View from the Bottom

Holiday Wishes from Mike and Mike

Ski and snowboard season is finally here! Christmas and New Years’ are right around the corner and it is a magical time to be in Breckenridge. The lights on Main Street are lit, shops are open for business and we’ve gotten some fresh snow on the slopes. I’ve been trying to get out to cruise the groomers when I can. Keep on the lookout for Captain Corduroy next time you’re out on the hill! 

End of Year Awards

This week we had the privilege of announcing our end of year awards. These awards are very special to me because it gives us a chance to recognize our BGV employees for all of their hard work throughout the year. We have quite a variety of awards such as the Green Hero of the Year, Superior Service Award, Behind the Scenes Service Award, and many others. Our employees work incredibly hard to not only serve our owners and guests, but to help each other and their communities as well. It is an honor every year to be able to recognize their dedication and excellence. 

Superior Service Award—Honors the employee who has most consistently provided superior service to our owners and guests.

This individual contributes so much to improving, maintaining innovative systems and procedures used by the ARM department. He is intelligent and kind, and always sets owners up for success with BGV. The company’s success and this department’s success is influenced greatly by this individual’s dedication to top-notch service and amazing hard work.

The Superior Service Award is presented to Cameron Kender.

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Behind the Scenes Service Award—Honors the employee or department whose work, while not on the front line of customer service, has most significantly contributed to the success of BGV.

These individuals deserve to be recognized for their ongoing and dedicated support to nearly all BGV’s teams and departments. Without hesitation, they have been able to field requests from multiple departments and prioritize their workload in order of importance to the company’s short-term and long-term strategic goals. This team brings an incredible knowledge of our business and systems to every discussion and is enthusiastic about helping others improve process and reporting. They do not shy away from challenges, are happy to take on new projects, and most importantly, they approach every assignment with a positive, proactive, and solution-oriented mindset.

The Behind-the-Scenes Service Award is presented to the Analytics Team: Zack Black, Iris Bradford, and Jacob Budnick.

This individual has played a critical role in the success of the Engineering team at Grand Timber Lodge and displays the highest job proficiency level out of anyone on the crew. He spends considerable time training the team to expand the skills of every technician while elevating team engagement to new levels. He has improved the efficiency of all buildings, saved the resort money, and elevated our commitment to Sustainability. Our team would not be as successful as it is without Andy’s hard work and dedication to internal and external customers.  

The Behind-the-Scenes Service Award is presented to Andy Lovinggood. 

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Greatest Change Award — Honors the employee or department who conceived and implemented the idea that had the greatest positive impact on BGV.

This hardworking and passionate individual works tirelessly behind the scenes to ensure BGVers are paid accurately and timely – which is a very complex task. She is constantly open to and soliciting feedback from employees and leaders to improve the pay, time keeping, and other systems she works on. This year she had two major projects – Pay Cards and WorkForce Ready Upgrade – providing cost and time saving benefits to BGV. This individual has also set up dozens of remote locations in 2021, in at least 6 other states, so that BGV could pivot and allow remote workers in those jobs where this was a good fit. The HR department and BGV are extremely lucky to have such an asset on the team.

The Greatest Change Award is presented to Dawn Taylor.

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Culture Champion Award— Honors the employee who best exemplified the BGV Passion Statement, Five Hospitality Standards, OneBGV and other aspects of the uniquely positive BGV Culture. This is a person who fully integrates these principles into their daily work and inspires others to do the same.

This individual has shown an unmatched enthusiasm for BGV’s culture. His charisma is infectious with the GTL team and was recognized by the Breckenridge Tourism Office as one of the Breckenridge Service Champions. This individual shares his passion for sustainability by utilizing his bilingual skillset to provide the weekly sustainability presentation to BGVO-S attendees. His appetite to grow as a public speaker and deliver an engaging session is admirable. This selfless, motivated, team player has shown that he is totally committed to the BGV culture and no matter what department you are from, he will gladly help you with whatever is needed with a smile on his face.

The Culture Champion Award is presented to Erick Hernandez.

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Rob Millisor Volunteer of the Year Award—Honors the employee who made the most significant contribution of their time and talent to benefit our community.

