MC Fireside Chats – July 30th, 2025

Brian Searl: Welcome everybody to another episode of MC Fireside Chats. My name’s Brian Searl with Insider Perks and Modern Campground. Excited to welcome you back to one of those weird fifth weeks we have with no recurring guests. But we have three really great, amazing special guests who are gonna make up for all that, right guys? No pressure at all.

But super excited to be here with you guys. Again, we’ve got a couple great people. I’m gonna go around the room and let them introduce themselves in a second. But yeah, just super excited to be here. So who wants to start? Vicki, Martin, Laura, who wants to go first?

Who’s the least shy person? Vicki, raise her hand. She’s all in. Let’s go Vicki. 

Vicki Jones: Hi. So I’m Vicki. I run Tracks and Cream Glamping, which is a geodesic dome glamping site in Somerset in the UK. So we’ve got nine geodesic domes. We’ve got six glamping domes, and one of the glamping domes has got three domes, a kind of in one.

And then we’ve got an event space as well that’s a 10 meter geodesic dome. So we do a lot of retreats. We do weddings, we do hen parties, a lot of yoga and Pilates. So we are glamping, but we’ve got the event side of it as well. So we’ve got caterers and things like that.

And we’ve been running for nine years and we started a YouTube channel back in 2020, documenting all the crazy stuff that happens when you run a glamping site. So that’s been really interesting and we’ve spoken to loads of people all around the world about glamping. And so that kind of enabled me to get involved with ResNexus.

So I am the UK ambassador for ResNexus, which are property management software. So they sponsor our YouTube channel. And then also in the UK, I know you guys over in the US have got the American Glamping Association. 

Brian Searl: Hey, now I’m in Canada. Let’s not lump everybody into the US 

Vicki Jones: Oh, okay. Okay. The US had the AGA so we’ve just started the Glamping Industry Trade Association over for the UK.

So I’m on the board of directors for the trade association. So I’m heavily got myself into the glamping world and I absolutely love it. 

Brian Searl: Awesome. Excited to dive into some of that stuff for you. It is interesting we’ve talked about in the show before, not necessarily on, with glamping people, but in all assets of the industry about glamping, just how it’s had such a headstart in the UK.

It’s been so far ahead of where the United States industry or the Canadian industry is right now. By leaps and bounds. So I still think there’s so much, but obviously we can learn from each other anyway, but just from you guys who have been through all the things that we’re just now going through in North America as we get it under our belt.

So excited to hear from that. And then I’ll have to check out the YouTube channel too because I was doing this yesterday, I make these videos on LinkedIn where I talk about marketing, advertising and because that’s my bread and butter, we work for 500 different, parks all around the world and do that stuff for them.

But we were, I was talking to them about like why I put out so much LinkedIn content or social media content in general. And the answer is for me is to train the AI algorithms, right? I do want you to comment, I do want you to share, of course I do wanna provide value to you, but I also wanna teach LinkedIn’s AI and X’s AI, and Meta’s AI and all that stuff.

Like who I am, what I stand for, what I’m about. And I think from a property perspective, like you’re doing it from a flip side of how to teach people glamping, right? Which is important because that brand’s, Vicki and all the things that you’re doing and side brands your property, right? But I think it’s important for a lot of the property owners too, to realize yeah, maybe X isn’t your audience of typical people who would go Camping or glamping, right?

But if you train Xs AI and then Grot can answer questions about you, that’s just helpful, right? 

So check the box on Hootsuite or whatever and just send it there too. 

Vicki Jones: Yeah.

Brian Searl: Anyway, that was a little bit off topic, but it was just on the top of my head and you mentioned something. So let’s go to Laura.

Laura, you’re in the UK too. Do we wanna stick in the UK? Is it seven o’clock for you guys? 

Laura Benaggoune: Yes it is. Yeah, I was here at two, but then I realized you were on the East Coast. 

Brian Searl: I’m in Calgary time. Yeah. So I’m two hours behind East. 

Laura Benaggoune: Two hours behind East. Okay. Uhhuh.

I’m Laura. I’ve got my campsite’s called, Welsummer Camping. We started off 20 years ago with a really small, simple campsite. And within I think two years we were moving into glamping. So we had started off with a few bell tents back then. And now we have, I have eight bell tents up right now.

