MC Fireside Chats – January 12th, 2022

Good afternoon, morning, night. I’m gonna figure this out. One of these weeks, Kara, I swear what? I’m just gonna say hello. Welcome to another episode of MC Fireside Chats. My name is Brian Searl with Insider Perks. Here as always, with Cara Csizmadia from the Canadian. Camping &. RV Council, and Angela Hilton, the editor-in-chief of Modern Campground.

We’re super excited to be here on another episode on a balmy spring day in Calgary. I don’t know where you guys are, but it’s beautiful here at 40 degrees Fahrenheit. We’re really excited to be here. We’ve got a, an exciting kind of, Special show that we’re gonna devote here to Camp Spot. The reason for that is, is because they’re doing something super cool that Aaron’s gonna tell you about in a second.

But first, uh, let’s go around the room and just talk to a little bit, uh, a few of our guests who have never been on the show before. Just a brief introduction from you guys who you are. And then we’ll turn over to Aaron and see where the show goes from there. So, who wants to start?

We your hands at once. Okay, cool. Hey, I’m Brit Roth and I’m one of the owners of Dark Sky RV Campground in Canna, Utah. Thank you so much for having me. Thank you, Brit, for joining us. I really wanna learn more about your name later because I was in a dark sky preserve in Jasper and it was amazing. So I don’t know if that’s a play on your name, but I wanna we’ll talk about that later.

Sounds good. Brian, you wanna go next? Sure. My name’s Brian West. I, along with my partner Tom Searl, uh, we own Elk Camp Campground here in Mineral Washington. Awesome. Fantastic. How far is that from Seattle?

Say that again? How far is that from Seattle? How’s that? How far is that? About an hour and a half. Okay. We’re equally, uh, spaced between Portland and Seattle. Okay. That’s a perfect location. That’s two of my favorite cities. I was just in Seattle a couple weeks ago, so Yeah, that’s why I asked. Uh, we’re It’s great.

Tyler and Kendra. Hey Tyler. Hi. I am Kendra. We’re currently in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and usually we’re full-time in, in our Airstream. We’ve done a couple loops around the country, but we’re in our home base of Michigan enjoying the Weis Snow. Have you always had an Airstream or did you re Yeah, we’ve always had, since 2017 when we first started, that’s always been our home, 25 foot, uh, mayor Street.

And, uh, yeah, we’ve been able to travel quite a bit with Camps Spot for the last year and a half, but wanted to spend the holidays closer to home . So where’s home for you, did you say? I can’t remember. I’m sorry. Yeah. Grand Rapids, Michigan on the west side, not too far from, oh boy. Angela, another person from Michigan.

Every time we have a call, I told her nobody’s from Michigan. I’m like 40 people. We come across every month are Michigan and Camp Quarter Michigan too. So the high five of America, you can’t go wrong

all. Uh, Aaron, you wanna introduce yourself. Yeah, sure. I’ve never had so many conversations start like with a hand since joining Camps Spot, but PMO Camp Spot, I joined around August, September of last year and I’m tuning in here from Maine, so we are probably representing with the one degree, maybe coldest weather here today, but so excited to have this chance to be on the call of Brian Searl.

Kara, thank you for hosting us. Thank you guys for being here. I love Maine too. Portland and Portland are both probably my top two cities in the us but I remember going to the coast like I never made it as far north as Acadia National Park, so it’s on my list. That’s a good one. Beautiful state. But yeah.

So we’re here today to talk about Camp Spots awards first annual first ever. Um, Just gonna shut up really, and turned it over to Erin here so she can describe a little bit of a background before I say something incorrect. Just how you guys, how did you come about with the awards? Why did you feel they were necessary?

How are yours different? Just give us a little bit of a background and then I’ll let you take the direction from there, Erin, if that’s okay with you. Absolutely. First of all, thank you for having us on this really special day. One of the reasons that we were so thrilled to be able to announce the Camps Spot Awards this morning was the opportunity to be on this call and to have this podcast.

So we’re thrilled that we get to use this opportunity with all of you to just announce and further promote our, the launch of the Camps Spot Awards this morning. I have to just say no credit can really, can I take to this idea? This has been an idea that was, the team came up with, I think around over a year ago, quite frankly, we launched the Camp Spot Marketplace in.

2020. And so we are just rounding the corner here into our two year anniversary for the marketplace. And at one point it was really, we knew some early signals that were suggesting that we wanted to make sure that as part of the marketplace, which is our, uh, place where you can discover and book your next Campground Camping activity and Camping adventure.

We wanted to make sure as we looked down the line that we knew it was really important that we had a celebratory portion of our, um, camp Spot awards or camp spot, um, recognition. So hence the launch of the 2022 Camp Spot Awards is really the first annual celebration of the top campgrounds and on the.

Camp Spot Marketplace across North America. The mission of the awards is to recognize excellence in the Campground industry and really celebrate campgrounds who are providing such an important experience for campers across the US and and Canada. But all things considered world issues or, or not aside, we all know, and we’re all here for various reasons around what the outdoors and Camping industry brings to our personal lives, and just a campers and an outdoor enthusiasts across the.

US and Canada, the world. So one of the opportunities here that we see is just taking a pause, quite, quite frankly, and taking a pause to acknowledge and celebrate Campground owners campgrounds and the Camping industry. I’m sorry, I just wanted to ask you a follow-up question and maybe you’re gonna answer it, so I apologize if you were, but how do, how did parks go about getting nominated for these awards?

Yeah, so I think quite frankly, that’s probably something that we can continue to evolve. So for year one, one of the core initiatives was to make it not necessarily anything that any campgrounds had to take initiative to apply for or to take any, um, extra lift on their already busy season. So a lot of this was in motion in Q3 and q4, which is still the, uh, you know, tail end of the very busy Camping season.

So for 2022 Camp Spot Awards, the way that we came to be is it’s organized across seven categories, which we made up for this year. Could change, but we could also see adding to over time. Um, these initial categories, I’ll just briefly touch on, highlight important aspects that campers consider. Things like destination, the camper experience, unique offerings of the campgrounds and overall campsite design, Campground design.

So with that, we used our ability to understand and, and have all this public information that we have on our campgrounds. To short come up with a short list across these seven categories. From there, we actually were able to identify an awesome group of panelists, which we’ve got to here to help, uh, speak to the panelist experience.

