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Colorado - Mon. 07/20/26 |
A Free Business Publication from Alpine Bank
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LOTTIE’S MEATS: FROM STARTUP TO SALES IN TARGET STORES
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In 2024, Cassie Maschhoff and her sister Chelsey founded Lottie’s Meats in Denver, producing their brand of sausage. The sisters grew up on the family farm in Illinois, which had been in the family for six generations. Chelsey graduated from the Culinary Institute of America and after moving to Denver worked at several restaurants. She started making sausage using pork from the family farm, and serving it at restaurants where she worked, as well as some pop-ups. In 2024, Cassie quit her job at Google and joined her sister to launch Lottie’s. They sold their sausage to independent restaurants and grocery stores and within months were picked up by a regional distributor. In 2025, the company began expanding into markets in Northern and Southern California, which they identified as sharing a similar customer base.
In the fall, Target reached out to Lottie's as the chain tries to add more healthier and premium items to its grocery section. Lottie's products started reaching the shelves of 200 Target stores on the West Coast in late April and early May. Target decided to expand the products to stores in Colorado, Kansas and Nebraska, bringing the total number of stores to 250. The rollout in those stores started this weekend. Lottie's currently offers two types of raw ground sausage along with cooked bratwursts and sausage packs. The sisters are still the company's only full-time employees, but as the brand expands, they said they hope to start adding to the staff in 2027.
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MARTIN FAITH, STAINED GLASS ARTIST, REPAIR MASTER, SBA PERSON OF THE YEAR
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Martin Faith had a very indirect path to being named Colorado’s Small Business Person of the Year by the U.S. Small Business Administration. At his home in Glasgow, Scotland some 35 years ago, Faith was using vinyl windows to replace older windows, and he retained most of the old stained-glass windows he replaced, not knowing what to do with them. On vacation in Aspen in 1990, he saw stained glass for sale for high prices and nowhere near the quality of the ones he had in storage. He came to Colorado and began selling the windows from his new company Scottish Stained Glass and began historical restoration of stained glass. Today, his company in Centennial has 35 employees and Scottish Stained Glass has restored over 40,000 stained glass windows. Among those restored in Colorado: Mother Cabrini Shrine in Golden, the Deer Creek Church in Littleton, the Boulder Theater’s stained-glass facade, and Temple Emanuel in Denver.
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USING NATIVE PLANTS ON SKI SLOPES FOR REVEGETATION & CONSERVATION
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Some 90 people, including land managers and staff of the U.S. Forest Service, ski industry officials, university researchers, conservation group members and others, gathered Wednesday, July 15 at Copper Mountain Resort for the resort’s Ski Conservation Summit. Presentations focused on Copper Mountain’s 10-year carbon sequestration study, which started in 2022. The study aims to develop methods to increase the native plant diversity on ski trails. The study grew out of a project to collect native seeds from around the resort and use the native plants to restore the land that is impacted from cutting ski runs. The creation of lifts and ski runs has historically impaired or removed nutrient-rich topsoil and while the native plants cannot restore the soil, they can stabilize the surface, providing watershed protection as well as runoff and erosion control.
Now with the increase in impacts of climate change, the carbon sequestration project is designed to use plants to help reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Plants absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through photosynthesis, and that carbon can be locked into the soil when plants die and decompose into a nutrient-rich topsoil, according to Western Colorado University researchers. The Copper Mountain carbon sequestration study will compare how three different treatments affect native plant growth on the ski slopes.
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CPW ISSUES VOLUNTARY CLOSURES ON COLORADO, EAGLE, ROARING FORK & CRYSTAL
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Last week, Colorado Parks and Wildlife announced voluntary fishing closures on the Colorado River, as well as the Eagle, Roaring Fork and Crystal rivers. According to CPW, the voluntary closures are a result of low flows and high-water temperatures. The release states, “Severe drought conditions have driven river flows well below 50 percent of the long-term average, while daily maximum water temperatures are consistently exceeding 71 degrees in several cases." The voluntary closure on the Roaring Fork stretches from Carbondale to the confluence with the Colorado River in Glenwood Springs. CPW has created a Summertime Drought Management section on its website with a List of Closures for all rivers and streams in the state at cpw.state.co.us.
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CDOT WORK ON RED MOUNTAIN PASS WILL CAUSE DELAYS FOR TWO MONTHS
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The Colorado Dept. of Transportation announced that it will begin two months of road work on U.S. Hwy. 550 on Red Mountain Pass between Silverton and Ouray on Monday, July 20. According to CDOT, the work will occur at two locations about two miles apart just south of Ouray. Repairs are scheduled for Bear Creek Tunnel at mile point 90.3 and retaining wall repairs are scheduled at mile point 88.6. Travelers should expect full stops, alternating traffic and up to 20-minute delays, with full night-time closures scheduled for late summer. Work hours are from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. on weekdays, and work may also occur during weekends. Access to trailheads and scenic overlooks will remain open. CDOT advised backcountry 4×4 travelers taking the Alpine Loop from Lake City to Ouray to heed traffic impacts. Single-lane, alternating traffic will be directed by 24/7 traffic signals through the work zone.
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HIGH-END PROPERTIES IN SUMMIT COUNTY CONTINUE TO BOOM
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Just ten years ago, Summit County had four active residential property listings priced for more than $5 million. Today? There are more than 50. There is particular growth at the high end of the market. Real estate brokers say that prior to 2020, there weren’t $15 million properties in the county. Now, Summit County boasts multiple listings well above that price level. The most expensive active listing is currently priced at $25 million, with the next-highest just above $20 million. Ten properties are listed above $10 million, all located in Breckenridge and primarily in established luxury areas such as the Timber Trail neighborhood below the base of Peak 8 and the Shock Hill neighborhood near the Breckenridge Nordic Center.
