MC Fireside Chats – December 3rd, 2025

[00:00:00] Brian Searl: Welcome everybody to another episode of MC Fireside Chats. My name is Brian Searl with Insider Perks and Modern Campground. Excited to be here with you again for a really good episode on data, trends, and all that kind of stuff.

[00:00:10] Brian Searl: We’ve got Miguel from the Mexican Glamping Association, Scott from Cairn Consulting, Phil from RVDA. Deneen and Jen are our special guests, and Simon Neal from CampMap all the way from Croatia.

[00:00:19] Brian Searl: Welcome, guys. Do you want to go briefly around the room and just introduce yourselves for those of the people who are watching who don’t know who you are? Do you want to start, Phil?

[00:00:26] Phil Ingrassia: Hi, I’m Phil Ingrassia. I’m President of the RV Dealers Association of America. We represent motorhome and travel trailer dealers all across the US.

[00:00:37] Brian Searl: Thanks for being here, Phil. Appreciate it. Whoever wants to go next. I mean, I can call on people if you really want me to.

[00:00:44] Scott Bahr: I’m Scott Bahr, the President of the Cairn Consulting Group. We’re a market research organization conducting market research across outdoor hospitality and the RVing world as well. So yeah, we’re pretty much immersed in data from dawn till dusk. Even longer now because the days are too short.

[00:01:06] Brian Searl: I like your plant back there. Is that real?

[00:01:08] Scott Bahr: Yes, it is.

[00:01:09] Brian Searl: I like it. It kind of looks like the plant I have, but not quite as rough around the edges. What kind of plant is it?

[00:01:16] Scott Bahr: That’s like a rubber plant.

[00:01:17] Brian Searl: Oh. See, Jessica said rubber. So, okay. Thank you for being here. I appreciate you, Scott. Simon?

[00:01:24] Simon Neal: Yeah, I’m Simon, the founder of CampMap. So a web platform that helps campsites and campgrounds improve marketing and guest experience with digital premium site maps.

[00:01:40] Brian Searl: Thanks for being here, Simon. Miguel?

[00:01:45] Miguel Huerta: Hello, everyone. I’m Miguel. I’m the President of the Mexican Glamping Association. I get a little bit better weather nowadays compared to the rest of the folks. So I’m happy to be here. I think that this might be the last show of the year, is it?

[00:02:02] Brian Searl: It is, yeah, for this group. Yeah. I think we have one more MC Fireside Chats next week with a different group, and then we have like a wrap-up episode, and then we’re off for like two weeks.

[00:02:13] Miguel Huerta: Where’s the sparkling wine and like the 2026 glasses and whatever?

[00:02:17] Brian Searl: I was waiting on you to ship those to us, right?

[00:02:20] Scott Bahr: Thank you, Miguel. Thank you for bringing that up.

[00:02:23] Brian Searl: We should have those for sure. Do tariffs impact that? Or they cost more? There wasn’t a budget for it this year. I asked Phil to donate money and he was like, “Nope, that cost too much money.”

[00:02:33] Brian Searl: Deneen and Jen are our two special guests. Deneen, you want to go first?

[00:02:36] Deneen Allen: Sure. Deneen Allen. I’m the CEO and founder of Firecircle, which is a tourism and hospitality entrepreneur accelerator. We host digital programs and mentorship all across Canada and now into the US and Jamaica recently. We have hundreds of entrepreneurs in our program and as members in Firecircle and all getting together in similar fashion to this, Brian, so that they can talk to each other about all sectors of the tourism industry. But I’m happy to be here on an outdoor hospitality podcast. Thank you.

[00:03:22] Brian Searl: That’s awesome. Yeah. Anytime we can facilitate conversations between people, we always end up learning more, I think. So. Jen? Last but not least, of course.

[00:03:30] Jen Ballenger: Yeah. I’m Jen, and I am a campground owner here in Missoula, Montana. We have Jim & Mary’s RV Park.

[00:03:39] Brian Searl: How did you get Jim & Mary’s RV Park and your name’s Jen?

[00:03:42] Jen Ballenger: We purchased it from Jim and Mary way back. This is our 25th season. And when we bought the park, they had a really great following, a great reputation, lots of repeat business. And so we didn’t want to scare anybody away. And it’s worked for us. I have been called Mary a lot for 25 years.

[00:04:02] Brian Searl: That’s got to be the most interesting push and pull ever. Because you’re right, I’m a marketing guy, and when I come in and people are like, “I’m gonna take over a campground or buy or change a brand name that’s existed for 20 or 30 years that has a really good following,” and you’re like, “Well, you probably shouldn’t change the name.” But that’s a really unique, interesting like… “I swear I own it. It’s called Jim & Mary’s, but my name is Jen. I promise you, I really am the owner.”

[00:04:25] Jen Ballenger: Yeah, well, sometimes I deny it, and it makes it easier too. Depends on if they’re complimenting me or coming in with a complaint.

[00:04:31] Brian Searl: I like it. Glass half full. Always come from a positive perspective.

[00:04:35] Brian Searl: All right, guys. So we’re gonna toss this to the room as we normally do at the beginning of every episode. It’s been a little bit since we’ve been together. Phil, a little bit longer for you. You’ve been at conventions and some other places doing some cool things with RVDA. Is there anything that’s come across you guys’ desks that you think we should talk about here to start the episode?

[00:04:52] Phil Ingrassia: Well, a couple things came out this week actually. One was the RVIA wholesale shipment forecast for North America for 2026. And, you know, a lot of people have been watching this with, you know, a lot of economic uncertainty on both sides of the border, tariffs hanging over everybody a little bit.

[00:05:15] Phil Ingrassia: But the forecast is actually for some incremental improvement, building on the incremental improvement that we had this year. So right now, in 2025, RV shipments in the US and Canada are up about 3% year over year. Which is, you know, kind of pretty much what people expected.

[00:05:35] Phil Ingrassia: And then the 2026 forecast that just came out is showing some more incremental growth for 2026, probably around that same, you know, 2% to 3% increase over 2025. So, you know, we’re seeing kind of a stairstep increase in RV activity, which overall is good.

[00:05:59] Phil Ingrassia: I think there’s a few things building into that. One in the US particularly are lower interest rates. Hopefully some tariff stability as far as announcements coming out of Washington D.C. And then in the US, there’s an expected increase in income tax returns. And a lot of times in past years when there’s been higher increases in refunds, that goes right into discretionary spending.

[00:06:34] Phil Ingrassia: So those are some tailwinds I think that we have that are helping push us along. But you never know, you know, there’s always things going on. But I guess cautious optimism is the thing here.

[00:06:47] Phil Ingrassia: That’s exactly what THOR Industries put out there, first quarter results which were better than expected too, which is another data point.

[00:06:58] Brian Searl: Yeah, I mean, I think that’s cautious optimism for everybody. For the RV industry, for the campground industry, for me in marketing and AI. Like, it’s all cautious optimism. It seems to be teetering on a like, “Which way is it gonna go? We’re not sure.” But like, as long as Phil’s working with RVDA and working with your dealers and your members and the RVIA and all those other people to make everything we can do build a really good foundational base. Like if we’re doing everything we can do, we’re setting the foundation for if it lifts off, it does. If it doesn’t, then that’s not what we want, but at least we’re doing everything we can, right?

[00:07:28] Phil Ingrassia: Right. And dealers have been very cautious on building inventory. So I think that, you know, I think we’re set up for success. Certainly some economic things have to go our way. We need consumer confidence to rebound. We need to have better stability, I think, especially on the tariff issue for a lot of folks. I think that we’re set up for success and I think that’s kind of reflected in these incrementally better forecasts.

[00:08:03] Scott Bahr: Phil, I have a question for you. In some of the forecasts I see, not in the RV industry but in other sectors, saying that a lot of the improvements—for example, retail sales overall—being driven by the higher income category markets are projected to spend a little bit more this year. Do you think that’s being reflected in this, and is it impacting the types of models that are being shipped and being requested out there from the dealerships?

[00:08:38] Phil Ingrassia: Well, I do think that we’re still seeing a lot of growth in the entry-level and mid-level travel trailer market. Although I am hearing entry-level has, like you’re saying, has not been as robust maybe. You’re always gonna have that entry-level—the folding camping trailers, entry-level travel trailers—kind of drive the volume. But for a lot of the manufacturers and dealers, that mid to higher-level unit is a more profitable unit to sell. And I think you’re right. I think that we are seeing some of the higher-end fifth wheels doing better than maybe they had been in the past.

[00:09:20] Phil Ingrassia: And it is a discretionary income purchase, let’s face it. It’s like boats, it’s like powersports. RVs are not something that gets you to work every day. People gotta be feeling good about their jobs, about the stock market. All these things that are baked into consumer sentiment.

[00:09:39] Scott Bahr: Yep. Okay.

[00:09:42] Deneen Allen: Could I ask Phil a question? Phil, I wondered in Canada, when the numbers came off after COVID, I wondered if there was any concerted effort happening up here with new Canadians and educating them on the RV industry and the opportunity for camping and teaching them how to camp using an RV or trailer, any version of an RV. How does that happen down in the US? Is any of the lift coming from immigration, from new Americans? Or how would you describe the sort of the bulk of the market?

[00:10:24] Phil Ingrassia: Well, there’s been quite a few studies done about pandemic buyers. And one of the big concerns that the industry had during that bump, both on both sides of the border, was are we gonna be able to retain those people? Are they gonna go on cruises? Are they gonna go find something else to do with their discretionary purchases?

[00:10:44] Phil Ingrassia: And we’ve done some studies and remarkably, and maybe not remarkably, but between 60% and 70%, depending on the product type, of those pandemic buyers are gonna buy again or at least are telling people that they’re considering buying again. Which is pretty good. So we’re holding onto those folks, which I think is great.

[00:11:08] Phil Ingrassia: The new market entrants are coming from a lot of different sources. And certainly Scott’s well versed in that because of all these different types of people that are camping, so to speak. Whether they’re glamping, whether they’re in more rustic areas or overlanders. There’s just so many different types of people who may not even consider themselves RVers that are using the product now, which is good news again for the industry.

