Boulder’s A-Lodge Shifts Gears to Help the Community.
photo courtesy A-Lodge
Asa Firestone figured his business would be booming with adventure-seeking customers in April.
But instead, just like everyone else, the CEO and co-founder of the A-Lodge watched everything come to a complete standstill because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Since 2016, the quaint basecamp facility in the foothills outside of Boulder has offered lodging, camping, adventure van rentals, and a variety of spring and summer events like group trail runs, movies and live music.
Instead, Firestone made his property with 27 private rooms and 12 hostel beds available to healthcare workers at greatly reduced rates and has provided a temporary women’s shelter for those in need. In the meantime, despite putting the regular adventure business on hold, he worked on projects around the property to get ready for a delayed spring/summer season.
“We’re all in this together,” Firestone said. “The shelter-at-home orders have certainly been hard on small businesses, but you can either take the approach that you’re going to go out of business or you can think positively and work to make things better, make changes or somehow be a productive part of the community. And if you choose a positive approach, you’ll be more grateful and happy whenever the new normal emerges.”
