Lance Mortensen?Lmortensen@naytura.com?http://ht??Fax: 866-422-7473

12-07-2008
Contact's Name
Lance Mortensen
Contact Email
lmortensen@naytura.com
Contact Phone
925-788-2500

Lance Mortensen
PO Box 132
Freedom WY 83120
T: 866-684-4159
F: 866-422-7473
info@thedoublelranch.com

Monterey Pasta was incorporated in 1989. Its successes in Northern California continued and in the early 1990s attracted the attention of Lance Mortensen, a self-made millionaire who had made his fortune first manufacturing and retailing aquatic equipment and later building fully furnished mansions in the San Francisco Bay area. Mortensen was initially attracted to Monterey Pasta as an investment opportunity, but he envisioned a grandiose future for the company, and before long he had persuaded the Hills that, under his direction, it would be attainable. In 1993 they let him assume the strategic management of the company, first becoming MPC's chief financial officer and then its CEO.

Although he had no experience in the food industry, Mortensen had sweeping plans for the company. In addition to enlarging its distribution base among supermarkets, in August 1993 he launched a chain of Monterey Pasta restaurants. Mortensen planned that after gaining a foothold in California, he would expand throughout the United States. To aid him, he sought out staff members who had food and restaurant experience at companies like Nestlé, Bennigan's, and Boston Market. To finance the new restaurants, a public stock offering of more than two million shares was arranged for December 1993. As the date of the IPO approached, optimism ran high among investors despite the company's obvious risks. First, supermarkets constituted an extremely competitive market, in which Monterey Pasta was battling much larger and better-financed competitors, including Kraft's DiGiorno line and Nestlé's Contadina brand sauces. Second, Monterey Pasta's retail sales were overly dependent on two large customers, Costco and Safeway. Mortensen brushed aside these reservations, predicting that within a year half of MPC's sales would come from its restaurants. Critics countered that restaurants were an even riskier venture than supermarkets, particularly when the CEO had no restaurant experience.