And they were given a short list of campgrounds that fell into that category based on the different methodologies for each category. And then we had, we trust and relied on our esteem group of panelists who represent different facets of the outdoor industry. To then vote and rank on their top camp campgrounds for each category.

And as an example, one of the reasons our panelists was so important was they’re au bringing authenticity. They’re bringing, um, their own voice, their own perspective as being, uh, industry experts. And in many cases, like Tyler and Kendra can speak to, they actually are bringing personal firsthand experiences at many of these campgrounds.

So we are thrilled to be able to, um, layer in that source of expertise to help us come to the finalist for this year. And maybe I’ll just speak really quickly to the categories. Um, and we can obviously go into Yeah. Different detail, especially cuz we’ve got two campgrounds here that have, were finalists in a number of the categories, but this year we had seven categories.

So top campgrounds in the US most popular campgrounds in the US top campgrounds for families, top campgrounds with a view top campgrounds for first timers. Top Camping sites and Top Campground design. It’s a mouthful to say all at once, but in those seven uh categories, we are really excited that we’re recognizing 45 finalists or 45 winners for this year.

And just to celebrate another point that we really believe, while we’re so excited and get the chance to talk with two Campground Camp Spot Award winners today, even. We do really believe that these campgrounds, even the winners, are representative of the totality of all Campground types that are out there.

And we’re really confident that they’re a great showcase of the type of Camping experiences that are available today. So I, I have two questions. Uh, one is that more of a statement, cuz I was a panelist too. I, I will admit, and maybe Tyler and Kendra feel the same way, maybe they don’t. The hardest thing for me was dragging it up and down, trying to figure out which one was two and three and which one was bumped down to four and five like, I felt terrible every time somebody had to go down to five Cuz four was had a better picture or something.

It was a traumatizing experience and so I don’t know if they share that but uh, and, and we’re not gonna talk about what happened with Dark Sky cuz they were obviously one of our top, we just kept Slutting that one cuz they’re on the show. So, but so these are more camper focused, right? So obviously they’re important to campgrounds because now you’re an award-winning Campground, you get a lot of recognition and stuff like that, but they’re more geared toward the public facing side than the industry versus an Arabic award or something.

Is that correct or? Yeah, that’s a great distinction. And I, I think personally, coming from a, a real marketer’s lens, I’m excited that there’s a lot of industry competitors and industry, other companies doing similar things. Cause I think we should all find ways to recognize and celebrate both the campgrounds and campers if we were possible.

Our specifically is considered in our business. We bought our software business and the marketplace business. We’re using the marketplace as a platform to promote and recognize the campgrounds, um, on the marketplace. That said, most of our marketplace campgrounds are in fact software users. But to your point, explicitly, this is recognizing camp Spot awards.

Recognize campgrounds that are on the marketplace, which are more the bookable inventory for campers. So is that, sorry, is that where your nominations were coming from? Was No, just to be really clear, for this particular year, we didn’t use any type of voting or so the campers themselves weren’t voting and campgrounds themselves didn’t have to nominate themselves or apply to be, to be part of this year’s awards.

Process. The methodology that we used this year was just to take, uh, mostly public information like amenities, water, water, parks, YesTo, the type of Camping sites, the popularity of those sites all through our marketplace. And that became a short list, which then Brian, yeah, we can talk through the psychology impact that we’ve had on, on the panelists, it’s date.

We know we need to improve that process, but then we relied on our panelists to actually come up with the rankings. Yeah, I love that. That’s great. All. Where do you wanna go from here? Aaron, where do you wanna start? I know we’ve got a lot of stuff to cover. Yeah, we do have a lot of stuff to cover. I, you know, would love, we’ve got such great representation on the show, so maybe briefly it would be great we could start with a panelist just cause we’ve been talking a little bit about that experience.

Brian Pi, Kendra. I would love to know what that was like for you and different things that you factored into the, uh, as part of the. Process of ranking. And then I would love, I’m really excited Brit and Brian, that we have a chance to hear from you all. I would love to understand. So we’ll come back to you.

I think that’s the next segment, if that’s okay. We’ll go ahead, Tyler and Ken first. Thank you. Thanks Aaron for hyping us up. I feel like I didn’t have as negative as, uh, experience, Brian, as you did. I’m sorry. But I think it’s also because we’ve had the privilege of visiting so many of these that are on the list, and particularly in the last two years.

Tyler and I have been traveling for about five years and we just added them up and we have almost 200 Campground experience experiences in the last four and a half years. And yeah, but it was really, I think, fun reliving some of the best outdoor experiences we’ve had living full-time in our trailer.

But yeah, I, I think it was kind of, Hard. I think the hardest part for me was comparing some of these, because they provide such different experiences and sometimes you want the luxury of an RV resort. Sometimes you want the rusticness of something that feels like a state part, if you will. So I think that was the hardest thing for me.

In what? In voting? I don’t know if people felt similarly. Yeah, definitely hard to choose, especially because each Campground is so unique and we’ve had campgrounds in the middle of the desert. We’ve had campgrounds on the ocean. We’ve had campgrounds. , um, and the mountains and Pacific Northwest. And so it also depends on are you a mountain person?

Are you an ocean person? Are you a lakefront? So it is very difficult to choose because there’s so many great options and different landscapes that you’re looking out and experiencing. So, yeah, and I think that’s why the, the category speak really well in communicating the different options for campers.

Right? Tyler said it really depends on what you want and what you’re looking for in Camping. and that’s not even dependent on the, um, the person. It’s dependent on the circumstance, time of year or season, et cetera. I feel like. I’m sorry Brian. I didn’t have as difficult time . I tried to keep that in mind as I was organizing all of the, the campgrounds in Ruby Parks and stuff.

It did take a while though. It did take, it was a long process to go through each one and kind of do the due diligence of looking at all the images, especially the ones that you haven’t been to before. You have to, so it’s like site and the research that you have to do. You have to go through the images and see, and even pulling up.

Google Maps and all the camp spot features that they have listed on the amenities and things like that. So it’s, uh, a detective researching, um, as much as you can about a Campground if you haven’t been to it. Yeah, it wasn’t super difficult. It was just when you get down to those last three or four, who’s number 1, 2, 3, 4, and disconnecting yourself from that experience that, that you prefer.