[00:11:37] Brian Searl: Is there any data that RVDA or RVIA collects about what people are planning to use the RVs for? Like long-term, transient, BLM land, private campgrounds? Like is there any data that’s collected about that?

[00:11:50] Phil Ingrassia: Scott’s probably got some data on that.

[00:11:53] Scott Bahr: Yeah, we do. RVIA does collect that information quarterly.

[00:11:58] Brian Searl: Do you have any sense of… I’m just asking, maybe I’m putting words into Jen’s mouth or Miguel’s mouth in Mexico, because obviously there’s RVs down there. But my mouth too, for everybody. Like what can we expect in 2026 from these new sales?

[00:12:17] Scott Bahr: You’re gonna see a little bit of movement, it looks like, toward the less expensive forms of RVing. You know, staying in a little bit more boondocking, a little bit more BLM land. Overlanding is a growing sector. We’re seeing that pop up a lot more as well.

[00:12:42] Scott Bahr: But people are using their RVs and it seems that it’s growing a little bit too for using RVs for like events. They’re calling them—what do they call the parents take their kids to sporting events all the time? There’s a new word for it. But a lot of RVers are doing that. In fact, they’re buying their RVs because the kids are in like travel sports and stuff like that. So instead of renting hotel rooms and stuff like that, the parents are getting together as a group and they’re traveling to sporting events.

[00:13:13] Scott Bahr: And also just festivals and so on. Those things are all very robust. We didn’t see a drop-off. I thought we might see a drop-off like after in the COVID, post-COVID years, but in fact, we’ve seen growth in those areas. People see the RV as an opportunity to kind of… The group stuff is something we’re seeing a lot more of. It was down for years after RVers. It seemed like we’re a lot part of these groups and so on. But now it’s a lot of self-initiated and we’re seeing a lot some climbing interest in that. The older millennial group, surprisingly enough, is really kind of driving a lot of that.

[00:13:58] Brian Searl: Jen, how was your season if you don’t mind sharing? And then tell us a little bit about your park afterward, please.

[00:14:03] Jen Ballenger: Yeah. So here in Missoula and Montana in general, what I would say is I would echo what Scott just said. Events, sporting events, music, festivals. My town in particular has done a great job of bringing a lot of new events to town and promoting those nationwide.

[00:14:29] Jen Ballenger: So when you talk about the financial aspects of RVing, I’ve always felt like over the past 25 years, it is budget traveling in a sense. Those parents that are traveling for sporting events, that’s expensive to hotel it and eat out for every meal. Although it’s not cheap to RV and stay in private campgrounds, it’s a lot less expensive than a local hotel. And that goes double for music events and so forth. And especially in an era of dynamic pricing. So the price jacks up for all those hotels. They certainly sell out here in town. And people are looking for a little bit less expensive way to do that. Plus then they also have a vehicle to get around in a state like Montana. They can see a lot more and avoid renting another vehicle.

[00:15:31] Brian Searl: I had an interesting discussion about that actually on LinkedIn the other day. I was talking to you guys about how I have my AI agent post on LinkedIn. And it wrote a topic about how Waymo was expanding their self-driving cars to multiple additional cities in the United States. And it tied that in as I have it do with RV parks and how that changes the landscape of that. And what it ended up coming out with was like, this is going to be interesting for RVers who travel and don’t get involved in the local community maybe as much as they should because they don’t have a tow-away vehicle or it’s expensive to get into town or whatever else. And so when you—and this is years away—but when you have thousands of those vehicles on the street and you can just get a Waymo and you can take it into town and you don’t have to worry about unhooking and bringing a towable with you and doing all that stuff, I think that helps the local communities a lot more too.

[00:16:17] Jen Ballenger: Mhm.

[00:16:18] Deneen Allen: Is this trend, if we think it’s here to stay, is this an opportunity for RV parks to focus a little bit more on the group camping infrastructure? So that they’re gathering, you know, you can get all the RVs in one area, you have one fire pit or one pavilion or something that is group focused. Do you see an opportunity there?

[00:16:47] Brian Searl: I know you’re gonna talk Scott. Give me one second. I’m interested to hear about groups in Mexico from Miguel first and groups in Croatia, and then I’d love to hear the data, Scott. Can we do it that way?

[00:16:56] Scott Bahr: Absolutely.

[00:16:57] Miguel Huerta: Fire away.

[00:16:59] Brian Searl: Like how does this work? Is the glamping industry set up in Mexico to welcome these types of groups, family reunions, stuff like that? Do you guys see a lot of that?

[00:17:11] Miguel Huerta: Well, actually, I think I would like to start with how 2025 was for the hospitality industry in Mexico. And I also made a small comparison with the States, Canada, UK, and Spain. And what my data is showing me is that, for example, the main lodging category which is hotel has seen a decline in each one of these markets: the US, Mexico, the UK, and Canada. A decline on demand.

[00:17:46] Miguel Huerta: Now, and from this, the country that has had the steepest decline has been Mexico, which had 12% less demand for hotels in 2025 compared to the first 11 months of 2025 to the first 11 months of 2024. Now when we are talking about glamping, things are looking up a little bit. Although we have steep declines in Spain that had a 5% decrease, Mexico which we have 7% decrease. And the UK surprisingly has had a 10% decrease on demand for glamping sites. But I think that the country that has gotten the most traction and the most increase on demand for glamping is Canada with a 20% increase. And I think that it has to do with the tariffs and we all stayed home.

[00:18:47] Brian Searl: Yeah, we all stayed home.

[00:18:49] Miguel Huerta: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now when, now that we have seen that this has been a very rough year for the industry pretty much regardless of the country, I think that the glampings that will not only survive but will actually make a decent return on the investment will be the ones that are catering their commercial strategy for B2B or this type of groups and parties of people.

[00:19:22] Miguel Huerta: Like for example in my case, in my company, we have three individuals that their only focus is bringing in these groups to our glamping sites. Sadly, the average glamping site in Mexico has four units. So you cannot host as many people. RVs are not that big in Mexico because of insurance. That’s a huge liability that nobody wants to take.

[00:19:51] Miguel Huerta: But I mean, sure, it sounds that I’m being very grim on the industry. But I think that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, which is the World Cup that we have been discussing which is bound to happen this upcoming summer. So a lot of, and why I’m bringing this to the table pretty much for the last three or four shows, is because a lot of Americans, they don’t realize how big this is.

[00:20:22] Miguel Huerta: So this Friday, December 5th, we’re gonna have like this raffle or where everybody will know which teams are coming to what countries and cities. And I’m pretty sure that a lot of RV operators and owners, they will find a very nice area of opportunity where if the rates are lower, I can buy like a low entry or basic model as Scott was saying and put it to work for me as an Airbnb using this event that drives a lot of demand. So that’s something interesting.

[00:21:09] Miguel Huerta: Of course glampings are important. The issue will be, I foresee that a lot of glamping sites pretty much all over the world, as the industry is maturing, we’re going to see a lot of them closing their doors. So only the ones that have designed their property and their commercial efforts to bring in groups will survive in this very tough environment.

[00:21:37] Brian Searl: Or that they focus on the guest experience, right? I asked you about groups, so that’s fair. But like or just something to differentiate themselves between being just another property with four more tents. Right? Is that fair?

[00:21:51] Miguel Huerta: Yeah, but to me, and I mentioned this in my last participation, the guest experience, if you take a look on the five Ps of marketing: people, price, promotion, place, and products—sorry. The product it’s very interesting, but if you don’t have the right promotion in place, it will be hard for people to know. And a lot of the newcomers to the industry are focusing too much on the guest experience, like okay that they read them well when they arrive to the location, that they have somebody taking care of them during they stay. But sadly, to me that only… Since most of the sales are done over the internet, this guest experience to me goes in the People category that sadly you won’t get to experience until you are in the location.

[00:22:55] Miguel Huerta: The closest will be the ratings on platforms like Google Maps or TripAdvisor or Airbnb, Booking.com, whatever. That helps a lot. But I think that in this survival economy, a lot of people, they need to open their properties and their capabilities to new revenue streams and to these events that are coming to certain locations. So it’s quite challenging, I will say.

[00:23:25] Brian Searl: Yeah, you’re not wrong. I mean Scott and I spend a lot of time on—like we’re gonna talk on Outwired later about guest experience. And we try to drill that home because we see that there’s a little bit of a lack of it in the United States specifically, which is where we’re most familiar with. But you’re not wrong. It can’t just be guest experience. It has to be guest experience combined with telling the story, combined with showing people how it is before the promotion. And then also of course price comes into account, right? I think price is going to be the thing that’s going to hurt a lot of people in 2026. But then if you get price out of the way, and you still have as we talked about this K-shaped economy where the top 10% are spending 50% of the consumer discretionary spending in the United States. Those people, after you discount price, are still willing to maybe take a vacation instead of two. But then where they’re going to go I think is dictated by the guest experience, I think. Maybe a little bit about price. But guest experience with price, whereas the lower income would be just price, right? Is that fair or am I off base?

[00:38:32] Scott Bahr: The one important thing to keep in mind with the pricing discussion is that when your… Your pricing is part of the perception. It is part of the experience. People will assign something to their experience based on what they pay.

[00:38:50] Scott Bahr: So it’s a fine line and it’s hard. And I know exactly what you’re saying, Deneen, because we did some research in post-COVID about overcrowding at campgrounds, for example. And everybody kept saying that there were no campsites available. But all the campground owners are saying, “We have plenty of sites.” And what it was is chatter. It was a lot of chatter out there that was creating this. We found that something like over half the people who said that there was overcrowding had not even personally experienced it.

[00:39:22] Scott Bahr: And so it becomes, as prices of everything else increase, the perception comes into play where the person thinks that they’re paying more. And this is where the communications come in. This is where the experts—that I’m not one in this part, by the way—is how you communicate that value that you offer so that the person understands it. If you have a big jump in prices and someone’s a regular guest, they’re going to be like, “Whoa, what did you do? Put in a big spa here or something?” You’re going to hear that kind of thing.