I have five little wooden cabins. I have about five Camping pitches and I’m running a wedding this weekend. We’ve run a couple of retreats. I’m a lot into sort of nature and herbal medicine and I try and keep things pretty real. 

Brian Searl: That’s a good place to be. I’m the same way. Like I eat straight organic food. Like I take a lot of supplements, use essential oils. Everybody thinks I’m crazy 

Laura Benaggoune: uhhuh.

Brian Searl: Hey, I’m healthy and it works, and. 

Laura Benaggoune: Yep.

Brian Searl: I’m still ugly. I haven’t figured out the face thing yet, but I’m working on it. Martin, tell us a little bit about yourself, sir. 

Martin Berrini: Okay. Okay. I am arriving to the hospitality industry, but by chance, because we love travel mainly. My background is a vet. I am a veterinarian. I was born in Argentina, moved to Italy. We lived in Italy 20 years and sales and marketing and corporate companies. Because all our time and our dreams were related to travel, we say with my wife.

When the children were in the university, why not to start a project like living in the jungle, like here in Costa Rica. Now, we have a successful project that is Colina Secreta is a luxury glamping site here in the Caribbean side of Costa Rica at Puerto Rico. Also I own and manage and we sell tents to the hospitality industry through tailor tents.

And now we are working in, let me say entry level project glamping in that we call Glampea is something after the Camping. And we have an amazing group of partners in Chile and Argentina and in Spain. So we want to launch this product as a business lab and we are working very hard on that.

Brian Searl: Awesome. Thank you. Welcome from Costa Rica. Thank you because always one of those countries. It’s on my list to visit. Which was also fascinating to me as I saw, I was looking to the guest list and I saw you got two people from UK, I’m from Canada. I’m American to be clear, migrated to Canada.

But and then Martin from Costa Rica it just came across my mind. I was researching a trip to, we were gonna go to Madera, Portugal in September and then we ended up for some reason wanting to not take a shorter or wanted to take a shorter flight, not hop and, ’cause my girlfriend is a respiratory theorist, didn’t wanna use our vacation.

So we’re gonna go to Dublin ’cause it’s nonstop from Calgary. But in the course of this I don’t know if any of you guys like follow some of the obsessions that I have with AI and all that kind of stuff. But I’m very interested to see how AI, I use it to go in to Chat GPT and I say Hey enough about me from our conversation history.

Help me figure out a really cool, interesting place that I would like to go. Now it knows that I like glamping ’cause I talk about it all the time, camping, stuff like that. I also stay in hotels like I’ve been to Slovenia, I’ve been to Iceland, I’ve been to, but I haven’t traveled extensively. But the typical pattern of behavior is the same, right?

I like forested, hiking, nature, stop in the city for a day or two, whatever else. It fascinates me to see as we go forward into this world, and I don’t wanna talk about this extensively today, but it fascinates me to see how we go forward. If somebody says, I want to take a glamping trip to a really interesting location, what does the AI interpret that to mean?

Will it recommend the UK, because it’s interesting? Will it recommend Costa Rica? Will it recommend somewhere else? Does it change the playing field of if you already know you want to go to a Costa Rica or go to a UK. It’s fascinating to me how things will be surfaced in the future, I guess for consumer discovery.

I think that ends up benefiting a lot of properties in a lot of countries that aren’t rolling off the tip of everybody’s tongue. Even like a Costa Rica though, that’s gotten much more popular in recent years and Argentina. Obviously Italy rolls off people, generally people’s tourism tongues more than an art. Is that fair to say, Martin?

Martin Berrini: Yeah.

Brian Searl: Yeah. So it’s just interesting to me, like I hope that some of these, not that the UK is not undiscovered, right? There are certainly places in the UK outside of some of the larger cities that remain undiscovered in the countryside. That should be surfaced more. But I think that it just leads to a better experience of people discovering all these cool little smaller places that have more, not more culture, different culture. Does that make sense? 

Vicki Jones: There are certain places in the UK that I think AI would recommend above others. It would say, go to Edinburgh, go to London, go to the Lake district, go to these certain places that like us as a glamping site in Somerset.

We don’t fall in any kind of touristy area. So we’ve had to make our site the destination that people want to come to rather than, oh, we’re in a really touristy location like Cornwall or the Lake District, for example. 

