Pursuit Attractions & Hospitality

Ian MacIntosh has led Pursuit since its 2012 formation and serves as Chief Executive Officer. He overseeing capital allocation and acquisition strategy from the Denver headquarters. Major transactions, such as the $1.1 billion Glacier Park and Alcatraz Cruises deal, were executed under his tenure alongside the Viad Corp board. Strategic direction is supported by Viad's CFO Ellen Ingersoll and divisional presidents who manage the Canadian Rockies and Iceland operating segments.

Pursuit is a wholly owned subsidiary of Viad Corp (NYSE: VVI), making it a corporate operating platform rather than a family office or closed-end private equity fund. This public-company structure provides permanent equity capital without artificial hold periods or forced exits, allowing Pursuit to manage multi-generational concession agreements inside national parks. Pension-backed minority investors like APG Asset Management add infrastructure-style duration to the capital base.

Pursuit sources acquisition opportunities through its management team's four-decade history in tourism infrastructure, relationships with national park concession holders, and the corporate development function at Viad Corp. The firm targets owner-operators nearing retirement who hold federal use permits inside the US park system and private real-asset owners in the Canadian Mountain West. The 2017 Glacier Park lodging portfolio transaction emerged from a multi-year dialogue with the exiting operator rather than a broad auction process.

Pursuit targets mature, cash-flowing tourism infrastructure assets rather than greenfield development or venture-stage companies. The firm acquires operating businesses with existing physical footprints—gondola systems, lodges, cruise concessions, geothermal spas—then invests additional capital to modernize infrastructure and extend seasonal throughput. New-build attraction development, like the Golden Skybridge suspension park and the FlyOver Iceland flight-ride, occurs only when market studies demonstrate proven demand corridors.

Pursuit stays out of commoditized hospitality categories—urban core hotels, convention-center properties, chain-affiliated resorts, and cruise-line operations beyond the discrete Vancouver-to-Alaska ferry service. The firm also avoids digital economy investments and purely virtual experiences. The mandate is physical, scenic-attraction infrastructure with a high repeat-visitation coefficient: if the asset cannot be photographed from its primary access point, Pursuit generally passes.

Pursuit is the sole operating division of Viad Corp following the October 2024 divestiture of the GES events business. Viad Corp purchased the Brewster Travel Canada assets in 2012 and installed Ian MacIntosh to build the Pursuit platform. The parent company provides centralized treasury, corporate development, and investor-relations support while Pursuit manages all operating decisions, branding, and on-the-ground general management from its Denver office.

Pursuit operates through Viad Corp's community-impact frameworks rather than a standalone foundation. The firm applies destination-stewardship principles within each concession: the Glacier National Park concession agreement mandates conservation fund contributions tied to revenue, and the Sky Lagoon runs on geothermal heat sourced under Iceland's public-resource framework. Philanthropic activity is site-level, not aggregated into a separate grant-making vehicle.