[00:39:54] Scott Bahr: So it’s important to work with a professional who knows how to communicate and knows how to address this because, again, whatever the person pays, that’s how they’re going to perceive you. And increases… there’s a perception that goes with it. Most people are pretty reasonable. We do price sensitivity research by the way, and I’ve priced a lot of different things. But it’s one of those things you gotta kind of find that zone of tolerance, but understand that how they perceive you when they stay there, the price is going to come into the mix with all the experiences and everything they had. If it doesn’t, you’ve done your job right.

[00:40:34] Deneen Allen: Yeah, that’s so well said. Like that value perception is… and we’re all making these decisions every second of the day on… I mean, we are the pricing mechanism as consumers, right? Every time we pay for something, we have said to the market, “We will accept this product at this price.” So every time we buy something at the grocery store, every time we book a hotel room or an airline flight, every time we buy an RV, we are saying this is the value for money that I expect. And so, yes, we have to pay attention to that as operators. And even if you are just putting your prices up to match inflation, the value delivery has to be there. Exactly what you’re saying, Scott. The guest has to believe that it’s worth it. You will lose a few people. You will lose some of those seasonal or repeat guests because you have to do it from a business standpoint. And you know you’re being reasonable about it and you know you’re delivering value where the value that’s reflected in your pricing. And you will still lose people because it’s just the highest price without going over. But for that guest, it just went over. Right? So we always advocate for no discounting. It’s that it’s understand your base pricing and then you go up from there. So your base pricing is the bottom, right? And then you go up from there. So yeah, the highest price without going over.

[00:42:13] Brian Searl: The Price is Right, yes. Jen, tell us how you think about this at your RV park.

[00:42:17] Jen Ballenger: Yeah, I have a lot of thoughts. For us being a smaller campground, and in the past we’ve primarily catered to the older generation of retiree RVers, and we don’t have a playground or a pool. And so some of the other parks had more of a family-oriented niche in the area and we kind of steered away from that.

[00:42:48] Jen Ballenger: And the older guests back when my price was half or less of what it is today complained about the price. Would come in and sometimes say… you know the story, just kind of a snarky comment, “Holy cow, that’s so expensive.” And one trend that I have seen, and maybe as the demographic has changed, but even with those older guests, people are paying more for everything. And they’re complaining a lot less at me about my prices. Now I did no huge jumps. We creep up a little bit every year. We did a little bit more during and post-COVID. But we keep it incremental until we catch up to where we want to be so that it’s not a sticker shock because we do have a ton of repeat guests.

[00:43:47] Jen Ballenger: But also, I’ll go back to the thing that people perceive RVing and camping as, not everybody, but they perceive it as a value. They are saving money on the hotels. They’re saving money on the restaurants. In a big picture of a vacation, regardless of what the facts are, is still I think perceived as a less expensive way to travel and get your vacation in.

[00:44:15] Jen Ballenger: So if that’s their goal, a discount is an incentive. It takes a little sting out of it. And I know, Deneen, you say no discounts, but there are a lot of camper clubs, Good Sam and here in the US anyway, that people get involved in for the value of it. And it’s 10%. We build our price around that because a lot of people have it. And they think… I’m guilty of it when I shop too. Like if I get a little 10% discount, it makes me feel a little bit better about the money that I spend. And maybe the increase in the rate year over year too.

[00:44:59] Jen Ballenger: So I guess I see a lot less complaining because everything’s more expensive. And I do think in general people understand I’m paying more for power, I’m paying more for my infrastructure, I’m paying more on property taxes. They know everything went up.

[00:45:12] Deneen Allen: Yeah. And I think you can frame those discounts in fun ways that… and you’re always moving off that floor rate. You’re never going below that floor that you’ve set as “this is our base price.” So 100%, there’s so many promotions that we can do, so many fun ways of offering additional value. Sometimes it’s giving something that doesn’t cost you a lot to give to them instead of discounting the rate, right? So it might be something they get on arrival. It might be something you do that is a very low incremental cost to you, but you know, it’s third night for a discount, right? Or something like this. Especially in glamping where you’re really mimicking the overhead of a room night in a hotel where you’ve got housekeeping and things like that, right? Additional.

[00:46:03] Brian Searl: The key is how you frame it, right? The key is how you frame everything. And so like I remember reading an article about Black Friday here in the United States—when I say here in the United States, I’m in Calgary, but you understand. In the United States. Where like they were talking about how the stores had sales and then the consumers weren’t actually buying as much as they normally do on Friday, so the stores discounted more on Saturday and Sunday and then they started buying. So there’s this mindset of the consumer that like “I expect a discount before I buy.” I expect to, maybe not on Black Friday see the value, but not the same way we’re talking about it, right? So I think there’s a mindset in the consumer that like everything is going to be discounted at some point somewhere. I just have to wait for the right opportunity, which is maybe too much of an overcompensation on the side of business people. But I don’t know.

[00:46:54] Brian Searl: I want to spend the last couple minutes of the show—we have 13 minutes left. I’m gonna try something new virtually. We’ve only done it in show or in person at the OHI conference and then we did it at KOA. Where I want each of you guys to ask a question to one other guest. But one other guest, but you can only ask one person one time. So what I mean by that is like, Jen, if you ask Phil a question, no one else can ask Phil a question. And then we’ll just do process of elimination and we’ll see if we can get some good answers out of people. Anything you want to ask anybody. We’ll start with our special guests. We’ll do Jen first. Pick anybody you want.

[00:47:26] Jen Ballenger: Um, going to assume that this question is best for Scott, but I’m not quite sure. In terms of the US anyway, I have been seeing a lot of trends towards corporations gobbling up the little mom-and-pop parks. And I’m just wondering, and if there’s any data on obviously they can offer more with the money behind it in terms of perks and big water parks and who knows what else they can put in and offer to guests. But is there any data out there that shows… I’m seeing campers are looking for a more like traditional camping experience. They want the campfire talk. They want… and we lean in really hard to that mom-and-pop thing because of the people buying up big parks and then becoming more corporate. Do is there any camper data out there about what people are really interested in or is it just still really varied depending on where they go?

[00:48:43] Scott Bahr: It does vary. And there is a very large market for folks who would like to stay at the mom-and-pop types of parks with maybe not all the bells and whistles that you get at other locations. There’s a movement right now for a little bit more disconnection. People want authenticity in their experiences. They maybe, like where you’re at near Missoula, the whole idea of immersion in the culture there in Missoula, in the town, the food, the experiences, the surrounding lands that you’re by, that’s what people are seeking.

[00:49:27] Scott Bahr: If you’re much more, if you’re located for example near a very large urban area, you might get a different type of guest who comes in there and probably wants a little bit more entertainment. They want things to do. Or if your park is not located near some of those features, you need more that’s on site.

[00:49:42] Scott Bahr: So what we’ve been seeing is that there is a movement toward… I sometimes joke and I call it the Luddite movement. People who want to be a little bit more disconnected, a little bit more…

[00:49:56] Phil Ingrassia: Rustic, Scott. Rustic.

[00:49:58] Scott Bahr: I know. I like using Luddite though around Brian. But no, I know exactly what you’re saying. It’s like, yeah, and we saw that we saw that peek up a little bit last year among some of the younger folks that there’s that desire there. They’re not doing it yet, but that desire is there for something a little bit more rustic, Phil. And so it’s… and I see there being in especially in some areas a movement toward that.

[00:50:29] Scott Bahr: The campfire experience is always the number one draw. It’s the number one draw and people like that. They like the social part of it, sitting around the campfire, making s’mores. That experience rises to the top in everything we do. And I won’t try to take up everyone’s time because I know we have more questions.

[00:50:48] Brian Searl: Well, Scott, you’re next. You get to ask somebody now. We’re going in…

[00:50:51] Scott Bahr: I’m gonna ask Miguel. Miguel, where do you see the Mexican market heading in terms of—and I’m gonna go back to what we were just talking about—rustic camping? I know you’re involved in glamping, but you also have your finger on the pulse of what’s going on in Mexico. Is there a good market for people that want a more rustic experience or is that still something that’s farther out on the horizon maybe?

[00:51:23] Miguel Huerta: Can you define rustic just so we are aligned?

[00:51:26] Scott Bahr: Fewer amenities, few services and amenities. Maybe staying in a tent even.

[00:51:32] Miguel Huerta: Got it. Okay. Well, actually, the Mexican market I think that it’s priming right now the other side of the spectrum, you know. Not rustic, but more luxurious. At the end, people want to get more from the peso that they are paying for their experience.

[00:52:00] Miguel Huerta: So what I’m seeing is that almost 95% of the operators in Mexico or the glamping owners in Mexico, they have this very basic experience, you know. So what that would mean is that I foresee that the industry will consolidate in Mexico. Which means basically a lot of mom-and-pop closing down their glamping sites. That’s number one.

[00:52:30] Miguel Huerta: And the ones that survive either they improve their product or… I mean basically they will improve their products. Most of the, let’s call the corporate glamping operators in Mexico, I am not seeing that they are opening as many locations as they did, which basically it’s three: Grupo Presidente, we have Wander Cabins, and Nantly Living, my company. Because I think that these corporate entities are being very cautious. Because as I was telling you, demand is decreasing, the product is getting more complex and more expensive. So at the end with the cost of labor, I mean you might as well build a regular hotel than a glamping site.

[00:53:29] Miguel Huerta: But I think that there are areas of opportunity that people they can monetize, which is basically right next to natural parks. Our infrastructure has nothing to do what you guys have in the States, Canada, and Europe. So these natural parks at the end are driving a lot of visitors. And from that 100%, the top 10%, the top 5%, they will pay prime for those experiences. So I don’t know if that answered the question.

[00:54:07] Scott Bahr: No, no, that’s great. That helps.

[00:54:11] Brian Searl: Your turn, Miguel.

[00:54:13] Miguel Huerta: My turn. I’m gonna go with Simon. And I will ask him what’s his vision for 2026, especially that you have a SaaS platform that allows you to see different markets very fast.

[00:54:34] Simon Neal: Yeah, I mean we don’t necessarily track that high-level stuff in such a way. But I think, yeah, this 2025 was a very uncertain before the season, and it turned out to be kind of okay. So I’m optimistic that 2026 is going to build on that and be better. And I’m hoping for a, you know, globally a lot of better news coming out of the first part of 2026 that’s going to help relax everybody a bit and make everybody a bit more comfortable traveling around and spending again. So that’s kind of my hope and prediction.

