From Bankrupt to Mountain Empire Builder

Summary

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Living The Red Life – "From Bankrupt to Mountain Empire Builder"

Host: Rudy Mawer (with guest host Rey Guterres)
Guest: Spencer Christiansen
Date: May 22, 2026

Episode Overview

In this episode, guest host Rey Guterres sits down with entrepreneur and lodge owner Spencer Christiansen to delve into the realities, challenges, and philosophies behind building the Grand Mesa Lodge in Colorado. The conversation paints a vivid portrait of how Spencer transitioned from previous setbacks (including bankruptcy) to crafting a legacy-driven business in one of the nation’s harshest yet most beautiful environments. The episode delivers actionable insights for entrepreneurs on resilience, operational excellence, and the deeper need for real-world, nature-rooted experiences in today's artificial world.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Origin & Mystique of Grand Mesa Lodge

• Grand Mesa Lodge: Established in 1897, now boasting 15–16 cabins and a main lodge situated at 10,500 feet on Colorado’s Grand Mesa (01:28).

• Restoration & Vision: When Spencer took over, the main lodge was solid, but cabins were dilapidated. He saw an opportunity to elevate and preserve its legacy.

  “My goal… was to elevate it from mostly a rundown… to bring it up to… a four star, five star, as opposed to one or two star…” — Spencer (10:02)

• Operational Challenges:

  • Fierce winters: ~400 inches of snowfall annually, bitter cold, and frequent thunderstorms create year-round difficulties (03:19–03:47).
  • Unique issues: keeping water/power running, constant snow removal, lightning strikes taking out hundred-year-old trees (03:40–04:41).

2. Diverse Clientele & Their Motivations

• Summer Guests:

  • Scenic Byway travelers on Highway 65 passing through for a day or two, seeking a nature break (05:18–05:59).
  • Outdoor enthusiasts: fishers, campers, disconnecting from tech-laden life—no cell service outside the lodge except for Starlink internet (05:59–07:00).

• Winter Guests:

  • Primarily destination snowmobilers from all over the country, drawn by Grand Mesa’s uniquely accessible terrain (07:00–08:12).
  • High percentage are business owners or entrepreneurs—snowmobiling is an expensive hobby, so those who can afford it are often successful professionals (08:12–09:32).
  • “Probably 70 or 80% of my snowmobiling clientele are also business owners, entrepreneurs, business managers…” — Spencer (08:51)

3. Elevating the Lodge & Creating Unique Experiences

• From Survival to Legacy Building:

  • The lodge’s deep history shapes Spencer’s vision for its future—bridging rustic legacy and upgraded hospitality (10:02).
  • Experimenting with marketing and experience offerings—e.g., haunted houses for Halloween, skills clinics, live music, community events (10:59–20:01).

• Backcountry Experiences & Entrepreneurial Parallels:

  • Ride the Wild: Spencer authored this comprehensive snowmobiling book, blending practical backcountry survival with business lessons. The skills needed for safe, effective backcountry riding mirror those needed in entrepreneurship: SOPs, final checklists, readiness for the unknown (11:32–13:47).
  • “One thing that really, really would help an entrepreneur if you're trying to build any sort of business—systems is everything, right? Oh, I mean, it's everything.” — Spencer (16:37)

• Systems Thinking:

  • The power of checklists—whether for snowmobilers preparing for an avalanche or entrepreneurs about to launch a campaign, meticulous preparation is non-negotiable for survival or success (13:57–16:37).

4. Nature, Clarity, and Escape from ‘Artificial Living’

• Disconnecting for Clarity:

  • Guests—especially entrepreneurs—retreat to the lodge seeking clarity and solitude, away from artificiality and digital overwhelm (08:12, 22:22).
  • Notable anecdote: A guest stayed 9 months with the sole purpose of writing a book, embodying the kind of transformation the environment can offer (22:22).

• On Modern Artificiality:

  • Both Spencer and Rey repeatedly underscore humanity’s increasing detachment from genuine experiences. Social connections, content, and even work have become ‘artificial,’ compounded by AI and digital overload (00:00–00:46, 23:02–23:54).