This caring and driven individual has taken personal responsibility and pride in taking our volunteer program to another level. She is a leader in volunteering and motivating others to do the same. She created a monthly volunteer opportunity newsletter for her department that encourages employees to take advantage of all opportunities available at BGV. Through her efforts, her department has increased participation in volunteer opportunities exponentially. In addition, she created a new program called “Litter Lunches” that creates dedicated time for employees to use their VTO by picking up trash in Breckenridge. As a result of all her work, this passionate individual was recently appointed as co-chair of the Volunteer Champion Committee.

The Rob Millisor Volunteer of the Year Award is presented to Kaylynn Knull.

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Kaizen Award— Honors the department that has achieved the greatest year-over-year improvement in performance.

This team has continued to look for new and better ways to reach our guests to increase satisfaction and show rates. With the addition of new tour sources and huge growth in Travel Click online bookings, they have implemented new processes to confirm tour qualifications, offer additional services and upgrade highly qualified guests – this impacts VPG and guest happiness.

They have decreased wait times and queue times month over month and year over year. They have increased conversions to tours with new incentives and offers.

This team has truly “built back better” since Covid and recently booked the most tours in a single month in the department’s history and processed over 450 tours in one month from other bookings sources as well.

The Kaizen Award is presented to the Marketing Guest Services Team:

Brittany Holloman

Laurel Coffman

Caroline Ludwig

Clay Richards

Danica Gonzales

Emmily Van Dorn

Katelyn Novak

Kim Henry

Maicie Bender

Sara Yarbrough

Shannon Mooney

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OneBGV Award—Honors the employee or department that best exemplified the spirit of OneBGV, by meeting an interpersonal or interdepartmental challenge through communication, cooperation, and collaboration, not competition.

TSW is essential for our business of putting smiles on people’s faces. This upgrade has been a monumental undertaking and massive in scope as a multi-year inter-departmental project. This dedicated team of people has put countless hours of time into this project leading up to, during, and now following the launch. The whole company has come together to make this transition as successful as it has been and is a true example of what it means to be OneBGV.

The OneBGV Award is presented to the TSW Upgrade Program Team:

Jill Johnson

Iris Bradford

Olesia Weatherly

Kenny Jeffery

Tricia Houstrup

Scarlett Lewark

Rick Tramontana

James Cummons

Brittany Holloman

Matt Dimler

Ryan Huff

Mindy Huff

Chris Feenstra

Olena Brack

Nick Borovich

Rebecca Doster

Colin Timm

Paul Hitzhusen

Monica Thinger

Zack Black

Jonathan Moore

Joseph Clark-Fulcher

Amie Yoder

Janna Polgar

Eli Yoder

Emily Symank

Tracy Dollars

Eric Luberto

Kimberly Henry

Mike Hurwitch

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Green Hero of the Year—Honors the employee who best exemplified BGV’s commitment to setting the standard for sustainability and environmental stewardship.

This individual has been an outstanding and proactive ally for the sustainability department. His compassionate efforts to effect change in his department and on property have directly reduced the environmental impact of BGV – by implementing an initiative to go bagless in recycling bins at GL7, he estimates we reduced the number of plastic bags we use in guest rooms per year by 90,000. NINETY. THOUSAND. This individual has also consistently agreed to help and meet with the sustainability team to support their sustainability efforts. From reviewing the room turnover checklist to incorporating best practices, to talking about sustainability in front of a camera, his authentic commitment to these efforts is clear. Best of all is how evidently genuine he is when talking about these issues, especially during his Green GVS presentations. He cares about sustainability because he wants a better future and because it is the right thing to do. He even invested in solar on his house!

The Green Hero of the Year Award is presented to Carlos Martinez.

Community Food Drive

Giving back to our community is incredibly important to Breckenridge Grand Vacations. In the spirit of the holiday season, BGV is supporting the community food drive hosted by the Family & Intercultural Resource Center (FIRC). We have donation bins located at all properties and encourage our owners and guests to help support the efforts of FIRC, if possible. You can visit their website to see a list of requested items. The more donations the merrier! 

We hope you have an amazing holiday season whether in Breckenridge or at home! Thank you for your continued support and we hope to see you around the resorts soon!

Mike and Mike
GrandVacations@breckenridgegrandvacations.com