And so maybe I prefer the mountains versus the ocean, and I have to totally disconnect that because that’s not my job to pick my preference. It’s my job to pick the best park overall that I feel. And, and maybe it was a little bit easier on YouTube. Because you’ve been traveling to so many of these parks.

When we first started Insider Perks back in 2011, I was doing that with K O A. We were going up and down the east coast creating videos of those parks and I think we probably visited 90 or 120 campgrounds. And so it is part of the thing that I really missed, but it’s probably easier having that freshen your mind and that experience at some of those parks where I’m just looking at information, photos and things like that.

So definitely. Yep. I think I’m excited to get other feedback too. I think one of the, we actually struggled a little bit with what’s the best methodology to share all this information and make it easy to follow. So process on being a panelist aside, I think you are all speaking to one of the things that we were trying to find a way to capture and celebrate, which was, there’s so many different ways to cut and slice recognition and experiences in today and and how interesting that, in fact, I think we’re all touching on.

Just the kind of root of one of the things camps, spot’s trying to even solve for, which is helping someone choose, like how do you choose when there’s such a swath of choices out there? So I’m enjoying the feedback too, to, to recognize that yes, our ex, our hope was that we were able to bring in a variety of perspectives to help remove some of those biases and those preferences that you mentioned, Brian, that it’s very natural for us to all bring to the equation, but also recognize the challenge of being able to make sure that we see representation across the different types of.

Experiences, needs, benefits that different campgrounds bring. I’m interested, sorry, I don’t wanna interrupt. I just wanna ask Tyler and Kendra, will those parks that you didn’t visit that were on the list, will that impact your future travel parts? Will you go, we make a point to go see them now, do you think?

I’m definitely curious. Yeah. Uh, especially with some of the winners that you’ll see. Cause I’ve heard about them for a while now, and so to see them. Once again pop up at in the top list. It’s just even more reason to go and visit if there’s room. That’s always the hard part now that things are popular and, and Brian West can talk about this as out camp and at Dark Sky and they have limited spaces and we gotta make sure we, we plan ahead and try and book early.

I think every years experience us fear of sharing what their favorite things are. Yep. And so it’s, you’s just gotta swallow your PR

Good place. Totally the, the fear that like, let’s keep it at secret and stay hush, hush goes against some of this conversation we’re having. So I find it funny that, pardon me, some folks have that. I get it. I understand both sides of the coin, but the recognition is so incredibly valuable and I’m sure has massive impact on these businesses.

Yeah. And not to mention the opportunity for these businesses to grow if they want to. Like why not share that so that they have assets to continue their dream. Yeah, totally agree. The one thing I will say before I just keep let you keep going, Aaron, is that it, the good thing about that ranking, the way you set it up, the one through 10, and the thing that actually made it easier, I’ve talked about how difficult it is, but what made it easier on me to finally deciding that 1, 2, 3, 4, was that by choosing number one, I’m not eliminating nine other people.

and so I really did the format of they’re still going to get recognition even if I don’t make them number. I love that. I don’t even know if we were conscious about that, but I think that’s a really great call out and I really hope, and I’d be curious to flip it over to Brit and Brian for your perspective on it, but you know, our hope is as an RB family care, just to your point, there’s definitely moments where I’m like, don’t tell anyone this is the best.

This is the best secret. No one knows about it in the upper Northeast corner here. On the other hand, we want to find ways to also recognize. The campgrounds themselves, the Campground owners. I think that is not always an opportunity that is available to Campground owners. But the flip side is just you’re creating these amazing experiences for campers, and why do we like, why not at least be able to find ways to share or enable the advocates and enable the enthusiasts of your parks to also share with their, so I guess Brit Brian, just curious from your perspective.

Again, I, I’m not suggesting that there’s some type of like, new excitement that you have as an award winner necessarily, but what does that mean for you? Is there any, um, conflict? I’m curious about that. Kind of like the secret or the option to keep something, uh, a little bit unknown, which is a good thing, but also take this opportunity to celebrate if you, if that feels right for your business.

I’ll start if that’s okay, Brian. No, I think it’s totally awesome. Like, I’m like, tell the world because you work so hard, um, and you put so much time and effort, money into thinking about all of the different aspects and what is going to create. A very awesome experience to get people to come back. That’s the number one goal, is to have those repeat customers who really thoroughly enjoyed what you were, do what you’re doing.

And we do hear it like nine times outta 10 from people that visit with us that they’re just like, I don’t wanna tell anybody cuz then everyone’s gonna know. And it’s just really humbling to hear that because they want. To cherish it. And like you said, we do only have 18 sites and it does become a supply and demand situation, but it’s then it brings to light for people like, oh, then I need to plan ahead, which also helps us for future planning and seeing what months are popular and where we need to market for slower months.

We do love the recognition. We appreciate it and the RV camper community. It’s so amazing that they do wanna share, even though they don’t, they do wanna share the awesome experiences. And so this only helps bolster, um, that position for people to then share, like, oh, and then it adds a little kaza for them too, that they maybe stayed at an award-winning Campground, which is extra cool.

So thank you. It’s totally awesome. Absolutely. Now this is a, I have a question for you. It’s not award related, so I just wanna touch on it real quick. Just so cuz we have a lot of Campground who, who watch the show as a 18 site park, that is probably one of the highest, would you say highest in demand parks?

Certainly more so now that you’re an award winner. But does that, how does that impact your rate planning and forecasting in advance when you know that you’re limited and there’s such high demand for your sites? We, we really try to be very aware of the pricing in our community. We have six other parks that were.

Quote in competition against, but personally we we’re very different. And so we don’t see ourselves necessarily as competition, and our, what we’re doing here speaks to a certain. Camper and what other parks are doing will speak to other people. And so we really are very aware to not price ourselves out.

And you can tell when if something is, we tried out leaving our pricing for the winter months to see. How things were going to gonna go and we didn’t have comparing our reservation grid from this time last year, we didn’t have as many reservations, so we just dropped down to our winter pricing and we’re able to up our traffic and every time we up our rates for the new year, we always justify it.

We don’t do it just because we think we can. We’re always adding something new for the user experience and so it always feels good. For them instead of feeling like they’re being taken advantage of it just because it’s because we can . Sure. Absolutely. Thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah, thanks. Back to the awards, Aaron.

I’m sorry we distracted us for a second. No, it’s okay. Maybe Brian, what’s your kind of experience or feedback here and how do you think about that kind of supply demand, uh, concept that we were talking about too?