    “Everything is so artificial. And I think that our brains as humans aren’t really designed to function like that… There’s this really deep, intrinsic, embedded need that people have to connect with nature.” — Spencer (23:24)

  • The lodge offers an antidote—real community, real nature, and real challenges requiring presence and engagement (23:54–24:47).

5. Year-Round Community Building and Content Marketing

• Local Hub:
  • Beyond being a destination, the lodge fulfills a local community function, hosting live music, events, and acting as a gathering point (19:44–20:02).
• Digital Reach:
  • The first snows of the season typically go viral—3–400,000 views on a short video, leveraging the lodge’s location and outdoor appeal for powerful content marketing (20:49).

6. Transformational Experiences and Encouraging Repeat Visits

• Seasonal Premium Experiences:

  • Summer foraging and mushroom clinics in the works—capitalizing on rising interest, creating new revenue channels while enriching guest experiences (18:28–19:29).
  • Each season brings new experiences—snowmobiling in winter, foraging and hiking in summer, meaning guests are encouraged to return for different adventures (21:27).

• Retreats for Creators & Seekers:

  • The lodge is already a favorite for writers, entrepreneurs, and teams seeking purposeful getaways (22:22–22:48).

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the Importance of Nature for Entrepreneurs:

  "A lot of people that go to the mountain... retreat to the solitude... because they're looking for clarity in their life. A lot of times it's business-related." — Spencer (08:12)

• On Systems for Success:

  "One thing that really, really would help an entrepreneur if you're trying to build any sort of business—systems is everything, right? Oh, I mean, it's everything." — Spencer (16:37)

• On Artificiality in Modern Life:

  “Everything is so artificial. And I think that our brains as humans aren’t really designed to function like that… There’s this really deep, intrinsic, embedded need that people have to connect with nature.” — Spencer (23:24)

• On Failures as Learning:

  “There have been people that have been killed in avalanches, and they found them with the transceiver in the off position. It's just one little thing.” — Spencer (15:34)

• On Building Legacy:

  “The lodge has been there for 125 years. 130 years. It's going to be there in 130 years after me.” — Spencer (10:02)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• The Grand Mesa Lodge & its History: 01:28–03:19
• Operational Challenges of Mountain Lodges: 03:19–05:09
• Types of Guests & Their Motivations: 05:18–09:32
• Upgrading the Lodge & Entrepreneurial Parallels: 10:02–13:47
• Checklists, Systems, and Business Lessons: 13:47–17:58
• Community Building & Digital Marketing: 19:44–20:49
• Nature, Artificiality, and the Need for Real Connection: 23:02–24:47
• How to Find Grand Mesa Lodge: 25:34

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Episode Takeaways

• Building a lasting business is as much about vision and systems as it is about overcoming operational adversity.
• Nature offers clarity, depth, and transformation—especially valuable for entrepreneurs mired in the artificial chaos of digital life.
• Systems, checklists, and preparedness not only save lives on the mountain—they are foundational for any business venture aiming for legacy.
• Real-world, legacy-driven entrepreneurship is messy, challenging, and deeply rewarding—especially when anchored in authentic community and environment.

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Find Grand Mesa Lodge:
grandmesalodge.com | Regular updates and captivating visuals on Facebook

Next Episode Preview:
Stay tuned for a deeper dive into Spencer’s personal journey—his failures, motivations, and the turning points that shaped him as an entrepreneur and legacy builder.

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Transcript

[Spencer Christiansen]

The world that we live in.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Is so artificial.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

In every way imaginable.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, for sure.

[Spencer Christiansen]

I mean, your relationships with other people. Artificial.

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

A lot of the content that you see and even more so now with AI. Right. And I think that our brains as humans aren't really designed to function like that. Right. I think that we're designed to have real connections with real people, not online and certainly not AI connections. It's really deep, intrinsic, embedded need that people have to connect with nature. One thing that really, really would help an entrepreneur if you're trying to build any sort of business.

