 1,800 square feet to 3,600 square feet.
The funicular is billed as the first at a North American ski resort. "What this allows the project to do is build the hotel (and residences) on the upper site where the views are and give guest access to the main basin at Snow Park" 500 feet below, Griffin said. "Another thing the funicular does is allow public access to the hotel from the Snow Park site."
Cabins for the funicular are being built by Gangloff of Berne, Switzerland, makers of the first funicular railway, produced in 1929.
E-mail: sfidel@desnews.com