The Dream of a Local Entrepreneur

Who would think of making a $60 million investment in a small town that “was out in the boondocks and had a reputation for being the center of Aryan Nation, a group of dangerous, vociferous right wing extremists?”

Maintain Local Control is one of the 7 ½ keys in my book. I found that it is often the local people who are willing to take risks for the betterment of their community that someone from the outside might not be willing to make. I found such a local person in Coeur d’Alene, a small town that once had the Aryan Nation reputation. But, largely because of the efforts of Duane Hagadone and his partner Jerry Jaeger, today Coeur d’Alene is developing a cosmopolitan reputation.

Duane Hagadone was born and raised in Coeur d’Alene which had a population of around 10,000 when he was growing up, the son of the publisher of the local newspaper owned by Scripps. Duane started working at the paper when he was 20 in advertising sales and Scripps named him publisher when his father passed away at the age of 49. He later bought out the Scripps and started buying other small town newspapers when he was still in his 20s, amassing a collection of newspapers in the northwest and Hawaii along with other businesses. But he had a dream…a dream to have a world class resort in his hometown, even though he had never owned a hotel.

The North Shore Motor Hotel, an old, two building, multi-storied hotel sat on the site that he coveted for this dream. Most of the rooms faced the parking lot, not the picturesque Lake Coeur d’Alene, but Hagadone who was in his late 40s got a right of first refusal if the North Shore was ever sold. The buyers decided to sell and he formed a partnership with Jerry Jaeger, 15 years his junior, an experienced hotel operator and also from Coeur d’Alene. He was born in Ritzville, WA (see my post of December 5th) that is known for being the birthplace of a number of Fortune 500 CEOs. Has anyone tested the water in Ritzville? He moved to Coeur d’Alene when he was in high school.

Hagadone’s dream was big, really big! He and Jaeger decided to build a showplace, destination resort with 338 rooms that resembles a Swiss Chalet or Bavarian Castle. The Coeur d’Alene, A Resort on the Lake opened on May 9, 1986. Idaho’s governor called it, “the biggest happening in Idaho since Averill Harriman built Sun Valley.” The “experts” predicted that it was in the wrong town, the hotel too big and that it would bring Hagadone/Jaeger to their knees. They were wrong.

The resort was an immediate success. Its location close to nature, next to a quaint downtown and only 40 minutes from an international airport (Spokane) quickly turned Coeur d’Alene into a destination location. Conde Nast’s readers voted it The Top Mainland Resort, one of many awards for the resort.

The Hagadone/Jaeger partnership has expanded into other resort and recreational locations, but they’ve continued to invest in Coeur d’Alene. One of their other notable projects in the town is the construction of The Coeur d’Alene, a world class golf course that features the first and only floating golf green. This green of 15,000 square feet, is 10 feet deep (5 below water), features 2 sand traps and 5 big trees, and weighs 5 million pounds.

A local entrepreneur…a dream….a transformation for a small town!