[Rudy Moore]

My name's Rudy Moore, host of Living the Red Life podcast, and I'm here to change the way you see your life in your earpiece every single week. If you're ready to start living the red life, ditch the blue pill, take the red pill. Join me in wonderland and change your life life.

[Rey Guterres]

Welcome back to another episode of the living your legacy podcast, the legacy makers Edition. Also 10x Red Life Edition for Inside Success. I am rigs now that we've got all of our brands and IPS out of the way. Let's see. Let me look at my notes here. Who do we have next here? Spencer Christiansen, my friend. How are you, buddy?

[Spencer Christiansen]

I'm doing well. Thanks for having me on.

[Rey Guterres]

You come with a vision. I've heard of a lodge. Tell me about this kingdom that you are building and we'll call it a lodge.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, so it's a lodge in western Colorado. It's on a mountain called Grand Mesa. Lodge itself is called Grand Mesa Lodge. It's 15, 16 cabins and a main lodge. And I think that we're the highest lodge in the continental United States that operates year round.

[Rey Guterres]

Very cool.

[Spencer Christiansen]

We're about two miles above sea level, right on 10,500ft.

[Rey Guterres]

I'm, I'm, I'm eager to know more about this lodge because I, I come from the video game world and boy, have I solved a lot of murder mysteries and lodges and so has my partner, Lauren. Tell me, tell me about the mystique up this lodge, especially out in the Colorado. What, what have you built, sir?

[Spencer Christiansen]

The. The mountains are really interesting and the lodge is very unique. The lodge was actually started not by me. It's. It's existed since the 19th century. It was started in 1897, I think, and in the early days, it was just a. It was just a fishing lodge where people would ride their horses up and stay for a couple months in the summertime. It has obviously traded hands several times and when I came upon it, it was. The main lodge was in, was really nice and was new, but the. The buildings were very old and run down. And I was like, this is a really cool place. It would be awesome to have somebody that could run it and could build it and could, like, bring it forth in, like, all of its glory. The mountains, really. It's kind of tough to run a lodge in those situations. The reason I mentioned earlier that it was the highest lodge in the continental United States, it's open year round. Is the difficulty of running a lodge in an area that gets so much snow.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, for sure, dude.

[Spencer Christiansen]

So we get. We get 400 on. On average, about 400 inches of snowfall per year. There's like 30 to 40ft of accumulation and obviously very cold. And so there's just a lot of operational challenges.

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah, yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

When you have that much snow that, I mean, six months out of the year, it's just snow, snow, snow, snow, snow. And we run year round.

[Rey Guterres]

So when folks visit the lodge, they're getting 20% of the experience, while 80%. It's really maintenance operations, things that are happening behind the scenes.

[Spencer Christiansen]

That's not. Yeah, that's probably a very good way to express it. I mean, just to show up. Just the amount of snow removal and the amount of other maintenance that needs to go into the operations, whether it's, you know, keeping the cabins unfrozen, whether it's, you know, keeping power to them and all the other things that go along with running in a very. Basically a very inhospitable place. Wow. I mean, that much snow, very cold. You've got other issues too. I mean, that high, we get a lot of thunderstorms. A couple years ago, we were in the main lodge and it sounded like artillery fire outside. Lightning struck the lodge and also struck a tree right next to it. And the tree was huge. I mean, at the base is probably four feet.

[Rey Guterres]

And I can see you're a tree hugger, so. Yeah, I recognize a good tree hugger.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Well, the lightning bolt definitely wasn't. It totally destroyed the tree.

[Rey Guterres]

But that was technically you from a different dimension coming down saying, yes, it's

[Spencer Christiansen]

your time, it's your time to go. I mean, there's tons of trees up there, so it's just the one inside, and it's still a beautiful place. But yeah, there's just a lot of. A ton of challenges running a lodge in a pretty remote place in, you know, that high up in the mountains.