Ooh, we might be on mute.

Unmute? Not yet. Hello. Heard your Yep. We can hear. Gotcha there. Are we good now? Yeah. Okay. Sorry. We’re still new to this. Uh, this is just our, we’re coming up on our second year here, Brit, similar to you. We’re not gonna outprice ourselves. We are, we’re seeing a great demand.

Did we lose him? Did he freeze September? It took us a while to understand why that was happening, and then we started looking in camp Spot and realizing that it was booking up quickly. Even online, we. Have held back, opening up our reservations more than a year out, and that’s helping us as one. It’s a great feature on camp spots that that really helps us control maybe where we need to be next year.

But we really don’t open up our reservations for the next year until, uh, we close in November and we are seasonal. We close November through March, so right now demand is high. As we slowly open up during the shoulder or the winter seasons, I think we’ll be able to bring more of our local guests in. More often, we have a lot of return guests who, who come stay with us for a weekend and make another two weekend reservations while they’re here.

We’re just really fortunate. We would love to be able to say we knew what we were doing and we were, we’re making strategic moves, but we’re not going with the flow. We’re, we’re campers ourselves and we want this place to be a place that we would wanna come to. So we’re adding features all the time as well, and we’ll increase our prices when our features are worth it.

That be a great answer, . Yeah, we did. We got you. Oh, thanks. Okay. No, you want Eric, please? Yeah. Yeah, I don’t know. It’s, this would be, we work for you, but maybe we could just talk a little bit briefly. We don’t have to go too in depth, but on like each category or each award. I don’t know. Tyler and Kendra, if you guys are open to walking us through each of those categories and then I think it might be interesting, Brett and Brian, Searl, I know you both were represented in a few categories, but some of the categories I think are interesting and speak to, and again, trends that we saw that are important.

Top of mind considerations for consumers today, but. Tyler and Kendra, I feel like you guys are really in a great, uh, spot in perspective of maybe sharing the categories, if you’re open to that. Do you want to go and, sorry to interrupt you. Do you want to go category and then talk about the winners and then go another category and talk about the winners or.

Sure. Yeah, that works out. I have like my little cute little cheat sheet here. Ready to roll. Can I recording if Aaron or Tyler or Kendra, anybody else wants to share your screen and show pictures, you can do that too. If you wanna bring up the camp spot website, it’s up to you. You let us know what you guys would like.

Okay, cool. I can, um, pull the site if that would help Kendra. Yeah, that would be great. I was gonna say, I don’t have that ready, but Erin, I will try to figure that out while you’ve been started. So while she’s doing that, we can talk about the cop campgrounds in the US and so we have number one Angel Fire RV Resort in Northern New Mexico.

Located in the Sang de Christo mountains, and so it’s way up there. It’s really beautiful. It’s open year round, which is pretty unique to that area, considering that right now, I’m sure they’re in like a foot of snow. So good for, uh, skiers, snowboarders. Snowshoes, et cetera. So if you, Erin, if you wanna scroll down to the Angel Fire RV Resort, beautiful mountain view sites, and so I’m thinking that this was a huge factor in why it, uh, was voted so high.

Also, it’s got the amenities of an RV resort. I think a lot of these winning campgrounds have the kind of laziness of an RV resort as opposed to an RV park. Or Campground and, and again, this speaks to what some campers want versus what other campers want. So not every winner is gonna be an art resort, but this one for sure is an art resort with executive, adult only area, which I thought was unique because sometimes for the older generation, they don’t want to be next to a screaming playground, or else you don’t have.

Kids don’t wanna be next to screaming playground, although we like kids, sometimes you don’t wanna be next. The playground are slides. Yeah, so we actually have not been to Apin Rose, or not Apin Rose, I’m sorry. Angel Fire. That’s Apin Rose is actually a similar one that’s in Durango, a little further north, but further down the list getting ahead of myself.

But definitely on our favorite list on Camp Spot. We favored it. Little hearted that definitely wanted go. I’m sorry to interrupt her to get it working. Aaron, are you able to scroll or, oh, it’s, I’m scrolling on my side, but it’s not scrolling on the screen, I don’t think. I’m sorry. I’m not sure. That’s okay.

Do you want, can you try Angela? Do you want me to try or.

Continue while we’re troubleshooting, please. Two computers. Yeah, I can give it a try. Just one second. Sure we’ll go on to the next one. Another RV Resort. You wanna talk about Kappa Robs? Yeah, so number two in the top campgrounds. Uh, Rob spends probably the most time in top campgrounds cause that’s the largest award’s all encompassing on.

It takes them to account everything about each Campground and Ka Noble is located and Paa Robles, California, which is basically wine country. And so you’re in the rolling Hill. If you look out and you. Vineyards. I’m in the distance and it’s just a beautiful park. The amenities are insane. It definitely is probably one of the top resorts for RV years in the country.

Yeah, with multiple pools, hot tubs, great cabins, rentals, a beautiful paved, and I’m sure they have people coming from. All over the country, but it’s smacked out between kind of the Bay Area and LA mm-hmm. . So a huge kind of getaway, weekend getaway destination for those communities. For sure. Yeah. So that was a big one.

And then third on that list is dark sky. So we can have Brit talk boat, dark sky, especially the outdoor shopper. So Dark Sky is located in Canna, Utah, which is considered, um, the Golden Circle or the Grand Circle. We’re right in the middle. Of Zion National Park, Bryce Canyon, the North Room of the Grand Canyon, lake Powell, and like gazillion other things to do.

We have. It’s just the, we have or we sit on 40 acres of which about like 10 to 15 acres are developed. So we really wanted, we loved when we were traveling full-time, we loved the natural feel that a state Park National Park offers you. But we wanted to combine that with the luxuries that we all look for.

pool, and we have high-end bath suites, so you get your own, uh, suite with beautiful tile, heated floors. There’s indoor outdoor showers. We just had someone, we had when we had, um, some snow here a few weeks ago. Someone was just like showering outside in the snow. It’s just cre giving them really a cool.

Experience. I tell you, you don’t realize how important those heated bathroom floors are until you go to the cabin. I’m telling you, they had ’em in the cabin in Jasper when we went up there. It was amazing. Yeah, it’s stepping out out of the shower and not having a freezing floor is just like luxury at its finest.

