Woody Creek Bakery & Café Concessions Contract Follow-Up

Photo showing Woody Creek Bakery & Café’s Concourse C location at Denver International Airport. Passengers traveling with carry-on luggage stand in line both to give their orders and to pick up their food.

Denver International Airport fully implemented three recommendations made in the original audit report. However, the airport only partially implemented five others and it has not taken steps to address the risks five other recommendations had sought to resolve.

The airport took steps to implement recommendations for developing explicit criteria for allowable and unallowable deductions from reportable vendor revenue, placing these criteria centrally in its concessions handbook, and distributing the handbook to its concessionaires.

Furthermore, the airport is now requiring an independent certified public accountant certify concessionaires’ annual statements, independently confirming their annual revenue and the deductions used in determining sales-based rent. By taking these steps, the airport has strengthened controls over the accuracy of variable monthly rent amounts due from concessionaires.

Recommendation graphic show three implemented in green, five partially implemented in blue, and five not implemented in red.

Remaining Risks

The 10 recommendations the airport did not fully implement present several lingering risks. Among them:

  • The airport agreed to explore automatic reporting for late payments and start calculating and charging interest on them, but both processes require a software upgrade to the airport’s revenue system, PROPworks, which is scheduled for 2026. Despite this, the airport did not change its processes to proactively identify late payments and did not investigate alternative methods to calculate and charge interest on late payments. This means the airport risks slow identification of late payments, leaving potential contractually-owed interest uncollected.
  • The airport agreed to collect unpaid rent and encourage Skyport Hospitality to make its payments on time but it did not provide us with evidence showing that either recommendation had been implemented. Consequently, the airport risks treating concessionaires unfairly and damaging its reputation.
  • The airport developed policies for allowable and unallowable deductions but did not establish procedures to actively review concessionaires’ compliance with them. Instead, the airport only relies on externally audited annual statements certifying that concessionaires’ annual statements are accurate. Audited annual statements should be the starting point for the airport to establish its own review processes over revenues and deductions. This means the airport risks receiving reduced sales-based rents due to unallowable deductions.
  • The airport developed procedures to implement contract monitoring activities. But the procedures are not proactive — focusing on accounts that are already overdue and have large outstanding balances. Also, while the airport has improved its compliance monitoring with risk-based audits and enhanced processes, a real-time monitoring tool has not been implemented. As a result, the airport risks delayed responses when addressing concessionaire compliance issues.
  • Payment guidelines and instructions were updated and monthly compliance reviews and escalation procedures have been established within the “2025 Standard Operation Procedures,” but airport leaders have not approvedthese procedures.

Auditor's Letter

October 2, 2025

In keeping with generally accepted government auditing standards and Auditor’s Office policy, as authorized by city ordinance, we have a responsibility to monitor and follow up on audit recommendations to ensure city agencies address audit findings through appropriate corrective action and to aid us in planning future audits.

In February 2024, we audited Woody Creek Bakery & Café Concessions Contract and found risks involving insufficient monitoring of concessions contract compliance, an inadequate process to verify deductions used to determine sales-based rent, persistently late payments, and utility fees based on estimates, not actual use. Denver International Airport agreed to implement all 13 of our recommendations.

We recently followed up and found the airport fully implemented three recommendations, partially implemented five, and did not implement another five recommendations.

Although the airport has made some progress, it did not fully address all the risks associated with our original findings. Notably, unallowable deductions according to the contract continue to occur, and policies have been drafted and put into use, but have not been fully approved by airport leaders. Consequently, we may revisit these risk areas in future audits to ensure the city takes appropriate corrective action.

We appreciate the leaders and team members at Denver International Airport who shared their time and knowledge with us throughout the audit and the follow-up process. Please contact me at 720-913-5000 with any questions.

Denver Auditor's Office

Auditor's Signature
Timothy O'Brien, CPA

Timothy O'Brien Official Headshot

AUDITOR TIMOTHY O'BRIEN, CPA
Denver Auditor

Denver Auditor's Office

201 W. Colfax Ave. #705 Denver, CO 80202
Email: auditor@denvergov.org
Call: 720-913-5000
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