[Rey Guterres]

I got to ask, who the hell

[Spencer Christiansen]

goes to a remote place where it

[Rey Guterres]

sounds very challenging to relax, like who is your clientele? What happens in this lodge?

[Spencer Christiansen]

So we have two different kinds of clientele. The, the first type of person that we have is the Scenic Byway traveler. And this is summertime mostly.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, right on.

[Spencer Christiansen]

So we're a little off of I70, which obviously is a major corridor. And then we're on a scenic byway. It's called Highway 65 and we're about 30 to 45 minutes off of I 70. But the Scenic Byway Highway 65 is marked on maps well known, it's know labeled and marketed and, and, and known as this beautiful scenic by bypass. Right?

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

So we get a lot of people in the summertime that are just passing through and we're right off that, that, that main road. It's not a highway, it's not a freeway, but it's a highway. And so we get a lot of people that are just walking. This is in the summertime. They just walk into our store, our restaurants. Sure. We have a, we have a bar, grill, a little convenience store. They walk in and they're just passing through. So that's one kind of person that, that is there. Those usually, those people usually are just there for a day or so and then they, and they move on. I guess there's two other kinds. There's people in the summer that are there because they're, they're fishing or they're, they're, they're camping or they spend a little bit of time totally disconnected from the world. Typically up on the mesa you don't have connection and you do at our lodge. But if you go anywhere outside of that, we, we have Starlink and so we have Internet there. But people go and camp and stay in the cabins and they, it's just a way to go camp and get away. So you've got that and then you have the winter clientele which is totally different than, than your summer clientele in the wintertime. We don't really get by just scenic by traffic or people just passing through. It's almost all destination and it's mostly snowmobilers really coming to ride. The mesa is a really interesting place. The mountain upon which the lodge sits. The locals call it the highest flat top mountain in the world. It's like I said, it's about 10, 11,000ft and it's relatively flat on top. And so it offers endless amount of rideable snowmobile terrain. Whereas a lot of other mountains. If you've got a mountain like this, there's a lot of Terrain that's inaccessible to country, whether it's snowbilling or backcountry skiing. And so the terrain of the mesa kind of offers this really unique place to ride snowbills. And so we get a lot of people that come in from all over the United States, especially the Midwest, obviously people in Colorado, and they're there to tear up our snow, you know, shred the mountain.

[Rey Guterres]

I like these folks that are the explorers, that are just the wanderers. How many of them are entrepreneurs trying to look for purpose? Like how many eccentric folks do you see?

[Spencer Christiansen]

I think a lot of people that go to the mountain, whether they're entrepreneurs or whether they're just looking for clarity in life, I think a lot of people retreat to the solitude of the mountain because they're looking for clarity in their life. And a lot of times it's business related. I think a lot of people, they are, you know, maybe their, their company that they're building. I think the snowbillers in the wintertime, I think that group of people, probably most of them are business owners.

[Rey Guterres]

Right on.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Snowmobiling is a very expensive sport. I didn't think.

[Rey Guterres]

What, snow is expensive?

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, the snowballs especially, I mean, they're. It. Snowballs are far more expensive than dirt bikes or four wheelers. I saw a meme a little while ago that said my parents when I was a kid taught me how to snowball, and Now I have $6.43 in my bank account. So it's like, it's kind of an expensive hobby. And so therefore, I think most people that are in that sport are business owners that can afford it. And so I would say that in my observation, probably 70 or 80% of my snowmobiling clientele are also business owners, entrepreneurs, business managers, with the majority of them probably being entrepreneurs.

[Rey Guterres]

So when you expo. When you expect this clientele, these folks that are running towards something or running away from something, do you kind of pivot your, your, your, your, your establishment? Do you kind of like lean into servicing these folks with more of a, what you call it, a white glove connoisseur service? Or are you just kind of like battleships already? This is our SOPs. We operate. We operate. Like, do you.

[Spencer Christiansen]

The, the goal is to elevate the lodge. I've had the lodge. I, I bought it about four or five years ago.

[Rey Guterres]

Wow.