[00:55:16] Brian Searl: Your turn, Simon.

[00:55:20] Simon Neal: Okay, I’m going to jump on your idea actually, Miguel, and throw something out there a bit. The World Cup, it’s going to be enormous and the opportunity is there. And you mentioned something about—sorry, I don’t mean to rain on your parade, but you can’t ask Miguel because somebody else already asked Miguel a question.

[00:55:36] Brian Searl: Sorry, I don’t mean to rain on your parade, but you can’t ask Miguel because somebody else already asked Miguel a question.

[00:55:36] Simon Neal: No, no, I’m asking Phil.

[00:55:37] Brian Searl: Oh, okay. All right. That’s fair.

[00:55:40] Simon Neal: You mentioned the idea of campground owners getting hold of RVs and sticking them on sites and Airbnb-ing them. And I think that’s amazing because you can basically very quickly change what you’re selling to cater for that very short-term but super intense market that’s coming. So Phil, is there a way to kind of capitalize on that based on what you know on the RV industry in the US?

[00:56:04] Phil Ingrassia: Yeah, well there’s a lot of things going on next year. And I was just talking to one of our major rental companies about some of what they call tailwinds that really should boost the US RV rental market next year. Not only do we have World Cup coming in, so a lot of international visitors coming to US, Mexico. But we also have America 250, which is the big celebration of 250 years of the United States founding. So there’s going to be events all over the country and they are beefing up their rental operations as much as they can.

[00:56:47] Phil Ingrassia: However, I will say over the last couple years, they weren’t buying as many for their fleets. But I do think they are planning for a big year of RV rentals just with all these special events and just World Cup being one of them. I don’t know frankly how much advance planning is going on in the campground industry and maybe Scott or Brian would have more information on that. But I’m not hearing a lot about that, but I do know that the RV rental companies are gearing up for some major events.

[00:57:30] Brian Searl: It’s on you, Phil.

[00:57:32] Phil Ingrassia: I would ask Jen a question. You know, we’ve pumped a lot of first-time buyers during COVID into kind of the RV camping ecosystem. If you could give one or two pieces of advice to RV dealers who are, you know, when you see first-timers or inexperienced RVers come into your campground, how could the RV dealer prepare those folks a little bit better for their first or maybe their infrequent camping experience so that they enjoy the experience more?

[00:58:09] Jen Ballenger: Um, you know, I guess I would have to say setting them up with some tools for advance planning. I think a lot of the bigger problems is people roll into town and there’s no sites to be had because they haven’t planned ahead. And those newbies maybe just don’t know that they need to get on there and pre-book.

[00:58:34] Jen Ballenger: Other than that, you know, the run-through… We have a lot of big dealers in Montana and they, the run-through is down quick and dirty. They don’t know what they’re doing when they get here. But I always tell them your neighbors are your best resource because other RVers love to help you. So, you know, I don’t know that they could spend a little more time on the important things like dumping your sewer, plugging into power, where to find your breaker box.

[00:59:07] Brian Searl: All right. Deneen is the last one. But Deneen, we’ve ran out of people for you to ask, so you can ask anybody then. You get a free-for-all.

[00:59:14] Deneen Allen: Oh, okay. I wanted to ask about RV resale. And what… so I know you may not have stats… Do you have stats for Canada as well, Phil?

[00:59:28] Phil Ingrassia: I do not have Canadian stats, and unfortunately, Eleonore Hamm, who’s RVDA of Canada, isn’t with us, but I can talk generally about resale.

[00:59:36] Deneen Allen: Yeah, I’d love to hear that because we’ve got a lot of members who are thinking about buying used RVs and using them for glamping sort of setup, things like that. Just wondering what, how they’re holding their value, what that market is like.

[00:59:56] Phil Ingrassia: Well, there’s an old saw that there’s two used RVs sold for every new one that’s sold every year. And that basically, amazingly, kind of holds up through almost every type of economic environment we’re in. Dealers will sell about, depending on the dealership, maybe 30 to 40% of their volume could be used. But that varies quite a bit.

[01:00:25] Phil Ingrassia: I would say that, and of course I work for the dealers, but I would encourage people to buy used from an RV dealer because the unit is pretty much been checked out versus private sale. But there’s a burgeoning private sale market as well.

[01:00:43] Phil Ingrassia: RV values on used have been pretty much steady. I do think recently the values may have ticked up a bit because of the affordability issue. People are looking for a bargain and used are cheaper. But now with interest rates coming down, you know, when people are making those comparisons, should I buy new or should I buy used? And there’s not that much difference in your monthly payment to that payment buyer between new and used. It’s an easy decision to make to go new for a lot of folks.

[01:01:25] Deneen Allen: Thank you.

[01:01:27] Brian Searl: All right. Well we are a couple minutes over here. I want to just wrap up the show. We’ll just go one by one real quick. Jen, any final thoughts that you have and then just tell us where they can find more information about Jim & Mary’s RV Park.

[01:01:37] Jen Ballenger: This was great. I had not participated in a podcast. You guys are full of great information and I just appreciate being invited. jimandmarysrvpark.com is where you can find me.

[01:01:49] Brian Searl: Love it. Thank you so much for being here, Jen. Simon?

[01:01:54] Simon Neal: Yeah, just coming down from a heavy show season. So it was really nice to get around to some of the shows, meet lots of people. It was great. If you want to find anything else about CampMap, just go to campmap.com. You can reach us there quite easily.

[01:02:08] Brian Searl: Appreciate you being here, Simon. Miguel?

[01:02:12] Miguel Huerta: Well, first of all, happy holidays and Happy New Year. Let’s 2026 be a better year than 2025. 2025 wasn’t that bad.

[01:02:22] Brian Searl: Yeah, you don’t have the glasses, but you have the stocking behind you. We got that, right?

[01:02:26] Miguel Huerta: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have a rosé bottle if you guys want some.

[01:02:34] Brian Searl: I’m coming over after this. How long is the flight?

[01:02:36] Miguel Huerta: This is Chinese rosé by the way. Sparkling rosé. But my point is that, sure, on my side, thank you so much for a year full of knowledge, a year full of friendships. If you are interested on the Mexican and Latin American market, please hit me up. Or if you would like how to drive sales to your American or Canadian RV park or glamping site using the World Cup, please let me know. It’s crazy the amount of people that go to the World Cup. Sadly, this year, the main countries that export people to this event are the host. Mexico in Qatar sent a little bit over 50,000 Mexicans to Qatar. The US is the country that buys the most tickets, but because of all the different nationalities that live in there. But for example, we have countries such as Bolivia that might come back to a World Cup. That’s going to be a huge market that people are not thinking about them. So yeah, you can find me on Nantli nantli.travel And sure, I’ll be happy to help or on LinkedIn.

[01:03:59] Brian Searl: Awesome. Thanks for being here, Miguel. And don’t forget to reach out to me. We gotta set up the Mexico thing because I will forget. I’m old. You’re young. So I’m putting it on you.

[01:04:06] Brian Searl: Deneen, final thoughts and where can they find out more about Firecircle?

[01:04:10] Deneen Allen: Well, this has been wonderful. What a great format. Thanks for the invitation, Brian. And firecircle… thefirecircle.ca. You have to put “the” in front of Firecircle or you get some really weird websites. So thefirecircle.ca. We also do market and feasibility studies, we do physical design, we do operational mentorship, all kinds of things. Yeah, and we’re just trying to grow the Canadian market up here. So thanks for inviting me.

[01:04:38] Brian Searl: Thanks for being here, Deneen. Phil?

[01:04:41] Phil Ingrassia: Well, it’s just great. I just think this is a great forum because I’m always an “and” person. You can RV, you can camp, you can glamp. You can do all of these things. I think it’s great to get everybody together to talk about these things. 

[01:04:56] Brian Searl: And if they’re interested more in learning about what RVDA does for the industry: 

[01:04:59] Phil Ingrassia: rvda.org.

[01:05:02] Brian Searl: Thank you, Phil. And last but not least, Scott.

[01:05:04] Scott Bahr: Yeah, we got a lot of new stuff coming out this coming year. So we’re pretty excited about it. Just, I’d love to spend the next two hours telling you all about it in all the detail, but I won’t. But I’ll talk about a little bit. Yeah, I think we should do an episode to some of what I’m talking about. I’ve spent some time in development this year, at the end of the year here, this fall. And I’m pretty excited about some of the stuff we’re working on. Working on some really cool stuff with Brian as well. And so stay tuned. cairnconsultinggroup.com. We have a resource library, a lot of reports and data and information there and we’ll be posting more stuff on our website as well as LinkedIn. So yeah, stay tuned. I think it’s gonna be a fun year. We’re gonna do our best. One of the things I just want to say one last thing about one of the things we’re working on this year, and if anyone wants to get involved at any level, please let me know, and that is I’m working on a research initiative on Gen Z. How do we attract more Gen Z folks in? I have started the process, but I’d love more minds put into it, and connections to young people. I want to mobilize them. So there, there’s my pitch. Sorry I took so long.

[01:06:24] Brian Searl: No, that’s okay. You know I’ll be involved in that, so.

[01:06:27] Brian Searl: Appreciate you guys joining us for another episode of MC Fireside Chats. It was a great conversation. It’s the last one of the year, so this group together will see you in early 2026 for our first episode. I don’t even know… do we have a first episode? It might be a holiday, so it might be two months. I don’t know. We’ll find out.

[01:06:41] Brian Searl: Anyway, thanks guys for being here. If you’re not sick and tired of hearing of me and Scott, we will be on Outwired in about four hours, 53 minutes, 52 and a half minutes, something like that. For a brief truncated show that we’re gonna do today because we both have some other commitments this evening. But we’ll see you guys later for that. If not, we’ll see you next week and another episode of MC Fireside Chats. Take care, guys.

[01:06:59] Multiple Speakers: Bye-bye. Thank you. 