So we really are, our kind of 360 degree views are the Red Rocks and then our, the far views of the Kibab and the Vermilion Cliffs and every site are separated. So since we only have 18 sites, they’re really spread out. So at least 75 feet apart, um, from the next camp, the next campsite. It just really offers.

The camper, an ability to feel like you have your own back backyard. People are here long term, lots of privacy, so yeah. And of course the amazing dark skies at night Can is. Brian, you’re curious. Canna is, is definitely has, uh, dark sky Wow. Low light ordinances and the Milky Way runs right over us. And people have said they’ve never seen the Milky way before until they’ve visited our park, which is just, you can just cry hearing those things that it’s just blows people’s minds.

It’s such a different experience. So are you familiar with what it, are you actually a dark sky preserve or We’re not? I would definitely. Unfortunately, like we are in a small town that does force the dark sky ordinances. We’re definitely like leading the way as we have some developments being put up around us.

But it’s super important and it is in like bylaws of new buildings, new construction around us to follow those guidelines. But the stars are epic and we make sure that people adhere to that so we can, everyone can enjoy the night skies. I tell you, I didn’t even realize it until I went up there. Like we went up there, Jasper’s a dark sky preserve, and we didn’t realize how much of a difference it made.

They showed before and after photos of, I don’t know, 13 years ago before they were, and they changed all the street lights and all the restaurant lights and just the view of the stars. Yeah. After that small change is so amazing. We went to the, the Fairmont Hotel up there has a telescope, like a planetarium.

You can look through and see the before and afters. and just the, the, yeah. If you’re a consumer and you have a chance to go to one of these places, to your Campground or somewhere else, it’s an amazing experience. Yeah, it does make a huge difference. And a lot of people who are into astral photography, they’ll bring their gigantic telescopes here and set up just to be able to set up at your own site and capture these incredible photos.

It’s a pretty cool luxury. Yeah, and I will add, as. We went, we were actually there last January and we did use the outdoor shower during while we were there. But yeah, Brit and Jeff and Marilyn and Rick, you guys did such a good job with that. One of our favorite places we’ve been to for sure. And mail delivery service too.

Yeah. , uh, drop around in their kids, hop out of their golf cart or their car or rock and then deliver the mail to . It’s kinda a cool personal Yeah, definitely like a, a family. Like run Campground just had a really nice personal touch to that. So, Guys. Yeah, it was awesome having y’all. So next on the list, number four is the views, RV Park and camp.

Mm-hmm. And so this one we actually haven’t been to, but it’s on the list. I think this really speaks to this glamping, I can’t even say trend because it’s not even a trend anymore. It’s just the evolution. Yeah. The clamping asset of, of the. Outdoor industry right now and how popular that is and it’s continuing to be right.

So they do have great glamping sites, as well as RV sites, tent sites. This is located in Southwest Colorado, but actually near the Four Corners. And so a lot of great places like the Mesa. Like National Park, we went there that was really beautiful. An underrated national park and close to a lot Mountain, et cetera.

Uh, yes. Number four, the views. RV Park Campground in Dolores. Cal or California, Colorado. Excuse me, . Next one from California and Santa Cruz Redwoods RV Resort. And that’s in Dalton, which is outside of Santa. This one is incredible because you are parking next to Redwood trees. And right on the other side of a creek is an old growth redwood forest.

And so it is just a beautiful area and Campground, you’re just Camping among the the trees, but you’re only. 15 minute drive from Santa Cruz. And so if you’re a surfer and I want to get to the beach, pier, Santa Cruz is right there. And then you’re just, uh, south of San Francisco. So we were the day trip up to San Francisco and so this is a great location.

Be wary of which direction you come into because there is a route that you should not take. They actually say it on the cam Spotless. I did not read that and I advised poorly and it was better. Scribe. It’s very intense when you’re telling rotors complain about us. Nobody reads their website. I’m sorry. I, in my defense, we have stayed at 200 campgrounds.

I kind of got a little. Proud. Felt like proud, confident. Yep. I’ve done it before too. So , it was a fun drive. Just a white knuckle drive. So that was a great one. So we’ll keep moving cuz we’ve still got a lot to go through and wanna respect everyone’s time. So number six is Yogi Bears Jellystone Park in Golden Valley.

I’m so Blue Ridge Mountains, if anyone’s been to those in the Carolinas. Super beautiful. I think the Eastern Mountain range. Is underrated. I use that term again, but it is really beautiful. I think everyone looks to the Rockies in the west and and stuff, um, for their like mountain excursions. But I love the BR Blue Ridge Mountains.

This is a great family. Campground as well. A Yoki bear park. It has all of like the traditional water park, mini golf. Et cetera, et cetera. But what’s unique about this one is the cabins, the cabin rentals, the cottages in that. As you can see in that image, they have these really cool treetop cabin rentals that are really popular and give you some of the best views of the Blue Ridge Mountains for sure.

Yep. And then next up is another than Elk Camp East Creek in Mineral Washington. We can’t say enough things about our time there. And this is actually Kendra and I hosting camps. Spott CEO Michael, his first time he’s rvd he rented, uh, an RV in Mena South there when incredible experience. Uh, Brian, I don’t wanna take away too much thunder.

If you wanna share a little bit about, more about your camp and social, your camp store in which our computer is currently. Sitting on top of some of the coffee table books that we’ve purchased from you and Awesome. Because of our, our skin products that we’ve purchased.

Well, thanks. We, we were really happy to have you guys with us. It was, it was an eye-opener for us that we were going in the right direction when we sought out buying a camp. We had some requirements. We needed to be a couple hours away from some feeder cities, which we are, we’re right between Portland and Seattle.

And we really wanted to be close to a national park and we couldn’t have chosen more wisely. Mount Rainier is really 25 minutes away, and that’s the, the year round entrance to Mount Rainier as well. So some of the things that we really

In his defense, he is in a remote area. , we can attest to the internet. That’s not why you, cause I figured it was my internet. I didn’t wanna, like if it was just pausing for me, so I wasn’t sure, but we’re. He’s got some beautiful artwork and we’re looking at his pictures too, this park, so if he comes back, yeah.