[Spencer Christiansen]

And I bought it. I, I have another company, but I bought the lodge because I felt like I had the bandwidth to, to elevate that place. The lodge has been there for 125 years. 130 years. Wow. It's going to be there in 130 years after me. So it's certainly something that there is a legacy there. My goal with the lodge was to elevate it from mostly a rundown and an establishment that most of the cabins had been built. Some of them have been built 100 years ago, and my job was to elevate that and to bring it up to more of a. I don't know if I'd say a white glove, but definitely a four star, five star, as opposed to one or a two star, which is probably realistic of what it was when I found it.

[Rey Guterres]

Right on. It's great that you literally saw the brick and mortar, the establishment, this lodge, and turned it around. And it's got to be rewarding. And I'm sure it's always a fun dopamine high when you're literally on what you've built, talk about what you're doing with experiences. I immediately thought, gosh, I really hope he converts these lodges into haunted house experiences for Halloween and charge a premium. Like, where are you, you know, experimenting? Like almost being on legacy makers. Where are you experimenting with your marketing? And how are you making the lodge experience so unique?

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, so we have. We have several things. The, the. The lodge itself, obviously you have the cabins and so you have a. In. In that sense, it's a lot like a hotel, a place to stay. We are doing a several things in this. I'll talk about the winner. Specifically, we've developed this backcountry experience where it's a skills clinic where we teach people how to ride a snowbill and all the skills that they would need for people who want to get into it. I've written a book, it's called Ride the Wild, and it's marketed as the most comprehensive book ever written on backcountry snowmobile riding. And in that book, it goes over a huge range of different stuff that you would need to know in order to ride a snowmobile in the backcountry. So avalanche safety skills, like how Avalanche

[Rey Guterres]

went first before safety.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, Avalanche is. Yeah. Right now, like riding in the backcountry. Avalanches is a very large component. I mean, you have to understand avalanches and how they work in order to be safe. Skills clinics, like how to ride, wilderness survival, how to get a sled out of backcountry. We go over checklists, all kinds of things, a lot of these things. Actually. The book itself was written about backcountry riding, but there's kind of a Second element to the book, which is how to use the same concepts that we learn in backcountry snowmobile riding and how to apply those to business. So that's what Ride the Wild is.

[Rey Guterres]

That's awesome.

[Spencer Christiansen]

So, for example, we talk about with snowbilling, one of the things that I go over is a checklist, and the book talks about this a lot. So you got. Before you ride, you've got a thousand things, it seems like, that you need to bring with you. It's a little different than going to the beach. You get your towel, you get your shorts and sunglasses and sunscreen in your. Your set.

[Rey Guterres]

Right. And confidence.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, that's true.

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah, you need that, too, especially in Miami. Yeah,

[Spencer Christiansen]

you definitely need that as well with snowbilling, but, you know, snowball, and you just. It's such an inhospitable place that you're riding in. So you've got your helmet, your goggles, your gloves, your monosuit, your boots, all your survival gear. Got your. Your. Your AVI pack, your beacon, your tr, your transceiver radio. Just all kinds of stuff that's like,

[Rey Guterres]

what, 5k in already?

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, probably. Probably at least that. You could even go more wild on.

[Rey Guterres]

You still haven't even stepped on the damn thing. You're already 5k in. All right, continue. Carry on.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Not. Not including the sled.

[Rey Guterres]

Boy, if I only had a lodge to put all this stuff in.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Carry on, mama. The. So one thing that we train people with on snowbilling is right before you leave, there's what we call the ride final checklist.

[Rey Guterres]

For sure.

[Spencer Christiansen]

And we do that here. Oh, do you really? So for, like, for. For. For video making.

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah. Launching a studio, like the check off audio, and then boom.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah. Because if you forget one thing. Right. What does it do to your. Your video? Like, it's gone. Like, you have to redo everything. I mean, if you.

[Rey Guterres]

Audio here.

[Spencer Christiansen]

If you forget to turn on the audio.

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Or you forget.