HAVENS; A Return to Nature, Mostly by Cutting It Down
By MATT RICHTEL
Published: Friday, April 12, 2002
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THE log home stood on the banks of Fall Creek in the shadow of 14,000-foot peaks. Its owner tossed his fly fishing line into the stream looking for German brown trout, but instead hooked a nagging idea for an acquisition.
The cabin, just outside Telluride, Colo., was to be Lance Mortensen's retreat, a refuge from the fast pace of Silicon Valley.
But standing knee-deep in mountain water, Mr. Mortensen realized he could not escape his compulsions and promptly packed up his pole and returned to California to wheel and deal.
This marriage of Captains of Industry with Log Cabins -- popping up from the Pennsylvania countryside, to Lake Tahoe and the great Northwest -- has created a curious culture, and some contradictions. For one thing, the logs often cannot protect movers and shakers from their own work ethics, and a home office is often a well-worn room in these retreats.
For another, while the outside of the homes are made of shorn trees (specifically, standing dead timber), they are far from Abraham Lincoln's log cabin.
Inside are the latest amenities: Sub Zero refrigerators, floors made of slate from Shanghai, and Cypress hardwood imported from South America, a Viking wine cooler kept at 55 degrees.
They are to a homesteader's cabin what a Land Rover is to a covered wagon. Some observers say the structures are mere shells of log homes -- less like Frontier Days, and more like Walt Disney's Frontier Land.
Yet the executives and well-heeled types who are building these high-end cabins as second homes say the the structures are not just aesthetic, but also spiritually pleasing. The logs are not mere building materials, it is said, they are about mood. Timber as transcendentalism. They remind one of a simpler time. Of a slower pace. Of the era B.C.: Before the Computer Revolution.
''It's back to nature, back to the frontier days,'' said Michael Hammes, chief executive of Sunrise Medical, a San Diego company that is one of the world's largest wheelchair suppliers.
He retreats to an 11,000-square-foot home just outside Aspen, which is called ''the cabin'' by his family.
''You walk in, put the fireplace on, and you're your own man,'' he said.
Michael McLaughlin, a Telluride real estate agent and designer of log homes, said that owners wanted a ''camplike experience,'' but with ''steam showers, granite countertops, the best appliances.''
For instance, Mr. McLaughlin designed a home owned by a money market trader from Chicago that has an outside stone deck on which the floor is heated; a gas fireplace near the hot tub (Mr. McLaughlin said he decided at the last minute not to include a waterfall because of potential legal liability); and a $6000 Viking Barbecue.
Inside, the kitchen floor is made of 125-year-old terra cotta from Provence, France, the countertop is Pennsylvania Blue Stone and the stove is cooled with a fan whose engine is in the garage, to keep fan noise to a minimum (''the little touches make a big difference,'' Mr. McLaughlin said). The showers are made of tumbled marble and include heated seats.
Mr. McLaughlin sold Mr. Mortensen his first log cabin, on the river. Subsequently, he collaborated with Mr. Mortensen -- who has started some 10 companies, including Zap Me, an Internet startup that put computers in schools -- to design a home closer to downtown Telluride.
But Mr. Mortensen has had particular trouble escaping his entrepreneurial nature. But, sensing a chance for profit, he sold that home; he recently purchased land on which he hopes to build his eventual retreat.
Despite all of his moves, he has not given up on the idea of a log cabin; he likes them, he said, because of the '' tranquillity that comes with stepping back in time.''
Generally, log home ownership has been on the rise since the mid-1980's. Then, 7,000 log homes were sold a year; today, 30,000 are sold in the United States, according to John R. Kupferer, publisher of Log Home Living Magazine, who said, ''there are more log homes today than ever in the history of the world.''
They are also more expensive; the average log home price is around $300,000, according to the magazine's surveys.
There has, however, been a slowdown in some of the fancier log home neighborhoods, in light of the dot.com collapse and the larger economic sluggishness.
In Mountain Village, an exclusive town beside Telluride that is or has been home to Oprah Winfrey, Dick Ebersol and Susan St. James, Marilyn and Dan Quayle, and Senator Jon S. Corzine of New Jersey, there are 75 homes for sale on the market, an all-time high, according to real estate agents.
But not all action is at a standstill, as evidenced by the Yellow Caterpiller bulldozer culling aspens from a hillside lot in Mountain Village. The land is destined to be the site to a 15,000-square-foot log structure that, according to the project's developer, Ronald R. Kurucz, will blend in beautifully, and may be more enticing than the current grove of trees that dot the land.
''Aspens,'' Mr. Kurucz said, ''are like weeds around here.''
What is less common are bowling alleys. That is the heart of the project Mr. Kurucz is developing for his client, Timothy S. Boberg, who retired last year from Miami, where he advised Fortune 100 companies on improving productivity.
''I haven't bowled since I was 10 years old,'' Mr. Boberg said, but added that he thought the alley would be a good way to entertain guests.
That will not be the only possible source of entertainment; the odd configuration of a bowling alley necessitated building other rooms with similar dimensions, so Mr. Boberg decided to build -- alongside the alley -- a lap pool and an indoor shooting range. On the level above the pool, the alley and the range will be a 6,000-square-foot master.
Mr. Boberg plans to live there with his girlfriend, Roxanne Pulitzer, a romance novelist once involved in a highly-publicized divorce from Herbert Pulitzer Jr.
The 15,000-square-foot development is sizable, considering that it is an addition. Mr. Boberg and Ms. Pulitzer live next door in a 9,000-square-foot home they moved into last year and that cost around $5 million (and will ultimately serve as the guest house). Touring the property, Mr. Boberg said he liked the natural aura of the structure, in particular the strength exuded by the 12-inch-diameter lodge pole pine that surround him. He said it had ''the feel of a log cabin in the woods.
''It's peaceful; it's healthy. There's something about being in the mountains.
Mr. Boberg, 55, said he liked to spend his time outdoors, hiking and skiing, though he said he got much of his exercise in one of two gymnasiums in his current home.
One gym has the latest Cybex weightlifting equipment, and the other contains cardiovascular machines. On the floor next to the treadmill is an authentic buffalo-skin rug; it came with the house, which came furnished. Mr. Boberg and Ms. Pulitzer have not quite figured out what to do with the rug, or some of the other rustic touches that they say seem a little too contrived.
Rather, Mr. Boberg has begun to decorate the place with his own contemporary art. The new addition will reflect their own tastes, such as including a mini-movie theater, along with the bowling alley.
''We just don't want a house that is stereotyped with a frontier theme,'' Mr. Boberg said, noting that he plans to ''keep the stuffed deer heads and buffalo rugs to a minimum.''
Indeed, Mr. Boberg said, there is a danger of going over the top with the rustic sensibilities, and he would not want to be accused of having that kind of home.
''Some people,'' he said, ''really overdo it.''
Photos: CABIN FEVER -- The million-dollar log mansions around Telluride feature breathtaking views, modern amenities and rustic touches like a bear mounted by an owner (but shot by his plumber). (Photographs by Richard Perry/The New York Times)(pg. F8); LOGGING IN -- Silicon Alley executives are reinventing the log cabin in the woods near vacation spots like Telluride. (Photographs by Richard Perry/The New York Times)(pg. F1)

Management & Trends
ZapMe Kills Computers In The Classroom
Betsy Schiffman, 11.28.00, 4:43 PM ET

SILICON VALLEY - You don't have to listen carefully to hear Lance Mortensen's desperate cry for help--he hasn't been all that quiet.

Mortensen, the founder and chief executive of ZapMe Corp. (nasdaq: IZAP - news - people) had a nifty plan to wire America's classrooms, but the plan backfired when some high-profile activists cried foul. Now he's scrounging for a few generous backers to support his partially executed plan.

Launched in 1996, ZapMe of San Ramon, Calif., wanted to give away free computer equipment and access to U.S. schools. The hitch was that the equipment and access would be supported by banner advertising, a concept frowned upon by educators. Still, ZapMe launched two successful pilot schools in 1998. By the end of the third quarter of 2000, ZapMe had wired 2,300 schools in 45 states, providing approximately 2 million students with Internet access.