Yeah. It is definitely a remote destination. Like he said, it’s crazy that it’s so remote because it’s only an hour away from Seattle and Portland, but it definitely gives you the vibe of being in a state park, but with a lu the luxury of like their bath suites and their Campground story. Like Tyler mentioned, it has pretty, uh, but we’re surrounded by, oh, Ryan

I think he’s coming in now. Probably. Go ahead. Yeah, go ahead. Eric. Or I was gonna say, they have onsite paths through some old growth forests of the Central Pacific Northwest vibe of like mosque covered trees all green. They have this beautiful meadow product and improving. Sorry. That’s okay. Was my wifi not working?

Yeah, that’s okay. You were just, you were popping in and out. That’s all that matters. All right. Good, good. . Yeah, and Tyler and Kendra, they, they saw everything, and we’re just working to improve it and make it even better. Next year, our store’s gonna be remodeled. We’re remodeling it right now, as well as our bathroom buildings.

I’m not sure if you heard me say that, but we’re just, we’re having so much fun. This is a fun world to live in. I, I don’t know why I didn’t do it sooner. , the photos are incredible. I’m sure they don’t do justice, but. Amazing. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. And to say, um, Mount Rainier is 25 minutes. I feel like it’s five minutes cuz you Yeah.

Well I felt like it was like 15 minutes away. It was really, really fun. It’s amazing to be that close to a national park and within two hours of, even as Brian Searl said, two of his favorite cities. Yeah. Um, it’s an incredible location. Yeah. And you guys have done a great job maintaining and building the customer experience, so Yeah, for sure.

Yeah. We’ll be back. Thank you. Thank you. Yes. Good. We look forward to it. I’m gonna come first, so you better reserve later . So let’s move on to number eight. Carolina Pines, RV Resort. A lot has been said about this RV Resort, I feel like in the. Camping industry, so I’m not sure how much I wanna go with it except for the fact that it’s like a quintessential RV resort onsite.

And many, we loved the pickleball courts in particular. It is close to Myrtle Beach, um, South Carolina golf cart rentals, water park, the whole nine yards. I think one like very unique thing about this user ex, or I guess Camping experience in this RV resort is they had like, Delivery service for like cocktails and meals and stuff.

That was crazy as well as I’ll mention like the community area, that was really fun. And I think different than other RV resorts, they have a fun area that you can get together with other campers and stuff. Number nine on the list is Yogi Bears, Jellystone Park, camp Resorts, Guadalupe River. This is in Hill Country, Texas.

Uh, Great for family. That’s also right on the Guadalupe River, so it’s beautiful. Just natural riverside amenities. You can fish. I have all kind of the resort amenities that you like included as you can see on the pictures, water slides and pools, and jump pads and, and great things for kids of all ages. I think Texas Hill Country is a year round destination, but I think in the summer in particular, the Guadalupe River is huge for rip like tubing and stuff.

Obviously it gets super, super hot in Texas and the river provides like a cool getaway destination to cool off and, and have some fun. Yeah, don’t forget a tube for your cooler. Um, when you tube on that, And number 10 is Lost River Valley Campground in North, uh, Woodstock, New Hampshire. And we had the pleasure of staying here as well.

It’s, um, run by a family and it’s about, I think 40 sites. And so it’s a medium sized Campground. Again, this one is like the state park feel, uh, rather than an RV park or RV resort, which is really great. You gotta go a little slow when you. Gwen and you’re parking your rig because there are some close corners with some trees, but I think they do such a good job preserving like the natural setting around you.

It’s located near, um, Mount Washington. It’s actually in a national forest, I believe. The white, white mountain national forest area. It’s near the flu, the core . We did all of the Mount Washington White Mountain stuff when we were there, and a great family that. Runs it. They just added some wintertime cabins, I believe, some mountain view cabins, and so it’s really cool to see that they’re expanding and doing so well, and they have a great brook that runs through a lot of the campsites in the back, and so you just sleep with your window open.

You just have this plin brook all night long. Yeah, we’re to sleep. Yeah. Great experience. And so that kind of wraps up the, uh, top campgrounds in the us, which is the biggest award. And then we’ll more briefly go through from the other awards and talk about process and why some of those were chosen. Yeah.

So we’ll keep moving forward and down that list into most popular. So this is a little bit more, yes, I was gonna say quantitative quantitatively based on, um, camps, spot’s booking. Erin, I’m good. Yeah, you’re right. This one was really interesting based on camper. So what were people looking for? Marketplace bookings.

Marketplace Favorite things. So we can actually see people who are saving campgrounds that they wanna revisit or visit again in their app reviews and photos. So number one, we have the Santa Cruz Redwoods, RV Resort. We already spoke to this. Um, It’s so close to San Francisco. It makes a lot of sense.

There’s a lot of people coming from Lodi when we were there as well. So those communities around San Francisco, a lot of people booking there. Canyon Lands, RV Resort, and Campground. And number two is in Moab, Utah. It’s uh, sort of in between Moab. And I was gonna say, in between Arches and Canyon Lands National Parks.

So a great destination for those looking to do like your Red Rock adventures. Number three is Oceanside, RV Resort and Campground in COOs Bay, Oregon. It’s on the water. I mean, it was really cool to have ocean, like front Camping your own. Kind of private beach mean you share obviously with other campers.

It’s a friendly beach as well. So I think that’s really unique to a lot of our years that have their dog with them. Sometimes they can’t take them to the state parks around the area. And so that was really cool. It was cool to see people like surfing and crabbing and fishing. So we had, uh, fresh salmon tacos on the beach.

We brought our, yeah, we didn’t catch ’em, but we went to a local and fish market. . We didn’t, people fishing, um, from the beach. We did not have. Fleet equipment, not expertise to do that, but yeah, you’re right on the beach and can really live that, that beach lifestyle. Next up we have another Jellystone Park.

This one is Park or Tower Park in Lodi, California. So this one’s located on the Delta and so it’s cool cuz you can, you have a boat launch and you can basically ride, ride around California Delta. But yeah, it is a Yogi beer park, so it’s got a really. Fun and big water park. They actually have cottages that you can rent that are connected, so you can like literally walk out to the pool.

But then they also have RV sites, golf rentals, tent, mini-golf that you’ll find at, uh, different Yogi Bear parks. Yeah. And it’s not far from San Francisco. So we met a lot of people who were just needed a little break from the city and, and. Came out. So yeah, I think it’s interesting to see that so many of these popular places are near some big metropolitan area.