[Rey Guterres]

Well, we have.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Here. So we have different order.

[Rey Guterres]

We have backups here, but if that backup goes down, it's happened. Yeah, it happened. Sorry to interrupt the.

[Spencer Christiansen]

No, no, not at all. So, same way with snowmobiling. And you forget one thing. For example, when you ride snowballs the same way with backcountry skiing, you have a device that's called a transceiver and sends out a beep of your location so that if, God forbid, you ever get buried in an avalanche, somebody else with the transceiver can come and find you. Sure. And it increases the speed at which they can dig you out. That only works if you turn on the device. And there have been people that have been killed in avalanches, and they found them with the transceiver in the off position. It's just one little thing. And that's just one thing. I mean, there's several things that you need to do before you go check and feel like in my book, actually, I talk about a story where when I first got the lodge, I've got a billion things going on, right? Like, everybody's coming to me, dude, you own a lodge? I own a lot. We got hit with this major storm. I think we got like three or four feet. And I had a friend call me up and he was like, hey, Spencer, do you want to go ride?

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

And I was like, yeah, I'll ride tomorrow. You know, the snow's gonna be good. He got there, he was all ready. And I'm still running around getting everything ready to go because I'm unfortunate. I want to go play, but also I'm kind of there running a business.

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

And Spence at his lodge.

[Rey Guterres]

Good old Spence.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Long story short, we. We. I. When I finally am like, okay, I gotta go, I jump on this lead, we book it down the trail. Like five minutes and five miles down the trail, I looked down at my snow bill and realized that I'd forgotten fuel up.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, geez. So you forgot your SD card.

[Spencer Christiansen]

My SD card? That's. That's equivalent to not putting the SD card in your camera. And there had to be that guy that went back to my friends, like this guy, and he was riding with three or four other friends. And I was like, hey,

[Rey Guterres]

I don't

[Spencer Christiansen]

know what to tell you guys. I'm a chump. I. I've got to go back and refuel. So it's just this one little thing. So we train on checklists. One thing that really, really would help an entrepreneur if you're trying to build any sort of business systems is everything, right? Oh, I mean, it's everything. It's everything.

[Rey Guterres]

We're currently doing that now here we're building our SOPs.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, you've got to have an SOP, a system for everything. And then so what I talk about a lot in the book and it's applied to snowbilling, but you can apply it to anything. You can apply it to your. Your personal life workout. You can apply it to your business. Oh, yeah. If you're trying to build a team, you create a checklist and then you post that in an easy to see place where you can Run that checklist right before you do whatever you're going to do. So in your case, running cameras, making film. In somebody else's case, let's say somebody's running a service company. Oh, yeah. And they've got their technicians or their service providers, they're going out. There's a checklist that they probably should have written for each technician to do before they leave the office. Before what? And I know there's a broad range of entrepreneurs in the. All kinds of different stuff, but whatever, whatever you're doing, a checklist is, is critical. So we use that a lot in snowbilling. I have, I have a gear checklist before I leave the house checklist. And the, the most important one, I think is the ride final. So it's like you're all geared up, you're on your snow bill. You look down, you run your checklist. Mentally, you just. It's like five. It's like 10 items. You can just really quick boom. And then you turn off down the trail. If you forget any one of those items, maybe nothing will happen. But it also could be, you know, it could be that one thing that you needed.

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah, yeah. And it's a domino effect. Like, like, like when we started our session, we, we're transparent. We're now, we're behind here. And it's not because we, we're not bad or good at our job. It's just because we just ran behind. What affects one studio affects the other studios. Especially when I'm running a session, hosting and taking photos and doing the, the good old client relations.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah.

[Rey Guterres]

Talk about how you operate and, and like, dude, you own a lodge. Like, what do you, are you, are you filming movies there? What are you doing beyond just having folks check in and check out?