[01:07:40] Brian Searl: Welcome everybody to another episode of MC Fireside Chats. My name is Brian Searl with Insider Perks and Modern Campground. Excited to be here with you again for a really good episode on data, trends, and all that kind of stuff.

[01:08:38] Brian Searl: We’ve got Miguel from the Mexican Glamping Association, Scott from Cairn Consulting, Phil from RVDA. Deneen and Jen are our special guests, and Simon Neal from CampMap all the way from Croatia.

[01:08:48] Brian Searl: Welcome, guys. Do you want to go briefly around the room and just introduce yourselves for those of the people who are watching who don’t know who you are? Do you want to start, Phil?

[01:08:55] Phil Ingrassia: Hi, I’m Phil Ingrassia. I’m President of the RV Dealers Association of America. We represent motorhome and travel trailer dealers all across the US.

[01:09:05] Brian Searl: Thanks for being here, Phil. Appreciate it. Whoever wants to go next. I mean, I can call on people if you really want me to.

[01:09:13] Scott Bahr: I’m Scott Bahr, the President of the Cairn Consulting Group. We’re a market research organization conducting market research across outdoor hospitality and the RVing world as well. So yeah, we’re pretty much immersed in data from dawn till dusk. Even longer now because the days are too short.

[01:09:34] Brian Searl: I like your plant back there. Is that real?

[01:09:37] Scott Bahr: Yes, it is.

[01:09:38] Brian Searl: I like it. It kind of looks like the plant I have, but not quite as rough around the edges. What kind of plant is it?

[01:09:44] Scott Bahr: That’s like a rubber plant.

[01:09:46] Brian Searl: Oh. See, Jessica said rubber. So, okay. Thank you for being here. I appreciate you, Scott. Simon?

[01:09:52] Simon Neal: Yeah, I’m Simon, the founder of CampMap. So a web platform that helps campsites and campgrounds improve marketing and guest experience with digital premium site maps.

[01:10:08] Brian Searl: Thanks for being here, Simon. Miguel?

[01:10:14] Miguel Huerta: Hello, everyone. I’m Miguel. I’m the President of the Mexican Glamping Association. I get a little bit better weather nowadays compared to the rest of the folks. So I’m happy to be here. I think that this might be the last show of the year, is it?

[01:10:31] Brian Searl: It is, yeah, for this group. Yeah. I think we have one more MC Fireside Chats next week with a different group, and then we have like a wrap-up episode, and then we’re off for like two weeks.

[01:10:41] Miguel Huerta: Where’s the sparkling wine and like the 2026 glasses and whatever?

[01:10:46] Brian Searl: I was waiting on you to ship those to us, right?

[01:10:48] Scott Bahr: Thank you, Miguel. Thank you for bringing that up.

[01:10:51] Brian Searl: We should have those for sure. Do tariffs impact that? Or they cost more? There wasn’t a budget for it this year. I asked Phil to donate money and he was like, “Nope, that cost too much money.”

[01:11:02] Brian Searl: Deneen and Jen are our two special guests. Deneen, you want to go first?

[01:11:05] Deneen Allen: Sure. Deneen Allen. I’m the CEO and founder of Firecircle, which is a tourism and hospitality entrepreneur accelerator. We host digital programs and mentorship all across Canada and now into the US and Jamaica recently. We have hundreds of entrepreneurs in our program and as members in Firecircle and all getting together in similar fashion to this, Brian, so that they can talk to each other about all sectors of the tourism industry. But I’m happy to be here on an outdoor hospitality podcast. Thank you.

[01:11:50] Brian Searl: That’s awesome. Yeah. Anytime we can facilitate conversations between people, we always end up learning more, I think. So. Jen? Last but not least, of course.

[01:11:58] Jen Ballenger: Yeah. I’m Jen, and I am a campground owner here in Missoula, Montana. We have Jim & Mary’s RV Park.

[01:12:07] Brian Searl: How did you get Jim & Mary’s RV Park and your name’s Jen?

[01:12:10] Jen Ballenger: We purchased it from Jim and Mary way back. This is our 25th season. And when we bought the park, they had a really great following, a great reputation, lots of repeat business. And so we didn’t want to scare anybody away. And it’s worked for us. I have been called Mary a lot for 25 years.

[01:12:30] Brian Searl: That’s got to be the most interesting push and pull ever. Because you’re right, I’m a marketing guy, and when I come in and people are like, “I’m gonna take over a campground or buy or change a brand name that’s existed for 20 or 30 years that has a really good following,” and you’re like, “Well, you probably shouldn’t change the name.” But that’s a really unique, interesting like… “I swear I own it. It’s called Jim & Mary’s, but my name is Jen. I promise you, I really am the owner.”

[01:12:54] Jen Ballenger: Yeah, well, sometimes I deny it, and it makes it easier too. Depends on if they’re complimenting me or coming in with a complaint.

[01:13:00] Brian Searl: I like it. Glass half full. Always come from a positive perspective.

[01:13:04] Brian Searl: All right, guys. So we’re gonna toss this to the room as we normally do at the beginning of every episode. It’s been a little bit since we’ve been together. Phil, a little bit longer for you. You’ve been at conventions and some other places doing some cool things with RVDA. Is there anything that’s come across you guys’ desks that you think we should talk about here to start the episode?

[01:13:20] Phil Ingrassia: Well, a couple things came out this week actually. One was the RVIA wholesale shipment forecast for North America for 2026. And, you know, a lot of people have been watching this with, you know, a lot of economic uncertainty on both sides of the border, tariffs hanging over everybody a little bit.

[01:13:43] Phil Ingrassia: But the forecast is actually for some incremental improvement, building on the incremental improvement that we had this year. So right now, in 2025, RV shipments in the US and Canada are up about 3% year over year. Which is, you know, kind of pretty much what people expected.

[01:14:03] Phil Ingrassia: And then the 2026 forecast that just came out is showing some more incremental growth for 2026, probably around that same, you know, 2% to 3% increase over 2025. So, you know, we’re seeing kind of a stairstep increase in RV activity, which overall is good.

[01:14:27] Phil Ingrassia: I think there’s a few things building into that. One in the US particularly are lower interest rates. Hopefully some tariff stability as far as announcements coming out of Washington D.C. And then in the US, there’s an expected increase in income tax returns. And a lot of times in past years when there’s been higher increases in refunds, that goes right into discretionary spending.

[01:15:03] Phil Ingrassia: So those are some tailwinds I think that we have that are helping push us along. But you never know, you know, there’s always things going on. But I guess cautious optimism is the thing here.

[01:15:16] Phil Ingrassia: That’s exactly what THOR Industries put out there, first quarter results which were better than expected too, which is another data point.

[01:15:26] Brian Searl: Yeah, I mean, I think that’s cautious optimism for everybody. For the RV industry, for the campground industry, for me in marketing and AI. Like, it’s all cautious optimism. It seems to be teetering on a like, “Which way is it gonna go? We’re not sure.” But like, as long as Phil’s working with RVDA and working with your dealers and your members and the RVIA and all those other people to make everything we can do build a really good foundational base. Like if we’re doing everything we can do, we’re setting the foundation for if it lifts off, it does. If it doesn’t, then that’s not what we want, but at least we’re doing everything we can, right?

[01:15:56] Phil Ingrassia: Right. And dealers have been very cautious on building inventory. So I think that, you know, I think we’re set up for success. Certainly some economic things have to go our way. We need consumer confidence to rebound. We need to have better stability, I think, especially on the tariff issue for a lot of folks. I think that we’re set up for success and I think that’s kind of reflected in these incrementally better forecasts.

[01:16:32] Scott Bahr: Phil, I have a question for you. In some of the forecasts I see, not in the RV industry but in other sectors, saying that a lot of the improvements—for example, retail sales overall—being driven by the higher income category markets are projected to spend a little bit more this year. Do you think that’s being reflected in this, and is it impacting the types of models that are being shipped and being requested out there from the dealerships?

[01:17:06] Phil Ingrassia: Well, I do think that we’re still seeing a lot of growth in the entry-level and mid-level travel trailer market. Although I am hearing entry-level has, like you’re saying, has not been as robust maybe. You’re always gonna have that entry-level—the folding camping trailers, entry-level travel trailers—kind of drive the volume. But for a lot of the manufacturers and dealers, that mid to higher-level unit is a more profitable unit to sell. And I think you’re right. I think that we are seeing some of the higher-end fifth wheels doing better than maybe they had been in the past.

[01:17:49] Phil Ingrassia: And it is a discretionary income purchase, let’s face it. It’s like boats, it’s like powersports. RVs are not something that gets you to work every day. People gotta be feeling good about their jobs, about the stock market. All these things that are baked into consumer sentiment.

[01:18:07] Scott Bahr: Yep. Okay.

[01:18:10] Deneen Allen: Could I ask Phil a question? Phil, I wondered in Canada, when the numbers came off after COVID, I wondered if there was any concerted effort happening up here with new Canadians and educating them on the RV industry and the opportunity for camping and teaching them how to camp using an RV or trailer, any version of an RV. How does that happen down in the US? Is any of the lift coming from immigration, from new Americans? Or how would you describe the sort of the bulk of the market?

[01:18:53] Phil Ingrassia: Well, there’s been quite a few studies done about pandemic buyers. And one of the big concerns that the industry had during that bump, both on both sides of the border, was are we gonna be able to retain those people? Are they gonna go on cruises? Are they gonna go find something else to do with their discretionary purchases?

[01:19:13] Phil Ingrassia: And we’ve done some studies and remarkably, and maybe not remarkably, but between 60% and 70%, depending on the product type, of those pandemic buyers are gonna buy again or at least are telling people that they’re considering buying again. Which is pretty good. So we’re holding onto those folks, which I think is great.

[01:19:36] Phil Ingrassia: The new market entrants are coming from a lot of different sources. And certainly Scott’s well versed in that because of all these different types of people that are camping, so to speak. Whether they’re glamping, whether they’re in more rustic areas or overlanders. There’s just so many different types of people who may not even consider themselves RVers that are using the product now, which is good news again for the industry.

[01:20:05] Brian Searl: Is there any data that RVDA or RVIA collects about what people are planning to use the RVs for? Like long-term, transient, BLM land, private campgrounds? Like is there any data that’s collected about that?

