Rick Schmitz’s passion for skiing became a family business
BROOKFIELD, Wis. (BVM) — If you ask Rick Schmitz, there is nothing in the world he would rather do than ski.
“It’s true,” Schmitz said. “When our ski season is done, I take a graycation and go skiing. A lot of people out East. And I go out West and go skiing.”
He loved it so much that when the opportunity came to turn his passion into a career, he didn’t hesitate to risk it all on his dream.
“I still remember it vividly,” Schmitz recalled.
It was his senior year of college and Schmitz was in business law night class when his brother told him to check out a website. It was a website where you could buy and sell businesses. Schmitz clicked on Wisconsin and looked for leisure businesses in his home state.
“The first thing on the list was Nordic Mountain,” Schmitz said.
Up to that point, Schmitz had had no luck figuring out what he wanted to do after college.
“I was looking to get a business degree and was looking at going into the finance world,” Schmitz said. “Had some internships and didn’t find any of them interesting, didn’t love them at all, in fact I kind of dreaded them.”
As soon as he saw Nordic was for sale, everything changed. He stopped applying for jobs and doing interviews. Instead, he began writing a business plan for the ski resort.
“It became my obsession from that point forward,” Schmitz said.
Schmitz bought the ski resort after he graduated. The resort had shown losses for five years and although he had practically no money to work with as well as no experience running a ski resort, Nordic Mountain turned a profit that first year.
After his success with Nordic, Schmitz partnered with a developer to run Blackjack in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Schmitz was loving what he did for a living and his family took notice.
Rick’s brothers Dave and Mike saw how much Rick enjoyed what he did and they wanted in. That’s when they turned their sights on the resort where they had first learned how to ski as kids, Little Switzerland. The longstanding resort had closed down in 2007, but the brothers were determined to bring it back.
With Dave’s background as an electrician, Mike’s background in construction and their dad, who loved working on projects, the brothers began to completely revamp the closed-down ski hill.
“It’s definitely a family affair,” Rick said.
On a shoestring budget and working long hours each week, the family slowly but surely began to bring Little Switzerland back to life.
However, just as they were putting the finishing touches on the resort and about to have their grand reopening, disaster struck. The chair lifts were failing the load testing and no one could figure out why. They brought in people to look at the lift and even removed chairs to lessen the weight on the lift, but nothing worked. Although it was looking bleak, Rick never lost hope. He stayed optimistic and above all else he kept the snow machines going.
“I remember my dad having a heart to heart with me saying, ‘Rick, are you sure you want to be making all this snow? Like are you sure you’re going to get this?’ and I was like, ‘Yeah, we’re going to get it,’” Rick said.
Only days before the opening of the resort, they fixed the problem and were able to open.
“I don’t know if it was for show or not, but Rick was super confident this whole time,” Mike said.
Little Switzerland has been a success ever since. Dave decided to leave the partnership, so Mike and Rick bought him out but the other two brothers are still loving the work. They have even added another resort to the group acquiring The Rock in 2017.
“It’s been a crazy adventure,” Rick said.
The brothers both love the work but in different ways. Rick just loves skiing. It’s his passion and if left to himself, he would ski everyday. Mike loves the business aspect of running the resorts. However, both love being able to turn their passion into a successful business.
For both the brothers, everything they have put into creating what they now have has been worth it.
“It is a challenge, but we’re building something and we’re very proud of what we’ve done here,” Mike said. “It’s a fun business. Like we always say here, we sell fun.”