[Spencer Christiansen]

So a big, the, the biggest part of what we do is backcountry experience or just the, the experience besides staying there. So we, we have people come out, they ride, you know, they ride snowbills. But we do training clinics. We teach people how to not die in an avalanche. Yeah, we train people how to, how to ride. We do in the. That's all in the winter time, in the summertime. What we're looking at expanding to right now, which is super popular, is I think it'll be very popular doing a foraging class for people that want to learn how to forage in the forest. And a big part of it is mushrooms. Like, mushrooms are very popular and becoming more and more popular.

[Rey Guterres]

Whatever do you mean? They're great on hamburgers. Is that what you're talking about grilled mushrooms.

[Spencer Christiansen]

I think that the psychedelic nature of mushrooms, I think pulls people.

[Rey Guterres]

So this is a family show, but

[Spencer Christiansen]

we don't do anything with that. We just. With the natural, healthy mushrooms that you can harvest and they grow all over on the Grand Mesa. And so that is a. You know, we're looking at doing clinics and things like that to engage people.

[Rey Guterres]

That's great.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Another thing that the lodge is really interesting for, as far as the local community is it's kind of a hub for activities. We do live music. Right on. Yeah, we do. There's a lot of community events that we hold there to pull.

[Rey Guterres]

So many possibilities.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, a lot of possibilities. And I think for the community itself, it provides a kind of a community center. Another thing beyond the. Beyond the lodge is the. The marketing and the social media reach that we have. When we. In the winter, especially when we get snow, especially the first snow of the year, we have a very loud megaphone. We post those pictures of the first snow, and everybody is interested in it. So for sure, actually, just. So what is it? It's like the middle of September right now, right? 20th September. September. It's the 17th. We just got snow about four or five days ago, and we took a short little video of it and it did 3, 400,000 views.

[Rey Guterres]

Fresh powder, as they call it.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, in this case, it wasn't powder. It was just like light flakes that didn't accumulate because of September. But we are. We're building a center, an online platform where we bring people from all over the world. All over the US all over the world.

[Rey Guterres]

Hell, yeah. Cool.

[Spencer Christiansen]

People that are interested in the outdoors. So it's a. It's a hub for outdoor the community, where people who are interested in the mountains, hiking, fishing, snowbilling, camping, you name it. Yeah, all things outdoors.

[Rey Guterres]

That's awesome. Because hear me out. When I have dinner, I like to enjoy sushi, but I always go for, like, the chef's course, where it's like the premium experience, where I don't ask any questions. I just want to sit down and have a good beer. And then things just come to me. I'm going to pay the premium. What does the chef want me to experience in his establishment? So what you've established is essentially kind of that, where it's like, here's the premium experience. And I'm also going to educate you and then ascend you and keep you within my culture. Because I'm also thinking this experience changes and modulates during the seasons. So what you do in the winter versus what you do in the spring is very different. But your clients can come back and be like, oh, man, what can I be learning and doing? The spring versus the winter and so on and so forth. And I'm sure you're hosting retreats where folks that are very eccentric and they've got their tribes can come out and rent out your establishment and host a retreat where folks can write their books, find purpose, ascend, and learn how to make a killer mushroom in the process.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Right, Absolutely. We actually had a guy that stayed at our lodge for about nine months.

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah, yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

And he was writing a book.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, right on. I was a co founder of Twitter. Okay, cool.

[Spencer Christiansen]

No, he wasn't. He wasn't the founder of Twitter. I. I can't remember what his book was called, but I. And I. I think it has been published, though. So he sold his house, went up to the lodge, just rented a cabin for. It was about nine months straight.

[Rey Guterres]

Most authors do this.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, yeah. Completely break from Twitter. X. All this, all the distractions of life,

[Rey Guterres]

all the patterns, all noises, all this.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, that's really, I think one of the biggest things that the lodge offers. The world that we live in.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Is so artificial.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

In every way imaginable.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, for sure.

[Spencer Christiansen]

I mean, your relationships with other people. Artificial.

[Rey Guterres]

Yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

A lot of the content that you see and even more so now with AI, right? Oh, yeah. I mean, how much. Now what you see online, how much of it is even real? I mean, it's one thing if it's Infomercial City.

