If there’s one trend that has many veteran campground and RV park owners shaking their heads, it’s the largely pandemic-driven phenomenon of the new camper, according to Andy Zipser, author of Renting Dirt, the story of his family’s experiences owning and operating a Virginia RV park.
Considerably younger, more diverse and more urban than their predecessors, the newcomers have changed not just the quantity of campers but their overall quality—and not always in a good way. At least, not from a traditional perspective!
Perhaps no one statistic sums up this new reality more succinctly than the answers to a Campspot survey taken this past August that among other things asked campers why they camp. A less than overwhelming 10 percent of 1,556 respondents answered “to spend time in nature.” The three larger responses could as readily have applied to an ocean cruise, a hotel stay, or a ski resort: 23 percent for vacation family time, 19 percent for relaxation, and 17 percent for proximity to outdoor activities. In other words, the one characteristic that traditionally set camping apart from all other vacation options has become the least important reason for doing it.
A summary of the Campspot survey was distributed at a breakout session at the National Association of RV Parks and Campgrounds (ARVC) annual convention this past month which was only fitting. Campspot, a cloud-based campground reservation management system has been a principal driver behind both the swelling tide of new campers—who are most comfortable in the online universe—and of the increasingly transactional nature of the camping experience.
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With more than 2,000 campgrounds in its customer base for which it processed more than $1 billion in gross bookings within a recent 12-month period, Campspot has been a leader in pushing “revenue optimization” in all its various incarnations including demand pricing, site-lock fees, and increasingly onerous cancellation fees.
But other industry representatives at the ARVC convention sang the same tune usually to lay the groundwork for urging campground owners to accommodate the changing demographics. Typical in that regard was the observation by Jon Gray of RVshare, a peer-to-peer RV rental company that the new campers are “looking for hotel-type amenities” which he contended is a “great opportunity” for campground operators.
In real-world terms “great opportunity” means the opportunity to spend more money on various upgrades, increased amenities, and all the marketing bells and whistles that go along with that. More spending, in turn, will necessitate higher rates but the new campers, everyone seems to agree, not only can afford to foot the bill but won’t even notice the difference. “They’re conditioned for it—nobody says anything,” piped up an audience member at the Campspot presentation.
Indeed, KOA’s North American Camping Report 2022, released in late April, found that nearly 40 percent of the new campers have annual household incomes exceeding $100,000. Moreover, nearly half went glamping in 2021 and the rest planned to glamp this year which is to say planned on the least outdoorsy—and most expensive—way to camp. That high level of glamping interest contributed to KOA’s broader finding that 36 percent of all campers went on a glamping trip for the first time in 2021 with 50 percent saying they would seek a glamping trip this year.
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While industry purists may shake their heads at such trends others are all too willing to jump aboard what they see as a gravy train. As one such campground owner observed at a cracker barrel discussion about managing RV parks in a softening economy, “When we first started we welcomed everyone but then we started upgrading our clientele.” Another campground manager who runs a large Florida park added, “People will pay to have fun. That will never go away.”
Just how pervasive the change has become was evidenced by ARVC’s choice of campgrounds for its prospective owners’ workshop, a pre-convention one-day session attended by approximately 30 people learning the business as they prepare to build or buy an RV park of their own. Following a morning of quick-and-dirty workshops, the prospective owners piled into a bus to drive an hour to … Camp Margaritaville RV Resort, the only example of what an RV park looks like that they would be shown.
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Nice place, Margaritaville. Two restaurants, 401 sites that include 75 RV park models, 650 imported palm trees, artificial turf throughout, its own call center, a cashless economy—everything that’s needed, said one of its amiable owners, “to propel old-style RV parks into the present day.”
Worth Pondering…
You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.
—C.S. Lewis