Brian Searl: Yeah. I think that’s a flaw of AI right now though, right? I think, and again, I don’t wanna spend even close to a quarter of the show on this, but like I think that a flaw of AI right now is the way that it answers questions outside of the thinking models. Is it just predictive text? And so because more people have written more blogs and more podcasts and more social media content about the big larger cities in the UK or Costa Rica or the United States or anywhere, right?

That it’s gonna default recommend that as a safe spot. I think that gets fixed as it becomes more personal and knows who you are. Like there’s a setting in Chat GPT where you can, I think it’s on by default, but you can turn on memory and it will learn about you, and then you can open, tell me about myself. It’ll blow your mind, right?

But as it knows more about what you prefer, I think it starts to learn what you’re searching for, what you’re interested in. I think those recommendations get more tailored and maybe you don’t get more traffic to the smaller sites in the UK, for example, or the Caribbean side of Costa Rica or whatever. Okay. But maybe get more qualified traffic that will convert higher. 

Martin Berrini: No let me share something. Some of the experience here for us in Costa Rica, for us, it’s almost an everyday tool. Every time that, I guest is asking for a trip to do in Costa Rica, we put inside the data, and we prepare almost every itinerary and travel through Chat GPT.

I was trying to train Chat GPT about my hotel is really stubborn, but it’s not easy but understand who we are. I think, in my opinion also, they read very well. This is a small tip LinkedIn. Because every time that, for example, as you Brian, ask for myself information, and it’s amazing.

All it knows, the other second opportunity is to pay for Chat GPT because you expand the memory. And I think that could be the future also for us. Imagine that we have more than 120 million research every day in AI. So it’s the future. 

Brian Searl: Yeah. I’m excited by it. Like I want my own personal AI and I could build one for myself, right?

But I want it just to be there for everybody and for it to know. All the things that I like in my calendar and my Gmail and to just go out I just wanna say Hey, I wanna plan a trip. Just gonna know my calendar and the availability and what I wanna spend on flights and where I like to stay and it’s just gonna pick the perfect place for me.

And I’ve done that recently. That’s how I landed on Madera for example. ’cause I told it I liked Iceland and Sylvania. It was like, and I wanted somewhere warm this time. And so it landed on Madera, but it’s just interesting to me how some of that stuff works.

Alright, let’s go to glamping. Laura, I wanna start with you. I’m interested ’cause maybe we’ll work ourselves in chronological order here. So we talked with Vicki when she was introducing herself briefly about how the glamping industry in the UK has been more evolved than the United States or Canada, just by very nature of the fact that you guys got a headstart, I think, on it, right?

And so you’ve gone through the wins and the losses and figured out what works and doesn’t work. And obviously there’s different, not types of people, but there’s a different. I don’t even know if it’s different, I can’t even say that. I don’t know the UK enough. There’s a different maybe mindset when it comes to taking a holiday in the UK versus taking a vacation in the United States.

Maybe there isn’t. I don’t know. But when you look at, you said you started yours 20 years ago, right? So we’re looking at 2005? 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah, 2005.

Brian Searl: Long time since high school math. So I just wanted to make sure I was somebody to tell me that was correct. So 2005 I’m interested in this because one, I wanna understand what the glamping industry looked like in the UK back then, and the basics of like, how did you get into it? How did you hear about it? ’cause that feels to me even early for the UK 20 years ago. And I don’t know. 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah. 

Brian Searl: You can correct me and tell me I’m wrong.

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah, I would say we were pretty ahead of the game with it. When we first opened, as interestingly though, my history in camping did originate in America.

So my experience of Camping was forest campsites, like with barbecues and, cook fire campfires and cooking outside. And so I think it was my personal experience that drove me to want to provide a little bit more for people 

Brian Searl: Okay.

Laura Benaggoune: On a campsite. And within the first couple of years we had a lot of good reviews and we gotten some guidebooks and some newspapers.

But in those first couple years, I think we were up against maybe two or three other glamping sites in Kent that were starting to provide bell tents. And then it boomed. And now I think we’re up against about two or 300, probably in Kent.

Brian Searl: A lot.

