Ask an avid winter slopesport enthusiast to name their top five favorite ski areas around Colorado. There’s a good chance at least one of their picks will be a spot that was formerly owned by a pet food company.

This story goes all the way back to 1894, when a company called Robinson-Danforth Commission Company was founded by William Danforth and two partners for the sake of manufacturing horse and mule feed. Just two years later, infrastructure damages from a tornado gave the company a sort of catastrophic fresh start with the decision made to sell food for humans, too. By 1898, the company was producing a product for the St. Louis market called Purina Whole Wheat Cereal and after successful marketing of this product with help from a man named Dr. Ralston, the company adopted the name Ralston-Purina by 1902 – a move that merged the two names that had started to develop good public recognition.

Over the following decades, the company produced its animal feed and cereal, eventually adding pet food into the mix, as well, along with other products. Once the 60s hit, the company was listed on the New York Stock Exchange and started to seek diversification in major ways.

Four years after Keystone Resort’s 1970 founding, Ralston Purina purchased the ski area. With the feed and pet food company as new owners, a major capital expansion plan for the area was implemented – something that would eventually play a key role in Keystone Resort becoming the major Colorado outdoor recreation hub that it is today.

Just four years after Ralston Purina purchased Keystone in 1974, the company bought Arapahoe Basin, too, in 1978. At a cost of $3 million, ownership hoped to supplement Keystone Resorts’ beginner and intermediate terrain with the expert terrain of their newest acquisition. Keep in mind – at this time, these resorts were significantly smaller in terms of skiable acres.

“Over the next 18 years, Ralston would bring stability and modernization to A-Basin while enhancing its reputation as a fun, challenging mountain,” reads the Arapahoe Basin website regarding this era.

Ralston Purina’s dive into the world of skiing didn’t stop there, either. In 1993, the company also purchased Breckenridge, giving them ownership of three prime skiing locations in Summit County. According to GoBreck, the three resorts logged a combined 2.6 million annual skier visits around this time.

Eventually, Vail Resorts would purchase the trio of spots as part of a spin-off merger in 1996. After less than a year, however, Arapahoe Basin was put back on the market as the “U.S. Justice Department balked at the potential for market dominance.” After all, the acquisition of the three ski areas by Vail Resorts mean that the company had become the owner of 43 percent of Colorado ski areas, per the Arapahoe Basin website. Arapahoe Basin was soon acquired by Dundee Resort Development of Canada (DREAM), which held onto it until A-Basin was sold to Alterra Mountain Company in 2024 for $105 million. Breckenridge and Keystone are still owned by Vail Resorts today.

Less than 10 years after the sale of all three ski spots, Ralston Purina – now with a key focus on pet food – was acquired by Nestlé in 2001. This resulted in the formation of the subsidiary called Nestlé Purina PetCare Company – or as most call it, Purina – that operates today. The company produces many recognizable brands of pet products, including Fancy Feast, Friskies, Moist & Meaty, Dog Chow, Beggin’, Purina Pro Plan, and more.

Locally, many Coloradans tend to associate Purina with the Nestle Purina factory that’s located along I-70 in the Denver area, but believe it or not, a former life of the same company also involved the crucial development of some of the state’s most famous and beloved ski spots.

STAY INFORMED: Get free Colorado news with our daily newsletter (Click here)