California. Yeah. The next one is not near a big city though. That is in Missoula, Montana. And that’s Jim and Mary’s RV Park. This is a great location because you’re Missoula, which is a great city in Montana. It’s not too far from Glacier National and a lot of great fly fishing as well. I think that’s subjective and it’s still, I think you’re.

Looking at two and a half to three hour drive to Yellowstone or Glacier. But I think when you’re in like big sky country, that’s all relative. Relative, right? Like you’re gonna be driving a lot, but it is really close to some of the best fishing that you’ll find in Montana. Huge fly fishing community there.

And Missoula was just a really cool downtown area to wander. So even if you’re not looking for outdoor experiences, that town is really great. Number six is Ocean Mesa RV Resort in Goleta, California. It’s actually just outside of Santa Barbara, so not far from the ocean. And I, we have not been to this. I want to go, it looks like it’s like a quintessential, like Cal SoCal, , like little RV resort that is just a rolling hills behind it.

I shouldn’t say hills, they’re mountains, but just the lush, um, green mountains behind and and stuff. Number seven. Is Ebenezer Park in Rock Hill, South Carolina. So this one is located on a big, uh, reservoir, I believe, or a big lake. I think it was Wiley Lake that located right between South Carolina. And so a good destination for those two states.

Number eight is Whispering Hills RV Park in Georgetown. Kentucky right outside of Lexington and not far from Louisville. It’s just beaut. If anyone’s been to like the beautiful rolling hills of, of Kentucky with like the horses going , it’s just a beautiful place. Next up, Alpine Rose. Every park in Durango, California, um, or Cal, Colorado, , excuse me, I don’t line, so you’re in Durango, which is a, a great California, oh my gosh, Colorado.

Location. So we’ve, we haven’t stayed at this park, but Durango before and again, it’s great Mountains of Colorado. Um, we actually wanted, I had this on. Our list. When we were going from New Mexico into Utah, we were cutting that Colorado corner. We don’t have a truck, we pull with an suv. So we were a little hesitant about going into the mountain range with this, I guess a war, not a warning, but it, an advisory, I guess it, it is in the mountains, it’s up there, but it is really beautiful and it’s gives you some of the best mountain views.

Like I have this saved on Camp spot because it’s like Red Cliffs. It’s like spacious and a really beautiful RV park. And then the last one is Lake Siski Camp Resort, Mount Shasta Kelp, actually in California. So this one’s really, it’s no brainer why this is popular. You have like lake views of Mount Shasta.

Uh, it’s a camp resort, so it’s, it’s not an RV park. It’s not an RV resort. But has Scott, this Camping old school vibe of what it was like to go to summer camp with a joke, pillow on the water and stuff. And as you can see by the image of these two really happy campers jumping into the water, a really fun place in Northern California.

And then, uh, top camp about the seven minutes left, I definitely wanna make sure we cover the awards, but if you want to just. Move. Move too fast. I wanna highlight all these parks, but we wanna at least talk about the awards and we can go over a couple minutes. That’s fine too. As long as everybody can stay.

Maybe at least mention some of the parks. Cause I know some of ’em won multiple award categories, so if we can touch on some of the ones that maybe haven’t been highlighted. Yeah, that’s a good point. I think just touching on the top campgrounds for families. These are all yogis and there’s the new camp info on Guadalupe River Stance Camp.

Fun is more fun Outdoor camp. So I think this is pretty self-explanatory, but definitely check out number three Camp Info, cuz that is a brand new park this year. We actually viewed it when it was under construction and so it, it’s crazy to see the pictures. Yeah, that’s right. Along the, the river. And again, tubing in Texas is a big thing.

It’s, I know that’s a big, um, draw and it’s right next to a music venue as well as, uh, great . The top campgrounds with views. Category two that we haven’t seen on other, uh, list are the Yellowstone Hot Springs, and so this is on the northern entrance of the Yellowstone National Park, and it’s actually attached to a separate business.

It’s like a sister business of the hot springs. It was really cool, like you’re just like sitting in the hot springs with like mountains around you. Really beautiful. And a great access point for Yellowstone and right out ranch, number five on top, um, campgrounds with views. We stayed here and we loved it.

It’s in a Saguaro Forest. I think this Campground is more geared toward horse campers, which I think is a kind of niche market that often goes overlooked. It was like super booked when we were there, and it was so cool to see people like, In the morning, they have like their coffee and they’re riding out on their horse like into the horizon and we’re like, oh, okay.

Let’s see you later. So a really cool spot of an old Saguaro Forest. I think a lot of people go Toro National Park, obviously the Tucson area to find these, but this is like a super accessible all of these paths. We rented the O H D that they had on site and it was a really great place. And then the next award is top.

Campgrounds for first timers, and this is important because it was a nice entry point for people who are buying new RVs or are new to the RV lifestyle. So this kind of provides all amenities you need in case you forget something or you just need help or you just want a great experience without having to bring all your own gear and a lot of things to do for family and friends.

Yeah. So, um, so a lot of great ones on the list there. Camping sites is the next award. And this is more specific, right? Like these are actual sites that are being nominated. We’ve had the pleasure of staying at the Sun Outdoors, Petoskey Bay Harbor Premium coach site, which was wild, but it was a great hosting site.

I am saying wild, because it really was like a luxury opportunity. And the Hideaway retreat is right on the water located on the panhandle of, uh, Florida. Of course we have our dark sky there with the 30 50 amp. Yeah. It’s really not a bad site at dark sky. Um, they also have fiber optic internet. You didn’t mention that Brit.

That was a Yeah, that’s true.

And then the top Campground design is the last award. And so this is more about this new Camping experience that we have, um, going on of unique. I think, like we all hear that millennials want like this experience based rather than like things. And so the experiences at these five are really incredible.

We spoke to out camp in Dark Sky, obviously, and how much we had there. We have not been to Fort Land. Oh, Aaron, you’re by there. You’re gonna have to go to Fort Land. Yes, it’s on our list, but like we said, cava rolls an excellent experience, very luxurious RV Resort and Camp fifo. A new fun family experience as well.

Yeah, that wraps up the 2022 Camp Spot Awards. Thank you guys for to fast and good job of being 45 amazing winners. And I know we’re running outta time, Brian, but I just wanna take two seconds if what? It’s okay to just thank Yeah, we can go a couple minutes over. That’s fine. There’s so much of our ability to even.