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah, it was an explosion. But yeah, right back at the beginning and then another, and another, and I think after about six years, we had to have our own bell tents made because the market in bell tents was crazy as well. So we had to, and then we’ll just get a decent bell tent we started buying them from China and we had a big stock and started selling them. So, yeah, we had just had a good entry point, if you like. ‘Cause we were into the tents. So we got decent tents early where other people were really struggling with the quality of the tents, getting that side of it up.

Yeah, I think we were a little bit of ahead. It was a slow thing at first. It was the camping boom, the cool camping boom. I think that started around 2005 and yeah. Yeah, we did. I think we got in early.

Brian Searl: But it is interesting how you got, you talked to your story briefly about how you enjoyed camping regardless of where it was in the United States. Anywhere else, like you had that love of the camping in the outdoors and that led you to your business. And we talk a lot on this show about, many of the owners in the United States and Canada, I’m sure all over the world are saying, I wanna get people in the experience of camping.

Let them enjoy not glamping yet, but even tent camping. And then the whole goal for I think, better part of 20, 30, 40 years here in the United States and Canada has been our goal is to get them into camping so that then they buy an RV and then they’re not necessarily real campers, right? But they’re more likely to come to my private Campground with an RV. And so then we’ve got them into the real lifestyle. They’re committed, they’ve purchased the RV, but I think oftentimes.

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah. Yeah, a hundred percent.

Brian Searl: I think oftentimes we, and that’s a critical component of it, but I think oftentimes we miss that. We really just want them to have a love of the outdoors and nature. Period.

Because we offer tent camping at a lot of campgrounds. We have RVing, we have cabins, we have new glamping accommodations that are popping up now and we just want to foster that love of the outdoors. And that can lead, who knows who that leads, that maybe leads to somebody who buys an RV. That maybe leads to somebody who takes their family glamping every summer. But maybe it leads to somebody like you who starts a business who then fosters like 150 more people every week or month who love the outdoors. So I think that’s interesting to me how we get there and maybe our perspectives need to broaden a little bit about how important just the aspect of the outdoors and enjoying that is, do you agree? 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah, us on our campground, so we’ve moved from to cabins, so I’m still immersing them properly in the outdoors and the sort of the camping the outdoor field. 

Brian Searl: Yeah. And there’s just so much to love about it. So walk me through, like starting this business.

So you started this business in 2005 which I would say and I don’t know, you tell me. Is it harder to start a business in 2005 pre what we come to know as the social media boom, which really started 2011-12 ish, for businesses on Facebook, is it easier to start it pre that boom without all the reach, but because you don’t have as much competition and it’s easier to advertised through your traditional means, like mail, postcards, stuff like that? Or is it harder and if you could go back, you would want social media? 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah, no, I think I would definitely prefer it. Like it was, I think being so saturated with, one with, all the other sites that have popped up, but saturated in that people can find a myriad, a million of different places and experiences now that they can compare to where before we could very much define this is what we offer and we could reach our ideal customer so much easier.

Whereas now I have to reach that customer amongst, one in a million. Yeah, I definitely would prefer that traditional means of getting in a few decent reviews and newspapers. It was a lot easier back then.

Brian Searl: Walk us through, I’m curious like, ’cause it’s been like a long time, right?

We say time moves so quickly. 20 years is not really that long. 25 years ago, Jeff Bezos was packing books in his garage and Amazon didn’t exist. We forget how not long ago that was but what were some of the things you did to build your business from a marketing advertising standpoint, pre-social media?

Laura Benaggoune: It’s never really been my strong point. I think in the beginning I think I focused a lot on the brand. We were really at the beginning of having a decent website, even back then.

Brian Searl: Yeah.

Laura Benaggoune: So I did focus a lot on the brand and the website. I wasn’t very strong in SEO, it was mainly the guidebook. I was winging it, really. I

Brian Searl: We were all winging it. I’m winging it.

Laura Benaggoune: Guide books, they came to us, the newspapers came to us. I think it was just being able to express a brand and a lifestyle and an image of what I wanted it to be and to look like.

And I think that’s really where I got it started properly because I was really focused on having it. The way I wanted it to look and the way I wanted it to be seen. And it wasn’t until, I don’t know, five or six years later, we got on a few listing sites, but I’ve never paid for any advertising. Never paid for any advertising. 

Brian Searl: And I think that’s the reason I ask you that question is because I think that you’re probably a better marketer than you give yourself credit for. Like certainly you’ve learned over the last 20 years a lot, right? Back then you were probably, as by your own admittance, right? You said you, maybe this wasn’t one of your strong suits.