[Rey Guterres]

It's Infomercial City.

[Spencer Christiansen]

It's just Infomercial City. Everything is so artificial. And I think that our brains as humans aren't really designed to function like that. Right. I think that we're designed to have real connections with real people. Not online and certainly not AI connections. And I also think that there's a. This really deep, intrinsic, embedded need that people have to connect with nature.

[Rey Guterres]

Oh, yeah.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Then nature of all kinds. Like, you know, if you're. If you're in Florida or you're on the beach going out and connecting with the. The Everglades or, or the beach or whatever is. If you're in the mountains, connecting with the mountains. I think that there's something very deeply spiritual, very deeply soothing to the soul to go into nature and break away from artificial social media. Artificial everything. Yeah.

[Rey Guterres]

Concrete jungles.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah, Concrete jungle. I just, I don't think that the human condition has been built to survive, to, to thrive in. In a concrete jungle. I think that Yeah, I think that a lot of people live and that's fine like, but I think that it's good every once in a while if you live in a city every once in a while to break off and to experience more of a disconnected.

[Rey Guterres]

And this is where Grant Cardone would step into this podcast and be like, well, let me sell you a timeshare.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Yeah,

[Rey Guterres]

go ahead.

[Spencer Christiansen]

But I was gonna wrap up say my brother, when he was, this was decades ago, but he got, he, he ended up buying a timeshare. I can't remember the company that it was with, but he could never sell the thing and it kind of became this financial burden for him. But. And the other thing which is funny is that my brother wasn't even into traveling, so I don't know why he bought it. But I'm sure time travels shares are, are great for, for the right person. For him it wasn't so is time travel as well.

[Rey Guterres]

All right, my friend Spence, how can people learn more about you? How can folks discover this amazing property?

[Spencer Christiansen]

So we're [e-mail] so really easy to remember the name of our company. Grand Mesa is the name of the mountain. It's a, it's the largest flat top mountain in the world. If you, if you Google largest flat top mountain in the world, you'll probably find the Grand Mesa. It's on the Half Life, Deaf Life, the Western. It's on the western slope of Colorado's Rocky Mountains. Grandmasa lodge.com. yeah, you can also find us on Facebook. We post regularly on Facebook. We do a lot of updates. You can see pictures if it's the kind of thing that you want to come out, obviously come visit us. But if you just want to connect with us, get on Facebook and every day we post pictures and videos of the beauty of the mountains. And it's a way for you to connect kind of to, to, to that world without actually being there. But obviously going there is a best for sure.

[Rey Guterres]

If you ever have a moment or you know, in the crapper, take a moment to Google Half Life, the PC game. There's a, there's a, there's a base. It was actually quite randomly mentioned this morning. There's a base called the Black Mesa and it's in the Grand Mesa. So you're probably neighbors. Yeah, I could probably see your, your, your villa in the game. That, that's a nerd joke there. But yes, it's very much a thing.

[Spencer Christiansen]

It's called Half Life.

[Rey Guterres]

It's called Half Life. It's it's quite popular. It's a little bit small. Company called Valve made it. Google it. You'll thank me later with. It was such a pleasure. We're actually going to step into that other room and do your interview now for legacy makers. What are we going to learn about you? Give us a preview before we hit record in that room.

[Spencer Christiansen]

So I think a big part of that is the kind of the journey that I took in order to get to where I am. Why, why build the Grand Mesa, what the long term goal of it is, and also what's the, what was the journey? What were the forces that shaped me and what were some of the things that I learned and some of the things that I've gotten from my childhood that's allowed me to be where I am and to be doing what I'm doing?

[Rey Guterres]

Right on, man. I'm so, so eager to learn more and stoked to hit record in that other room with that bub. I appreciate your time and energy. We're going to do this thing.

[Spencer Christiansen]

Thank you.

[Rey Guterres]

But we're going to end it here with our red life. Living your legacy podcast for Inside Success. I am Rey Guterres.