[01:20:19] Phil Ingrassia: Scott’s probably got some data on that.

[01:20:21] Scott Bahr: Yeah, we do. RVIA does collect that information quarterly.

[01:20:27] Brian Searl: Do you have any sense of… I’m just asking, maybe I’m putting words into Jen’s mouth or Miguel’s mouth in Mexico, because obviously there’s RVs down there. But my mouth too, for everybody. Like what can we expect in 2026 from these new sales?

[01:20:45] Scott Bahr: You’re gonna see a little bit of movement, it looks like, toward the less expensive forms of RVing. You know, staying in a little bit more boondocking, a little bit more BLM land. Overlanding is a growing sector. We’re seeing that pop up a lot more as well.

[01:21:10] Scott Bahr: But people are using their RVs and it seems that it’s growing a little bit too for using RVs for like events. They’re calling them—what do they call the parents take their kids to sporting events all the time? There’s a new word for it. But a lot of RVers are doing that. In fact, they’re buying their RVs because the kids are in like travel sports and stuff like that. So instead of renting hotel rooms and stuff like that, the parents are getting together as a group and they’re traveling to sporting events.

[01:21:41] Scott Bahr: And also just festivals and so on. Those things are all very robust. We didn’t see a drop-off. I thought we might see a drop-off like after in the COVID, post-COVID years, but in fact, we’ve seen growth in those areas. People see the RV as an opportunity to kind of… The group stuff is something we’re seeing a lot more of. It was down for years after RVers. It seemed like we’re a lot part of these groups and so on. But now it’s a lot of self-initiated and we’re seeing a lot some climbing interest in that. The older millennial group, surprisingly enough, is really kind of driving a lot of that.

[01:22:27] Brian Searl: Jen, how was your season if you don’t mind sharing? And then tell us a little bit about your park afterward, please.

[01:22:32] Jen Ballenger: Yeah. So here in Missoula and Montana in general, what I would say is I would echo what Scott just said. Events, sporting events, music, festivals. My town in particular has done a great job of bringing a lot of new events to town and promoting those nationwide.

[01:22:58] Jen Ballenger: So when you talk about the financial aspects of RVing, I’ve always felt like over the past 25 years, it is budget traveling in a sense. Those parents that are traveling for sporting events, that’s expensive to hotel it and eat out for every meal. Although it’s not cheap to RV and stay in private campgrounds, it’s a lot less expensive than a local hotel. And that goes double for music events and so forth. And especially in an era of dynamic pricing. So the price jacks up for all those hotels. They certainly sell out here in town. And people are looking for a little bit less expensive way to do that. Plus then they also have a vehicle to get around in a state like Montana. They can see a lot more and avoid renting another vehicle.

[01:23:59] Brian Searl: I had an interesting discussion about that actually on LinkedIn the other day. I was talking to you guys about how I have my AI agent post on LinkedIn. And it wrote a topic about how Waymo was expanding their self-driving cars to multiple additional cities in the United States. And it tied that in as I have it do with RV parks and how that changes the landscape of that. And what it ended up coming out with was like, this is going to be interesting for RVers who travel and don’t get involved in the local community maybe as much as they should because they don’t have a tow-away vehicle or it’s expensive to get into town or whatever else. And so when you—and this is years away—but when you have thousands of those vehicles on the street and you can just get a Waymo and you can take it into town and you don’t have to worry about unhooking and bringing a towable with you and doing all that stuff, I think that helps the local communities a lot more too.

[01:24:45] Jen Ballenger: Mhm.

[01:24:47] Deneen Allen: Is this trend, if we think it’s here to stay, is this an opportunity for RV parks to focus a little bit more on the group camping infrastructure? So that they’re gathering, you know, you can get all the RVs in one area, you have one fire pit or one pavilion or something that is group focused. Do you see an opportunity there?

[01:25:15] Brian Searl: I know you’re gonna talk Scott. Give me one second. I’m interested to hear about groups in Mexico from Miguel first and groups in Croatia, and then I’d love to hear the data, Scott. Can we do it that way?

[01:25:24] Scott Bahr: Absolutely.

[01:25:26] Miguel Huerta: Fire away.

[01:25:27] Brian Searl: Like how does this work? Is the glamping industry set up in Mexico to welcome these types of groups, family reunions, stuff like that? Do you guys see a lot of that?

[01:25:40] Miguel Huerta: Well, actually, I think I would like to start with how 2025 was for the hospitality industry in Mexico. And I also made a small comparison with the States, Canada, UK, and Spain. And what my data is showing me is that, for example, the main lodging category which is hotel has seen a decline in each one of these markets: the US, Mexico, the UK, and Canada. A decline on demand.

[01:26:15] Miguel Huerta: Now, and from this, the country that has had the steepest decline has been Mexico, which had 12% less demand for hotels in 2025 compared to the first 11 months of 2025 to the first 11 months of 2024. Now when we are talking about glamping, things are looking up a little bit. Although we have steep declines in Spain that had a 5% decrease, Mexico which we have 7% decrease. And the UK surprisingly has had a 10% decrease on demand for glamping sites. But I think that the country that has gotten the most traction and the most increase on demand for glamping is Canada with a 20% increase. And I think that it has to do with the tariffs and we all stayed home.

[01:27:15] Brian Searl: Yeah, we all stayed home.

[01:27:17] Miguel Huerta: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now when, now that we have seen that this has been a very rough year for the industry pretty much regardless of the country, I think that the glampings that will not only survive but will actually make a decent return on the investment will be the ones that are catering their commercial strategy for B2B or this type of groups and parties of people.

[01:27:50] Miguel Huerta: Like for example in my case, in my company, we have three individuals that their only focus is bringing in these groups to our glamping sites. Sadly, the average glamping site in Mexico has four units. So you cannot host as many people. RVs are not that big in Mexico because of insurance. That’s a huge liability that nobody wants to take.

[01:28:20] Miguel Huerta: But I mean, sure, it sounds that I’m being very grim on the industry. But I think that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, which is the World Cup that we have been discussing which is bound to happen this upcoming summer. So a lot of, and why I’m bringing this to the table pretty much for the last three or four shows, is because a lot of Americans, they don’t realize how big this is.

[01:28:51] Miguel Huerta: So this Friday, December 5th, we’re gonna have like this raffle or where everybody will know which teams are coming to what countries and cities. And I’m pretty sure that a lot of RV operators and owners, they will find a very nice area of opportunity where if the rates are lower, I can buy like a low entry or basic model as Scott was saying and put it to work for me as an Airbnb using this event that drives a lot of demand. So that’s something interesting.

[01:29:38] Miguel Huerta: Of course glampings are important. The issue will be, I foresee that a lot of glamping sites pretty much all over the world, as the industry is maturing, we’re going to see a lot of them closing their doors. So only the ones that have designed their property and their commercial efforts to bring in groups will survive in this very tough environment.

[01:30:05] Brian Searl: Or that they focus on the guest experience, right? I asked you about groups, so that’s fair. But like or just something to differentiate themselves between being just another property with four more tents. Right? Is that fair?

[01:30:19] Miguel Huerta: Yeah, but to me, and I mentioned this in my last participation, the guest experience, if you take a look on the five Ps of marketing: people, price, promotion, place, and products—sorry. The product it’s very interesting, but if you don’t have the right promotion in place, it will be hard for people to know. And a lot of the newcomers to the industry are focusing too much on the guest experience, like okay that they read them well when they arrive to the location, that they have somebody taking care of them during they stay. But sadly, to me that only… Since most of the sales are done over the internet, this guest experience to me goes in the People category that sadly you won’t get to experience until you are in the location.

[01:31:23] Miguel Huerta: The closest will be the ratings on platforms like Google Maps or TripAdvisor or Airbnb, Booking.com, whatever. That helps a lot. But I think that in this survival economy, a lot of people, they need to open their properties and their capabilities to new revenue streams and to these events that are coming to certain locations. So it’s quite challenging, I will say.

[01:31:53] Brian Searl: Yeah, you’re not wrong. I mean Scott and I spend a lot of time on—like we’re gonna talk on Outwired later about guest experience. And we try to drill that home because we see that there’s a little bit of a lack of it in the United States specifically, which is where we’re most familiar with. But you’re not wrong. It can’t just be guest experience. It has to be guest experience combined with telling the story, combined with showing people how it is before the promotion. And then also of course price comes into account, right? I think price is going to be the thing that’s going to hurt a lot of people in 2026. But then if you get price out of the way, and you still have as we talked about this K-shaped economy where the top 10% are spending 50% of the consumer discretionary spending in the United States. Those people, after you discount price, are still willing to maybe take a vacation instead of two. But then where they’re going to go I think is dictated by the guest experience, I think. Maybe a little bit about price. But guest experience with price, whereas the lower income would be just price, right? Is that fair or am I off base?

[01:47:00] Scott Bahr: The one important thing to keep in mind with the pricing discussion is that when your… Your pricing is part of the perception. It is part of the experience. People will assign something to their experience based on what they pay.

[01:47:18] Scott Bahr: So it’s a fine line and it’s hard. And I know exactly what you’re saying, Deneen, because we did some research in post-COVID about overcrowding at campgrounds, for example. And everybody kept saying that there were no campsites available. But all the campground owners are saying, “We have plenty of sites.” And what it was is chatter. It was a lot of chatter out there that was creating this. We found that something like over half the people who said that there was overcrowding had not even personally experienced it.

[01:47:50] Scott Bahr: And so it becomes, as prices of everything else increase, the perception comes into play where the person thinks that they’re paying more. And this is where the communications come in. This is where the experts—that I’m not one in this part, by the way—is how you communicate that value that you offer so that the person understands it. If you have a big jump in prices and someone’s a regular guest, they’re going to be like, “Whoa, what did you do? Put in a big spa here or something?” You’re going to hear that kind of thing.