But I think that some of what you’re saying holds true today, even on social media as people look to market their parks on, in the noise, as you described, rightfully completely true. Like it’s hard to stand out. But I think it’s hard to stand out because everybody’s trying to copy everybody else.

Everybody’s trying to do the same, the thing that will please the algorithm that will get them the most reach instead of putting on their brand face and showing exactly how they want their property to be envisioned and who they wanna reach and who they’re for. And that brand story, not for all people, but for some people, gets lost in the effort to just chase as much reach as you possibly can.

So I think it’s interesting that by stepping back, we can maybe see like maybe there’s a path forward here too. 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah. The vision, I think keeping to the vision all the way through has been the only thing that’s really saved us in the noise, like you said.

Brian Searl: So what sets you apart from all the other two, 300 people in Kent now?

And we do have your, if you can share, sorry, have the website pulled up. We’ll share it while you’re looking. We can look through pictures. Yeah.

Laura Benaggoune: Cool. It’s small. It’s really intimate. When people come and it’s very personal. We only have 50, 60 people max when we’re tops, full.

We have a wedding this weekend. It’s 60 people and we’re always there. So we are always out on the front. We have people that come back and back and they become our friends. So some weekends we have 90% returns and we know everybody and and we keep things changing and, they’ve grown with us.

So I think it’s the community, maybe, that’s what steps. Yeah. Maybe it’s the community that we’ve created.

Brian Searl: So that’s another thing too that interests me and Jessica scrolling through your website here, if there’s anything you wanted to click on, just let her know for photos or pages or anything you wanna highlight.

But I think that’s, the community is really interesting to me just because I’m a marketer by default, I guess maybe more of an AI guy now. But this is where I spent most of my career in the camping, glamping industry is marketing advertising. And I look at some of the properties who, for the same reasons we talked about social, are not focusing as much on the experience of what they offer.

More so than the, I’m gonna put some accommodations here, and maybe I’m by a nice place or near a nice place like a national park or an amusement park or a lake or a river or something like that. And that’s gonna be my thing that sets me apart. But if I just have nice accommodations, that’s enough to get me by.

And I think that is quickly changing and being flipped on its head. First, I don’t think it was ever like that, but there were a whole lot more people who were willing to, especially in RVs, as you drive around a much larger country like the United States or Canada. You’re willing to make that trade off.

But I think that, it’s interesting to me how, if you bring home that experience, if you focus on your community, like you’re talking about the type of person who stays there, then you can foster that loyalty. And I think some of that loyalty gets lost, the same reason it gets lost on social media.

It gets lost in regular marketing or when you’re talking to your guests because you’re just trying to get to the next 20 or 50 or a hundred people that are gonna come through your RV park or tent camping or glamping. And maybe that’s not the best way to build a long-term, viable, stable audience of business.

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah.

Brian Searl: What do you think? 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah, I think that is what you know, has created sustainability for us because we have. You’ve just gone past the kids there. So that little boy is now we just saw up there. There he is. He now comes as a young adult. So he comes without his parents.

Brian Searl: Does he get irritated that you have a picture of him in a tiger seat on the website still?

Laura Benaggoune: No, he loves it. He loves it. Yeah. So yeah, I think that’s it. We have fostered that kind of the way that people feel comfortable. It’s not often that you find a place where you wanna keep going back to. Oh, let’s go somewhere new and so when they come here, they don’t leave the site, they don’t go off visiting the area.

Not as much as there is stuff to visit. But they don’t, they just come, they stay, they hang out, they come to the bar. They chat to us. They don’t often go out. They might go out for a walk, but, they’re around. We’re around. It’s the experience that we enjoy together.

Brian Searl: Yeah, and I think not to slate anybody, like I think there’s a large number of campgrounds all over the world in the United States, Canada, everywhere else who are cognizant of their community and who build good relationships with their campers. I’m just not sure. It’s with the intent of, I’m gonna see you 5, 6, 7, 8 times, or I’m gonna grow up with your kid.

Like some of that, right? The season of the long term campers in the United States who are staying for a month or two or the entire summer. But I think there’s probably a lot more that could be done if you were able to tell your story and share your experience and build relationships with more people to have more of a stable audience long term.