Dana Cottrell, a Summit Resort Group broker and president of the Altitude Realtors Association, estimates there are currently 53 active residential listings above $5 million in Summit County. That accounts for roughly 6.7 percent of all residential inventory, excluding mobile homes and deed-restricted workforce housing. A decade ago, the picture looked dramatically different, Cottrell said. In May 2016, Summit County had four homes listed above $5 million. By May 2022, that number had climbed to 26. It rose to 36 in 2024 and reached 54 in 2025. As of this May there were 53, and Cottrell expects more listings to hit the market by the end of the year.
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GJ DEPOT PROJECT RECEIVES $624,000 TAX CREDIT FROM COEDIT
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The Grand Junction Union Depot project has been awarded $624,000 in tax credits by the Colorado Creative Industries division of the Colorado Office of Economic Development and International Trade. Although the award is not direct funding and will benefit the project only after completion, it is significant for securing a construction loan. The depot recently crossed $1 million in fundraising, with $3 million more still to be raised to meet the estimated construction cost. Co-owner Dustin Anzures notes, "This building can only produce so much income, no matter what you do with it, and it was never going to be able to support a $4-5 million restoration. Without public contributions, buildings like this end up being demolished and they never get saved.” The project also received a pair of $250,000 grants from History Colorado’s State Historical Fund. Nonprofit Friends of GJ Union Depot has raised about $150,000 in donations in addition to that.
The depot will, once renovated, integrate transportation, hospitality, cultural programming, retail and a community gathering space. The project includes an Amtrak ticketing and waiting area, a restaurant and a locally focused retail marketplace. Cultural programming will include exhibits, workshops, classes, live music and community events. Other Western Slope projects awarded the incentive include the Telluride Film Festival ($1.5 million for the restoration of the Nugget movie theater), Honey Rock in Silverton ($945,000 for the Old Livery mixed-use community hub), and the Creede Center for the Arts ($795,000 for a multi-use arts hub).
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MUDSLIDES A PRODUCT OF MONSOONS ON WESTERN SLOPE?
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Rainstorms brought mudslides that closed roads in two areas on the Western Slope last week. Although there has generally been very hot, dry weather, on Thursday, July 16, a heavy rainstorm caused at least three large mudslides on East Portal Road washing debris down the drainages above, leaving parts of it buried up to 6 feet deep in boulders and muck. The mudflow covered the entire East Portal campground, and a large part of the picnic area, which have since been closed for assessments and repairs. Twenty-one campers and other travelers were stranded at the bottom of East Portal Road. Law enforcement, NPS and facility management crews with that agency and the Bureau of Land Management successfully evacuated 18 of the people by Thursday midnight; a motorcyclist and two other visitors who had vehicle problems waited until the road wasn’t as saturated and were evacuated by the next morning at 9 a.m.
East Portal Road was also closed to all forms of traffic and travel. An estimated reopening time, extent of damage and costs of repair are not yet available. On Saturday afternoon, July 18, Colorado 145 was closed because of mudslides north of Keystone Hill outside of Telluride, near Silverpick Road, the San Miguel County Sheriff’s Office advised. Up to 2 feet of mud, with big boulders and large trees were part of debris that flowed across the entire roadway. The roadway reopened shortly after 9 p.m. Saturday.
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SOME 900 FIRES BURNING IN CANADA – WHY SO LITTLE CONTAINMENT?
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There are nearly 900 active wildfires burning in Canada, covering virtually all the country, with only one province and three territories without fires. Canada has vast forest land with its boreal forest, a forest with cold-hardy coniferous trees growing just south of the Arctic tundra, encompassing 1.3 billion acres. That is an area roughly seven times as large as the 154 U.S. national forests combined. Because of the location of the fires in these remote forests, there are no highways or roads, and very little access. Most are in northern Ontario and Quebec, where it has been hot and dry, as well as the Northwest Territories, which is experiencing a drought and received less than 40 percent of normal precipitation in June. Some places with fires had low snow accumulation last winter. Even if air resources are deployed, some fires have become so large and intense that water bombers are unlikely to put them out. Deploying crews is dangerous.
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TOP STATES FOR BUSINESS: BEST WORKFORCE
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For CNBC’s annual America’s Top States for Business list, one of the most important categories is workforce. The workforce category is measured on factors such as net migration of workers to each state, with an emphasis on college-educated employees; the percentage of each state’s workforce with college and advanced degrees, as well as the concentration of science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) employees; also, each state's pipeline of students and graduates in career education.
Top states in the workforce category:
- Texas
- Florida
- North Carolina
- Arizona
- Utah
- Washington
- Tennessee
- South Carolina
- Georgia
- Colorado
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MARKET UPDATE - 07/17/2026 Close
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(Courtesy of Alpine Bank Wealth Management*)
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Canadian dollar (per U.S. dollar)
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Mexican peso (per U.S. dollar)
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30-year fixed mortgage rate (Freddie Mac 07/16/2026)
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*Not FDIC insured. May lose value. Not guaranteed by the bank.
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Alpine Bank is an independent, employee-owned organization with headquarters in Glenwood Springs and banking offices across Colorado's Western Slope, mountains and Front Range. Alpine Bank serves customers with retail, business, wealth management*, mortgage and electronic banking services. Learn more at alpinebank.com.
*Alpine Bank Wealth Management services are not FDIC insured, may lose value and are not guaranteed by the bank.
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