[01:48:23] Scott Bahr: So it’s important to work with a professional who knows how to communicate and knows how to address this because, again, whatever the person pays, that’s how they’re going to perceive you. And increases… there’s a perception that goes with it. Most people are pretty reasonable. We do price sensitivity research by the way, and I’ve priced a lot of different things. But it’s one of those things you gotta kind of find that zone of tolerance, but understand that how they perceive you when they stay there, the price is going to come into the mix with all the experiences and everything they had. If it doesn’t, you’ve done your job right.

[01:49:02] Deneen Allen: Yeah, that’s so well said. Like that value perception is… and we’re all making these decisions every second of the day on… I mean, we are the pricing mechanism as consumers, right? Every time we pay for something, we have said to the market, “We will accept this product at this price.” So every time we buy something at the grocery store, every time we book a hotel room or an airline flight, every time we buy an RV, we are saying this is the value for money that I expect. And so, yes, we have to pay attention to that as operators. And even if you are just putting your prices up to match inflation, the value delivery has to be there. Exactly what you’re saying, Scott. The guest has to believe that it’s worth it. You will lose a few people. You will lose some of those seasonal or repeat guests because you have to do it from a business standpoint. And you know you’re being reasonable about it and you know you’re delivering value where the value that’s reflected in your pricing. And you will still lose people because it’s just the highest price without going over. But for that guest, it just went over. Right? So we always advocate for no discounting. It’s that it’s understand your base pricing and then you go up from there. So your base pricing is the bottom, right? And then you go up from there. So yeah, the highest price without going over.

[01:50:42] Brian Searl: The Price is Right, yes. Jen, tell us how you think about this at your RV park.

[01:50:46] Jen Ballenger: Yeah, I have a lot of thoughts. For us being a smaller campground, and in the past we’ve primarily catered to the older generation of retiree RVers, and we don’t have a playground or a pool. And so some of the other parks had more of a family-oriented niche in the area and we kind of steered away from that.

[01:51:17] Jen Ballenger: And the older guests back when my price was half or less of what it is today complained about the price. Would come in and sometimes say… you know the story, just kind of a snarky comment, “Holy cow, that’s so expensive.” And one trend that I have seen, and maybe as the demographic has changed, but even with those older guests, people are paying more for everything. And they’re complaining a lot less at me about my prices. Now I did no huge jumps. We creep up a little bit every year. We did a little bit more during and post-COVID. But we keep it incremental until we catch up to where we want to be so that it’s not a sticker shock because we do have a ton of repeat guests.

[01:52:16] Jen Ballenger: But also, I’ll go back to the thing that people perceive RVing and camping as, not everybody, but they perceive it as a value. They are saving money on the hotels. They’re saving money on the restaurants. In a big picture of a vacation, regardless of what the facts are, is still I think perceived as a less expensive way to travel and get your vacation in.

[01:52:44] Jen Ballenger: So if that’s their goal, a discount is an incentive. It takes a little sting out of it. And I know, Deneen, you say no discounts, but there are a lot of camper clubs, Good Sam and here in the US anyway, that people get involved in for the value of it. And it’s 10%. We build our price around that because a lot of people have it. And they think… I’m guilty of it when I shop too. Like if I get a little 10% discount, it makes me feel a little bit better about the money that I spend. And maybe the increase in the rate year over year too.

[01:53:27] Jen Ballenger: So I guess I see a lot less complaining because everything’s more expensive. And I do think in general people understand I’m paying more for power, I’m paying more for my infrastructure, I’m paying more on property taxes. They know everything went up.

[01:53:41] Deneen Allen: Yeah. And I think you can frame those discounts in fun ways that… and you’re always moving off that floor rate. You’re never going below that floor that you’ve set as “this is our base price.” So 100%, there’s so many promotions that we can do, so many fun ways of offering additional value. Sometimes it’s giving something that doesn’t cost you a lot to give to them instead of discounting the rate, right? So it might be something they get on arrival. It might be something you do that is a very low incremental cost to you, but you know, it’s third night for a discount, right? Or something like this. Especially in glamping where you’re really mimicking the overhead of a room night in a hotel where you’ve got housekeeping and things like that, right? Additional.

[01:54:32] Brian Searl: The key is how you frame it, right? The key is how you frame everything. And so like I remember reading an article about Black Friday here in the United States—when I say here in the United States, I’m in Calgary, but you understand. In the United States. Where like they were talking about how the stores had sales and then the consumers weren’t actually buying as much as they normally do on Friday, so the stores discounted more on Saturday and Sunday and then they started buying. So there’s this mindset of the consumer that like “I expect a discount before I buy.” I expect to, maybe not on Black Friday see the value, but not the same way we’re talking about it, right? So I think there’s a mindset in the consumer that like everything is going to be discounted at some point somewhere. I just have to wait for the right opportunity, which is maybe too much of an overcompensation on the side of business people. But I don’t know.

[01:55:22] Brian Searl: I want to spend the last couple minutes of the show—we have 13 minutes left. I’m gonna try something new virtually. We’ve only done it in show or in person at the OHI conference and then we did it at KOA. Where I want each of you guys to ask a question to one other guest. But one other guest, but you can only ask one person one time. So what I mean by that is like, Jen, if you ask Phil a question, no one else can ask Phil a question. And then we’ll just do process of elimination and we’ll see if we can get some good answers out of people. Anything you want to ask anybody. We’ll start with our special guests. We’ll do Jen first. Pick anybody you want.

[01:55:54] Jen Ballenger: Um, going to assume that this question is best for Scott, but I’m not quite sure. In terms of the US anyway, I have been seeing a lot of trends towards corporations gobbling up the little mom-and-pop parks. And I’m just wondering, and if there’s any data on obviously they can offer more with the money behind it in terms of perks and big water parks and who knows what else they can put in and offer to guests. But is there any data out there that shows… I’m seeing campers are looking for a more like traditional camping experience. They want the campfire talk. They want… and we lean in really hard to that mom-and-pop thing because of the people buying up big parks and then becoming more corporate. Do is there any camper data out there about what people are really interested in or is it just still really varied depending on where they go?

[01:57:12] Scott Bahr: It does vary. And there is a very large market for folks who would like to stay at the mom-and-pop types of parks with maybe not all the bells and whistles that you get at other locations. There’s a movement right now for a little bit more disconnection. People want authenticity in their experiences. They maybe, like where you’re at near Missoula, the whole idea of immersion in the culture there in Missoula, in the town, the food, the experiences, the surrounding lands that you’re by, that’s what people are seeking.

[01:57:55] Scott Bahr: If you’re much more, if you’re located for example near a very large urban area, you might get a different type of guest who comes in there and probably wants a little bit more entertainment. They want things to do. Or if your park is not located near some of those features, you need more that’s on site.

[01:58:11] Scott Bahr: So what we’ve been seeing is that there is a movement toward… I sometimes joke and I call it the Luddite movement. People who want to be a little bit more disconnected, a little bit more…

[01:58:25] Phil Ingrassia: Rustic, Scott. Rustic.

[01:58:26] Scott Bahr: I know. I like using Luddite though around Brian. But no, I know exactly what you’re saying. It’s like, yeah, and we saw that we saw that peek up a little bit last year among some of the younger folks that there’s that desire there. They’re not doing it yet, but that desire is there for something a little bit more rustic, Phil. And so it’s… and I see there being in especially in some areas a movement toward that.

[01:58:58] Scott Bahr: The campfire experience is always the number one draw. It’s the number one draw and people like that. They like the social part of it, sitting around the campfire, making s’mores. That experience rises to the top in everything we do. And I won’t try to take up everyone’s time because I know we have more questions.

[01:59:16] Brian Searl: Well, Scott, you’re next. You get to ask somebody now. We’re going in…

[01:59:20] Scott Bahr: I’m gonna ask Miguel. Miguel, where do you see the Mexican market heading in terms of—and I’m gonna go back to what we were just talking about—rustic camping? I know you’re involved in glamping, but you also have your finger on the pulse of what’s going on in Mexico. Is there a good market for people that want a more rustic experience or is that still something that’s farther out on the horizon maybe?

[01:59:51] Miguel Huerta: Can you define rustic just so we are aligned?

[01:59:55] Scott Bahr: Fewer amenities, few services and amenities. Maybe staying in a tent even.

[02:00:00] Miguel Huerta: Got it. Okay. Well, actually, the Mexican market I think that it’s priming right now the other side of the spectrum, you know. Not rustic, but more luxurious. At the end, people want to get more from the peso that they are paying for their experience.

[02:00:29] Miguel Huerta: So what I’m seeing is that almost 95% of the operators in Mexico or the glamping owners in Mexico, they have this very basic experience, you know. So what that would mean is that I foresee that the industry will consolidate in Mexico. Which means basically a lot of mom-and-pop closing down their glamping sites. That’s number one.

[02:00:58] Miguel Huerta: And the ones that survive either they improve their product or… I mean basically they will improve their products. Most of the, let’s call the corporate glamping operators in Mexico, I am not seeing that they are opening as many locations as they did, which basically it’s three: Grupo Presidente, we have Wander Cabins, and Nantly Living, my company. Because I think that these corporate entities are being very cautious. Because as I was telling you, demand is decreasing, the product is getting more complex and more expensive. So at the end with the cost of labor, I mean you might as well build a regular hotel than a glamping site.

[02:01:57] Miguel Huerta: But I think that there are areas of opportunity that people they can monetize, which is basically right next to natural parks. Our infrastructure has nothing to do what you guys have in the States, Canada, and Europe. So these natural parks at the end are driving a lot of visitors. And from that 100%, the top 10%, the top 5%, they will pay prime for those experiences. So I don’t know if that answered the question.

[02:02:35] Scott Bahr: No, no, that’s great. That helps.

[02:02:39] Brian Searl: Your turn, Miguel.

[02:02:42] Miguel Huerta: My turn. I’m gonna go with Simon. And I will ask him what’s his vision for 2026, especially that you have a SaaS platform that allows you to see different markets very fast.

[02:03:02] Simon Neal: Yeah, I mean we don’t necessarily track that high-level stuff in such a way. But I think, yeah, this 2025 was a very uncertain before the season, and it turned out to be kind of okay. So I’m optimistic that 2026 is going to build on that and be better. And I’m hoping for a, you know, globally a lot of better news coming out of the first part of 2026 that’s going to help relax everybody a bit and make everybody a bit more comfortable traveling around and spending again. So that’s kind of my hope and prediction.