What do you think, Vicki? 

Vicki Jones: Yeah, so we are really similar. We’ve even, this is our ninth season, we’ve still seen children grow up with the site and like a huge part of running a glamping site is customer service, isn’t it? It’s hospitality, your customer facing. And I think there are a lot of places that don’t give any kind of personal touch.

And I’ve spoken to a lot of different site owners about this sort of thing, they’re like, oh, guests don’t wanna see us. They just want to have the key left and they don’t wanna be disturbed. And, it’s their holiday and our experience is completely different.

It’s that people really want to be greeted. They want to know where everything is. They want to be able to be shown where to find the toilet or the showers or where the camp fire is or the play areas. They really like that interaction. I think that’s why we get good reviews is because the guests get to know you.

And that’s part of the reason we started the YouTube channel as well, was so that the guests felt like they knew us and our family before they came and stayed. So that then it’s more like you are visiting friends than it is, you’re just coming to a kind of faceless, glamping site that you don’t know anything about their story.

And it is all marketing is about telling a story. And so if you can have all these different points along the way, all the different social media that on your website and everything that’s telling the story that the guests can get invested in, then I think that really makes a big difference.

Brian Searl: And you’re not wrong. You’re not wrong. You don’t need me to tell you that. But we used to do this for, like, when we, when I started Insider Perks 2009 ish really 2011 was 10. 11 was the first time we started doing Camping, glamping, stuff like that. We were working with KOA at the time, going around to their different parks.

But before I started doing all the marketing services for the campgrounds, we were producing videos. And so we would go to, there’s one that like, I distinctly remember Twin Falls, Jerome KOA, who’s just south of me in Idaho. I’m in Calgary. And we went around back then, this is 2012, 13, something like that.

And we took the owner and we went to all the local attractions and, said, Hey, I’m Oscar from the Twin Falls Drone KOA, and created so many YouTube videos with so many different attractions that were personalized that said, Hey, come to the area, stay with us. Yes, call to actions, but let me show you around my town.

Let me show you all the things there is to do. And the amount of people that just like you said, would come in and say, oh, it’s Oscar from the videos, or whatever else, right? 

That just gives that immediate, warm, welcoming effect of you are already not family maybe, but friends. 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah. 

Brian Searl: On your way to family, hopefully, right? Yeah. I think some of that gets lost. 

Vicki Jones: I think people are worried to put themselves in front of the camera or have their face on social media and you can hide behind a glamping site. ’cause you can put all your pretty pictures that you’ve taken of the domes or the bell tents or anything.

But I think putting yourself out there is hard, but it’s definitely worth it. And nobody really cares what you look like. Nobody is worried about whether you’ve got makeup on or you look perfect or anything like that. They just want.

Brian Searl: Look at me. I can be on camera if I can conquer it. Anybody can. Sorry, go ahead. 

Vicki Jones: Yeah, so like when we’re vlogging now, I’m there showing people that, like I’m pulling a dead bunny out from underneath a dome. Like it’s not anything pretty, but it’s really authentic. 

Brian Searl: I bet you could build a niche audience for people who would want to actually see if there is a dead bunny under there.

If you need, remember there’s niche audiences for everybody. I’m just saying like there is, I’m not saying you always, you should face them or it’s good business. I’m just saying there’s a niche audience for everything.

Why do you think there’s a perception out there and maybe there isn’t as big in the UK as there is over here in North America, why do you think there’s a perception that guests don’t want to interact with the staff? 

Vicki Jones: I dunno, I can’t get my head around it. And it it all stemmed from our first ever glamping trip. We thought, oh, we might start a glamping site. We better go and actually do some glamping, otherwise we’re not gonna have a clue what we were doing.

So we went and stayed in a yurt. I was really heavily pregnant and we arrived. There wasn’t anybody to tell us where to go. We just followed a sign, found the yurt, the key was in the door. There was no toilet or anything there. And being heavily pregnant, that’s the first thing you wanna know is where’s the toilet?

I went to try and find somebody and they’re like, oh yeah, it’s just up there. So then, and it was just miles away. And so that whole experience was like, oh my goodness, if we are gonna do this, I want to be greeting the people as soon as they arrive, show them absolutely everything they need to see, be sending out information.

