Dig This LLC New theme park in Colorado allows people on vacation or staff retreat to jump inside a dozer, excavator or skid-steer.

Some people buy Harleys or Mustangs to cope with the routines of daily life. Now, they can get out their aggressions by playing with much bigger and louder machines at a 10-acre “jobsite” in Steamboat Springs, Colo. The place is turning heavy tools into toys by giving ordinary folks the opportunity to test their skills on excavators, dozers and skid-steers. The idea offers a hands-on opportunity to business owners looking for an alternative to the traditional ropes-course retreat, or just weekend warriors.

Billed as a construction theme park, “Dig This” offers custom and corporate training programs four days a week. The theme park opened last November and operated through the winter. “We had access to an additional 90 acres adjacent to the compound over the winter, which we opened up to people allowing them to move the almost 8 ft of snow,” says

Ed Mumm, the theme park’s owner and founder. “People found moving the snow was good entertainment.” Because of the success during winter months, Mumm has decided to add a snowcat for the upcoming cold season.

MUMM

Inspiration came to the New Zealand-born Mumm while he was using heavy equipment to build his home in Steamboat Springs. After clearing trees and scrub oak, creating a road, building a pond and digging foundations, he realized the importance of offering the same experience to everyone.

“Before opening the compound, I was always looking for an opportunity to play on big equipment,” Mumm says. “After operating every piece of equipment, that’s what sealed the deal for me. I was sitting on a hill in an excavator, like a kid in a sandbox.”

All courses begin with an operational and safety orientation from Mumm’s staff, all of whom are trained to operate the equipment, including a Caterpillar D5G dozer, two 315 excavators and a 6-ton skid-steer. Participants then get behind the controls in climate-controlled, radio-monitored cabs and operate at an individual worksite. Mumm says he chose Cat machinery because it is a brand name “we all grew up with.” Dump trucks and wheel loaders will come soon. Ages 14 and up can play in the dirt.

Dig This LLC Visitors play for a half or full day.

Half-day adventures cost $400 a person on either a bulldozer or an excavator. Full-day instruction and operation on both increases to $750. “Our prices reflect the cost it takes to maintain the equipment and insure the business,” adds Mumm, whose biggest hurdle was finding a company that would insure it.

“The insurance companies kind of shook their heads when they found out what we were up to,” he says. “The funny thing though about insurance companies is they didn’t want to insure us, but they told us if we did find insurance, they wanted to come out and try it.” A noteworthy trend, says Mumm, is that almost half his customers are women.

A Dig This franchise may be coming to a vacant plot of land near you. “We have had inquiries from all around the country,” Mumm says. The entrepreneur’s team has been looking at expanding, with its eyes on opening a site in Las Vegas by the end of 2009.

“Steamboat has been a great place to start and test our business model,” says Mumm. “But we feel that Vegas has the market we need to gain the next level of exposure needed to grow our idea.”