Opera these awards is to the assessment Tyler and Kendra that you just did and thoughtfully, but also as a panelist, Brian, you’re also a, a really important piece of this puzzle and so I just wanted to take a moment to acknowledge that we had nine, and as you can hear, Tyler and Kendra have such an expertise as full-time RVers, but also the founders of one E One, which is an A really.

Amazing creative agency that we’ve also had the chance to work with Camps spot really quickly. I’ll just highlight the other panelists, obviously. Brian, thank you so much, founder and CEO of Insight Perks and Modern Campground, and then running through our other panelists. We’ve got Adventures With Adventures with Gabby and Gabby, who’s the founder of Adventures with Gabby and Gabby, Jeremy Glisi, who’s the owner and author of RV Atlas, Phil Tmore, nor who’s the founder and admin of the Jelly Headss fan group.

Aaron and Lauren Alva, who are the creators of the preneurs, which is an amazing. Group that we love to work with. Joel Holland, the CEO of parp, Dan Humphrey, the director of operations for RV Life, and Denise Hagen, who’s the marketing manager at of Winnebago. So really this, um, opportunity would not even exist if it weren’t for wonderful campgrounds like Brit and Brian Searl, your campgrounds, but also with the, um, thoughtfulness and just the approach tackling the ranking process around the methodology for this year’s Camp Bot award.

So thank you all so much. Awesome. Thank you guys all for being a part of the show. I really appreciate it. And again, like I’m hopeful that this is running for another 10, 20, 30, 40 years especially because of that. I really like, and again, I can see the ways that you can approve, right? Not that you need to, but just the ways that you can enhance the nominating process.

Make sure more parks are aware, make sure there’s more recognition involved as yield on these awards and get more publicity for ’em. But. I tell you, like I, Tyler and Kendrick could probably speak to this, having been to 200 campgrounds, right? I’ve been to hundreds of them as well, not recently, but it still amazes me how many places I don’t know about despite all the traveling and all the parks I’ve been to and all the places I’ve been.

Uh, and so I think it’s just super critical to continue to highlight these different parks and a world and recognition. Just make sure that more people are aware of them, especially for all the hard work that goes into some of these places really is underappreciated. It really is. Yeah. And how humbling, right, to even just spend 30 minutes listening to some of these campgrounds to have just, you know, built our own bucket list.

I’m sure like many of you, oh my gosh, this is on the list now and this needs to be on the list. I think there’s something that really special about all the amazing experiences that Campground owners, like Brian, like Britt, like you guys are doing and bringing towards forward for us. But also this opportunity to remember that these adventures and these opportunities are literally in our backyards and we are really excited that we’re all part of, you know, that collective effort to make sure that we’re accessing what’s available to all of us.

Next year. We need to get Tyler and Kendra up to Canada, cuz I didn’t see any Canadian parks today.

We actually have a hypothetical loop in. If we pull the trigger on it this spring, that includes revisiting both dark sky and Elk Camp and making our way forward into Canada because I have not been to British Columbia, Calgary area and I want to, so maybe, yeah, I really should. Tons of great spots up here too.

I was gonna say, we need to set up a Canada category for awards too, here For sure. Yeah. I’m sure Cara can help facilitate that. So, I’ll do what I can. Sure. Round out our panel as well. Yeah. And all that so we can help ’em understand where they can go and what they can see. So, Lots of beautiful stuff up here.

So looking forward to that. And then we need, I think we need a best podcast industry category award. There might not be 10 people there, long that Brian is not like it would be valuable. But anyway, thank you guys all. I really appreciate you joining us. Thank you to the park owners, to the award winners, to everybody who joined us on this show.

It’s Tyler and Kendra. Just really appreciate. Highlighting again, this awards, the, the value that brings to park sharing, uh, some of those experiences. I know we have mostly Campground owners who watching the show, but just an appreciation of what is possible, what can be accomplished. Uh, everybody works hard.

Maybe there’s a different strategy. I can take something, a piece from here, a piece from there, and make your park even better than it already is. And so that’s what I think we’re really excited to share with, with everybody. So, Angela, Kara, do you have anything to add before we wrap up the show or? I just wanna say congratulations to you winners.

I absolutely understand the work and time and effort and heart and soul that goes into the work that you guys do, and it was a life changing experience for me, and I think, I’m sure that’s the case for you. And I, I would love to come and see your properties and, and, uh, experience and they look incredible.

Congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We hope you come see us. Absolutely, definitely . Angela, did you just, thanks everybody for joining us and I, we’ve all said there’s so many places that exist and until somebody tells you about some of them you don’t know that they’re out there. And so just being all of these beautiful properties, I’ve got an, I’ve got an itch to travel and I wanna get out and I wanna start the, some of these beautiful properties.

Yeah. Thanks for joining us guys. Awesome. And yeah, Aaron, you could thank you. Talk to maybe connect with Angela after the show. We can try to highlight some more of these award winners. Maybe be in-depth interviews or something on Modern, Campground, just giving me more exposure and talk about the good things you’re doing, reasons why they were nominated, all those kinds of things.

Ryan, Kara, thank you guys so much for bringing us all together. Appreciate this opportunity. Awesome. We hope everybody has a good day next week. I believe. Angela, who do we have on the show next week? He put me on the spot. I think I, next week I believe we have a founder and CEO of the Dirt. I think, I’m pretty sure we’ve had some shifting with guests for the last few weeks.

So I’ve tried to organize in my head who’s where, but I think that’s, I think you’re right. We have the founder and CEO of The Dirt. We’re also gonna focus more on some topical and recurring guests on our shows. So I think next week it’s gonna be the third week of the month going forward, we’re gonna have a couple regular park owners who appear on the show just to give a perspective of what goes into their mind at the time of year that things are happening or what’s crossing their desk and impacting their plans and stuff like that.

So, Obviously we’ll continue to change out guests here and there, but we’re gonna have at least two or three of those. I think trying to just a recurring perspective on that. So the Campground Hunters will be the third week and we’ll have a couple of those on the show next week as well. So really appreciate you guys.

Again, if you are listening to us here, you can see, uh, past episodes on MC Fireside Chats dot com, as well as on podcasts and Apple, Google, all those places, Spotify, et cetera, et cetera. So we will see you next week. Thank you so much for joining us. Thanks. Bye. Thank you. Thank you. Bye everyone. Thank you all.