[02:03:45] Brian Searl: Your turn, Simon.

[02:03:48] Simon Neal: Okay, I’m going to jump on your idea actually, Miguel, and throw something out there a bit. The World Cup, it’s going to be enormous and the opportunity is there. And you mentioned something about—sorry, I don’t mean to rain on your parade, but you can’t ask Miguel because somebody else already asked Miguel a question.

[02:04:04] Brian Searl: Sorry, I don’t mean to rain on your parade, but you can’t ask Miguel because somebody else already asked Miguel a question.

[02:04:05] Simon Neal: No, no, I’m asking Phil.

[02:04:06] Brian Searl: Oh, okay. All right. That’s fair.

[02:04:08] Simon Neal: You mentioned the idea of campground owners getting hold of RVs and sticking them on sites and Airbnb-ing them. And I think that’s amazing because you can basically very quickly change what you’re selling to cater for that very short-term but super intense market that’s coming. So Phil, is there a way to kind of capitalize on that based on what you know on the RV industry in the US?

[02:04:33] Phil Ingrassia: Yeah, well there’s a lot of things going on next year. And I was just talking to one of our major rental companies about some of what they call tailwinds that really should boost the US RV rental market next year. Not only do we have World Cup coming in, so a lot of international visitors coming to US, Mexico. But we also have America 250, which is the big celebration of 250 years of the United States founding. So there’s going to be events all over the country and they are beefing up their rental operations as much as they can.

[02:05:16] Phil Ingrassia: However, I will say over the last couple years, they weren’t buying as many for their fleets. But I do think they are planning for a big year of RV rentals just with all these special events and just World Cup being one of them. I don’t know frankly how much advance planning is going on in the campground industry and maybe Scott or Brian would have more information on that. But I’m not hearing a lot about that, but I do know that the RV rental companies are gearing up for some major events.

[02:05:58] Brian Searl: It’s on you, Phil.

[02:06:00] Phil Ingrassia: I would ask Jen a question. You know, we’ve pumped a lot of first-time buyers during COVID into kind of the RV camping ecosystem. If you could give one or two pieces of advice to RV dealers who are, you know, when you see first-timers or inexperienced RVers come into your campground, how could the RV dealer prepare those folks a little bit better for their first or maybe their infrequent camping experience so that they enjoy the experience more?

[02:06:38] Jen Ballenger: Um, you know, I guess I would have to say setting them up with some tools for advance planning. I think a lot of the bigger problems is people roll into town and there’s no sites to be had because they haven’t planned ahead. And those newbies maybe just don’t know that they need to get on there and pre-book.

[02:07:02] Jen Ballenger: Other than that, you know, the run-through… We have a lot of big dealers in Montana and they, the run-through is down quick and dirty. They don’t know what they’re doing when they get here. But I always tell them your neighbors are your best resource because other RVers love to help you. So, you know, I don’t know that they could spend a little more time on the important things like dumping your sewer, plugging into power, where to find your breaker box.

[02:07:36] Brian Searl: All right. Deneen is the last one. But Deneen, we’ve ran out of people for you to ask, so you can ask anybody then. You get a free-for-all.

[02:07:43] Deneen Allen: Oh, okay. I wanted to ask about RV resale. And what… so I know you may not have stats… Do you have stats for Canada as well, Phil?

[02:07:57] Phil Ingrassia: I do not have Canadian stats, and unfortunately, Eleonore Hamm, who’s RVDA of Canada, isn’t with us, but I can talk generally about resale.

[02:08:05] Deneen Allen: Yeah, I’d love to hear that because we’ve got a lot of members who are thinking about buying used RVs and using them for glamping sort of setup, things like that. Just wondering what, how they’re holding their value, what that market is like.

[02:08:25] Phil Ingrassia: Well, there’s an old saw that there’s two used RVs sold for every new one that’s sold every year. And that basically, amazingly, kind of holds up through almost every type of economic environment we’re in. Dealers will sell about, depending on the dealership, maybe 30 to 40% of their volume could be used. But that varies quite a bit.

[02:08:54] Phil Ingrassia: I would say that, and of course I work for the dealers, but I would encourage people to buy used from an RV dealer because the unit is pretty much been checked out versus private sale. But there’s a burgeoning private sale market as well.

[02:09:12] Phil Ingrassia: RV values on used have been pretty much steady. I do think recently the values may have ticked up a bit because of the affordability issue. People are looking for a bargain and used are cheaper. But now with interest rates coming down, you know, when people are making those comparisons, should I buy new or should I buy used? And there’s not that much difference in your monthly payment to that payment buyer between new and used. It’s an easy decision to make to go new for a lot of folks.

[02:09:54] Deneen Allen: Thank you.

[02:09:55] Brian Searl: All right. Well we are a couple minutes over here. I want to just wrap up the show. We’ll just go one by one real quick. Jen, any final thoughts that you have and then just tell us where they can find more information about Jim & Mary’s RV Park.

[02:10:06] Jen Ballenger: This was great. I had not participated in a podcast. You guys are full of great information and I just appreciate being invited. jimandmarysrvpark.com is where you can find me.

[02:10:18] Brian Searl: Love it. Thank you so much for being here, Jen. Simon?

[02:10:23] Simon Neal: Yeah, just coming down from a heavy show season. So it was really nice to get around to some of the shows, meet lots of people. It was great. If you want to find anything else about CampMap, just go to campmap.com. You can reach us there quite easily.

[02:10:37] Brian Searl: Appreciate you being here, Simon. Miguel?

[02:10:40] Miguel Huerta: Well, first of all, happy holidays and Happy New Year. Let’s 2026 be a better year than 2025. 2025 wasn’t that bad.

[02:10:51] Brian Searl: Yeah, you don’t have the glasses, but you have the stocking behind you. We got that, right?

[02:10:54] Miguel Huerta: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I have a rosé bottle if you guys want some.

[02:11:03] Brian Searl: I’m coming over after this. How long is the flight?

[02:11:05] Miguel Huerta: This is Chinese rosé by the way. Sparkling rosé. But my point is that, sure, on my side, thank you so much for a year full of knowledge, a year full of friendships. If you are interested on the Mexican and Latin American market, please hit me up. Or if you would like how to drive sales to your American or Canadian RV park or glamping site using the World Cup, please let me know.

[02:11:39] Miguel Huerta: It’s crazy the amount of people that go to the World Cup. Sadly, this year, the main countries that export people to this event are the host. Mexico, in Qatar sent a little bit over 50,000 Mexicans to Qatar. The US is the country that buys the most tickets, but because of all the different nationalities that live in there. But for example, we have countries such as Bolivia that might come back to a World Cup.

[02:12:11] Miguel Huerta: That’s going to be a huge market that people are not thinking about them. So yeah, you can find me on Nantli… nantli.travel. And sure, I’ll be happy to help or on LinkedIn.

[02:12:27] Brian Searl: Awesome. Thanks for being here, Miguel. And don’t forget to reach out to me. We gotta set up the Mexico thing because I will forget. I’m old. You’re young. So I’m putting it on you.

[02:12:35] Brian Searl: Deneen, final thoughts and where can they find out more about Firecircle?

[02:12:39] Deneen Allen: Well, this has been wonderful. What a great format. Thanks for the invitation, Brian. And firecircle… thefirecircle.ca. You have to put “the” in front of Firecircle or you get some really weird websites. So thefirecircle.ca. We also do market and feasibility studies, we do physical design, we do operational mentorship, all kinds of things. Yeah, and we’re just trying to grow the Canadian market up here. So thanks for inviting me.

[02:13:07] Brian Searl: Thanks for being here, Deneen. Phil?

[02:13:09] Phil Ingrassia: Well, it’s just great. I just think this is a great forum because I’m always an “and” person. You can RV, you can camp, you can glamp. You can do all of these things. I think it’s great to get everybody together to talk about these things.

[02:13:24] Brian Searl: And if they’re interested more in learning about what RVDA does for the industry?

[02:13:27] Phil Ingrassia: Rvda.org.

[02:13:31] Brian Searl: Thank you, Phil. And last but not least, Scott.

[02:13:33] Scott Bahr: Yeah, we got a lot of new stuff coming out this coming year. So we’re pretty excited about it. Just, I’d love to spend the next two hours telling you all about it in all the detail, but I won’t. But I’ll talk about a little bit. Yeah, I think we should do an episode to some of what I’m talking about. I’ve spent some time in development this year, at the end of the year here, this fall. And I’m pretty excited about some of the stuff we’re working on. Working on some really cool stuff with Brian as well. And so stay tuned.

[02:14:12] Scott Bahr: Cairnconsultinggroup.com. We have a resource library, a lot of reports and data and information there and we’ll be posting more stuff on our website as well as LinkedIn. So yeah, stay tuned. I think it’s gonna be a fun year. We’re gonna do our best.

[02:14:26] Scott Bahr: One of the things I just want to say one last thing about one of the things we’re working on this year, and if anyone wants to get involved at any level, please let me know, and that is I’m working on a research initiative on Gen Z. How do we attract more Gen Z folks in? I have started the process, but I’d love more minds put into it, and connections to young people. I want to mobilize them. So there, there’s my pitch. Sorry I took so long.

[02:14:52] Brian Searl: No, that’s okay. You know I’ll be involved in that, so.

[02:14:55] Brian Searl: Appreciate you guys joining us for another episode of MC Fireside Chats. It was a great conversation. It’s the last one of the year, so this group together will see you in early 2026 for our first episode. I don’t even know… do we have a first episode? It might be a holiday, so it might be two months. I don’t know. We’ll find out.

[02:15:09] Brian Searl: Anyway, thanks guys for being here. If you’re not sick and tired of hearing of me and Scott, we will be on Outwired in about four hours, 53 minutes, 52 and a half minutes, something like that. For a brief truncated show that we’re gonna do today because we both have some other commitments this evening. But we’ll see you guys later for that. If not, we’ll see you next week and another episode of MC Fireside Chats. Take care, guys.

[02:15:27] Multiple Speakers: Bye-bye. Thank you.