Salamander Has a Five-Star Rating, and GM

By Leonard Shapiro

His grandfather was the man in charge at the iconic Royal York Hotel in Toronto. His father ran the luxurious Fairmont Hotel in Banff Springs. So no surprise that Reggie Cooper, the grandson and son of hotel lifers, is now general manager of Middleburg’s Salamander Resort & Spa.

A Canadian native, Cooper, now 52, was a ski racer talented enough to make the team at the University of Colorado, where he earned a degree in resort management.

Following graduation, he worked in a Toronto-based restaurant company, then decided “I didn’t want to be in a city any more. I set out to find a place with green, open space.”

He moved to Maine to handle sales and marketing at a small ski resort near the New Hampshire border. Cooper stayed five years, played a significant role in number of skiers go from 87,000 lift rides a year when he arrived to 550,000 when he left.

He then had an opportunity to do more of the same at the Topnotch Resort in Stowe, Vermont, one of the premier facilities on the East Coast in a ski mecca town. Cooper was there for nine years, promoted to general manager and was involved in developing condominiums and expanding the resort’s spa to 35,000 square feet, the largest in New England. “It was a fun place and we had a great time there,” he said. “It’s the place where I really got into the luxury resort business.”

Then came one more move, perhaps the most fortuitous of all. He went to the Canyon Ranch in Lennox, Massachusetts, an upscale resort focusing on health and wellness. “I could have stayed there to the end of my career,” Cooper said. “Then I met Mrs. Johnson.”

That would be Sheila Johnson, Salamander’s founder/owner. She’d been a Canyon Ranch guest, and Cooper soon was making a visit to her Middleburg property and was blown away.

“When I saw the place, the beautiful detail everywhere and her dream to create a five-star property that would be thought of as one of the great resorts in the country, I was very impressed. This was a very unique opportunity. I told my wife Linda I was definitely ready for this kind of challenge.

“I didn’t know a lot about the region. But I saw the proximity to airports, to a Middle Atlantic customer base and affluent travelers. And when I got to know Mrs. Johnson, that sealed it. She’s just an incredibly dynamic entrepreneur and I definitely was aligned with what she wanted to do.”

Cooper is now in his fifth year at Salamander. His initial focus was to provide guests the highest possible level of service, as well as to grow the sales and marketing effort to pull in corporate business. The resort now has a respectable 70 percent occupancy rate, and Cooper said there is a strong local presence in the use of its spa, equestrian center and restaurants.

“We also had to create programs to attract people,” he said. “Guests can play golf at Creighton Farms. We’ve got the zip line, great equestrian facilities, a wonderful spa. We’re in an area with history trails, beautiful places to go hiking and biking, and the number of wineries has exploded.”

Cooper and his staff of 330 were rewarded for their efforts last February when the prestigious Forbes Travel Guide gave Salamander a five-star rating, one of only 270 such facilities world-wide.

Johnson owns six different major hotel and resort properties, and Cooper was asked if running one of therm may also be in his future.

“This is a very special place,” he said of Salamander. “Everywhere I’ve worked, I always say it’s the most beautiful place and the best community I’ve ever been. Then I decide to move and I say the same thing. But it’s hard to imagine anything better than this. I love this place.”

Photo by Leonard Shapiro Reggie Cooper is the general manager at Salamander Resort & Spa.