Your grandfather Isaac left Poland in 1855 believing he had found the Promised Land in Mazatlán. He built a shoe factory,
a luggage business, a real estate empire — and then it almost all disappeared. You grew up in old Mazatlán, the son of a man whose business was failing, selling insurance door to door and then timeshares in small apartments with nothing to offer but the view of the sea. At what point did you look at that view and decide it was enough to build an empire on?

Yes – I was selling insurance and along the way I met a man who told me that I would make more money selling time shares.  I knew I was a good salesman – I did the math on what this man was proposing, I understood the business and decided to go for it. This was the start of my new career. I saved money, invested in an oceanfront land and built my first project.

You wrote the story of your family’s journey from Poland to Mazatlán — a Jewish family that arrived in 1855 and within a
generation had become part of the local elite. You then wrote the story of how you went from desperation to a billion-dollar
empire. Most men of your stature hire someone to write their story. You sat down and wrote yours yourself and hired a writer to help you. What did you discover about yourself and your family in the act of writing that you had not understood before?

I investigated the history of my family through a lot of different sources – aunts, cousins – older relatives that knew the story and when I was clear on all the information I had gathered – I did get help from a writer; Joyce Schelling, and together we wrote the book.  What I discovered about myself was that I had inherited the Jewish drive to work hard and become successful in life. 

You had never been to Los Cabos. You felt like the king of Mazatlán and had no reason to go. Then a banker friend called and said come see this place — and you went, and you saw something that nobody else had seen yet, and you bet everything on a stretch of desert coast at the tip of the Baja Peninsula. BajaTraveler’s readers live and breathe that coastline. What exactly did you see in Los Cabos in the early 1990s that made you say — this is where the next chapter is written?

When I first arrived in Los Cabos, I saw the potential it had. The streets were not paved, the cows would graze everywhere.  The tourists were enjoying themselves, they were all from the U.S. and Canada and I thought to myself, this is it – this has potential – and our story in Cabo began.

Quivira Los Cabos is 728 hectares at the tip of the Baja Peninsula — one of the most dramatic pieces of real estate on the Pacific coast of the Americas. You put a Jack Nicklaus golf course on those cliffs that Golf Digest named one of the best in the Americas. You built Pueblo Bonito Pacifica, Sunset Beach, Rosé, and Los Cabos inside it. And now the St. Regis is
coming — on your land, on your terms, on a development you created from nothing. How does a man from Mazatlán end up
owning the most valuable hospitality real estate in Baja California Sur — and what did it cost you that nobody ever talks about?

We were blessed when we bought the land because of the spectacular views and the price was accesible.  There were high winds due to the Pacific Ocean, yet we hired experts to help us with that challenge. Security on that side of the beach was also a challenge, but we hired guards to secure the coast.  We built great projects- sales were great from the start – we hired Jack Nicklaus to build the golf course and it all came out magnificent. No other golf course in Cabo has views like we do in Quivira – they are breathtaking.

You decided to build the Gran Acuario Mazatlán — one of the largest aquariums in Latin America — in a city that many
had written off as a second-tier destination. You described the process as feeling like a castaway on a deserted island. Most
hoteliers build hotels. You built a cultural institution for an entire city. What made you take on a project that had nothing to do with your business model — and what do you want Mazatlán to be in twenty years because of it?

I built the aquarium in Mazatlan because it was the correct thing to do. Being from Mazatlan, I love the destination and since the municipality donated the land to me, I decided to build it for everyone.  We also improved the historic center – a lot of us hoteliers got together to do this.  We all wanted an iconic place in Mazatlan. We will soon be building a museum as well.

In 2024 you said publicly that banda music on the beaches of Mazatlán was driving American tourists away — that it was a
disaster, a scandal, that Mazatlán could not position itself as a first-class destination while the noise continued. The musicians responded. The internet went wild. You were praised by some and attacked by many. You didn’t back down. For a man who has spent his entire life building Mazatlán’s reputation as a destination, what were you actually trying to say — and do you think anyone heard the real message beneath the controversy?

Our message was very clear, we didn’t want this very loud music to be played in the beaches.  Beaches are meant to be peaceful and this type of music is very loud.  I personally don’t have a problem with this type of music, but I know that our visitors, our tourism doesn’t  like it.  When I spread this message, I had over 500 bands come and play (this loud music) to one of my hotels – all at once. It wasn’t easy, but we were able to have the government step in and regulate this problem.

You told the world you would not go to Cancún because it is too competitive and the offer does not allow you to stand out
the way you do in Los Cabos or Mazatlán. That is a remarkable thing for a developer of your scale to say — a conscious
rejection of the largest tourism market in México. But then you announced a 350 to 500 million dollar Mexican Caribbean project. Something changed your mind. What was it — and what does Ernesto Coppel in the Mexican Caribbean look like that is different enough from everything already there to justify the investment?  San Miguel de Allende opened two months ago, how is that going?

Yes – we are going to be building in the Mexican Caribbean – in Cancun. More about this later. We opened San Miguel de Allende two months ago and the acceptace has been incredible. The hotel which is part of our VANTAGE luxury division – is beautiful.  It sits in the historic center of San Miguel de Allende facing the parish. This is the first hotel in the collection, welcoming a new chapter of refined luxury where history, design, and elevated living come together. A sanctuary crafted for those who seek beauty, culture and timeless sophistication.

Every room in every Pueblo Bonito hotel contains paintings and sculptures of the Virgin Mary and Saint Michael the
Archangel — chosen personally by you. You have said that God and Providence gave you the mix of talents you needed to escape the life you were living. In an industry that runs on RevPAR, occupancy percentages, and EBITDA margins, what does it mean in practice — not as a philosophy but as an operational reality — to build a hotel company around faith?

 I am very grateful to God for having given me the talent and the courage to work hard – very hard and accomplish what I have built.

You have been president of AMDETUR and president of the CNET — the same organization that Antonio Cosío Pando
now leads, another voice in this series. You have watched Mexican luxury hospitality transform over four decades from the inside, from the boardroom, from the building site, and from the gremial. What is the one structural decision — in policy, in infrastructure, in market positioning — that México got wrong in that time and that is still costing the industry today?

Yes – I have watched Mexican Luxury hospitality transform over the years. When the Mexico Tourism Board existed, the entire country benefited from the world-wide promotion.  I think the decision of terminating this infrastructure has hurt the country as a whole and it’s affecting our industry today.

Your grandfather Isaac arrived in Mazatlán in 1855 believing it was the Promised Land. He was right — but not in the way
he imagined. He built a shoe factory. You built a billion-dollar hospitality empire on the Pacific coast and the colonial heart of México. The family has been in Mazatlán for 170 years. When you look at what Isaac started and what you have built, and then you look at your children and grandchildren — who you have said worry you, who you feel are the last wall between them and the world — what do you need the next generation to understand about what this family’s journey has actually been for?

My grandfather arrived in San Francisco with two friends. One was Mr. Strauss who later became the owner of Levi Strauss. After finding gold in San Francisco, my grandfather finds his way to Mazatlan and builds a shoe store along with some mines.

I would hope that my grandchildren continue in the footsteps that have been laid out for them.  There is a lot of material to work from, they carry my same blood – the Jewish blood which motivates us to be very hard working. I want them to know that we come from a hard working and very successful family tree.  We, the Coppels’ are all ambitious , decent, very organized and we don’t steal.  We keep our word.