Like we’ve got the touch day digital guide. So we send them out. We didn’t do that 10 years ago, but we send them out a digital guidebook so they can have a look beforehand as to, what there is and where everything is. We’ve got a virtual tour so people can watch the whole thing and sometimes I’m showing people around and they’re like, oh yeah, we saw that on the tour.

So I’m doubly doing it, but at least when you are doing it in person, then they really get to know the site and you as a person as well. And you can have really lovely chats and, the other thing is sitting around a campfire with people, that is the time when people tell you, oh, it’d be really good if we could have this or. 

Brian Searl: Yeah.

Vicki Jones: These are different ways of improving. But I haven’t got to grips with why lots of sites. I dunno whether it’s come from the kind of short term vacation rental market where you are a proper cottage or a house and there’s a key safe and you don’t check anybody in. It’s all just ready for you.

So I wonder whether that’s that kind of traditional vacation rental then went to glamping and people had this idea that you don’t need to check people in, they can just do it all themselves and you don’t need to talk to anybody.

Brian Searl: It’s easier, right? 

Vicki Jones: Yeah. Oh yeah. Much easier.

Brian Searl: Yeah. I wonder, it would be interesting to see, I don’t know if there’s a way we could study this and get the data. I’ll have to pick Scott Bahr’s brain. He does the KOA North American Camping reports and we do a lot of data work together.

But it would be interesting to see if it’s the type of conversations that people are used to having. And I think that varies not just by country, but by location and type of resort and what you’re offering and all those kinds of things, and what your goals are, and what your brand is and all that. But I wonder if the perception came from just the, if I have to talk to somebody, then maybe that means I’m gonna have to wait in line to check in or wait in a row of RVs at a campground that’s busy, or the person is just going to read me a bunch of rules and tell me things that I can figure out on my own.

And so I think if there was a larger perception of value being given. Or personality being given or Hey look, there’s this little quaint little pizza shop around the corner that serves great coffee in the morning that you never would’ve known before. You should definitely go there and sit at the picnic tables by the roadside and have your coffee in the morning.

Like that kind of useful stuff. I think if people were more accustomed to getting that, I think the perception of that flips because more people start to want that. Does that make sense? Or articulate that they want that. 

Vicki Jones: Yeah, definitely. And I appreciate it. We’ve only got the seven accommodation structures to check people in and sometimes yeah, everyone does arrive at 3:30 and then I’ll have another member of staff on to then do that same check-in process so that we do it for every single guest.

We’ve had guests arrive at quarter past one in the morning. And we’ve still got up and checked them in because especially in the dark, I can’t have somebody trying to figure out where to go and what to do. In the middle of the night, in the dark. So yeah, I appreciate it must be harder when you’ve got big RV parks on and more than say 10 structures.

But if that’s what you want to do with your business, and if you really want that extra guest experience, then you will find a way to make sure you speak to every guest. 

Brian Searl: Yeah. Even through, even through technology. I have in my notes here that Laura was gonna talk a little bit about how to use AI and tech in the off grid experience.

What were you gonna talk about, Laura? Does that correct notes or did somebody just make that up for me?

Laura Benaggoune: No, I did mention that it was more, I was interested in how that could, I was hoping if someone else would spark some ideas on how potentially I could use AI in the off grid situation. Because you sound like you might have some ideas on that. 

Brian Searl: I wanna make sure that we get to Martin. I’m giving enough time so I don’t wanna talk about AI too much. And I know I keep saying that and then I like talk about AI and I bring AI up.

Sorry. It’s a casualty of just, that’s one of my loves and passions and things like that.

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah. I’m totally with you. It’s just we’re so totally off grid that, I would like to be able to introduce some tech somehow, but without losing .

Brian Searl: Yeah, the reason I bring that situation, pivoting from Vicki was like, I think Vicki, when you’re talking about if there’s a large resort, if you truly want to be that hospitable experience, there are ways that you can do it. Even if you’re just filming a video that plays on people that says Hey, I’m the owner. Welcome to your site. I’m sorry I couldn’t be there with you personally. But as you can see, we’re a really big resort with lots of things to do and lots of experiences to have. So I just wanna walk you through it, right?

Even that little, is it as good as people in person? Of course not. Is it a good medium, middle ground between that and nothing except a piece of paper and here drive to your site?

Probably. But it depends on who you are and what you’re after and what your brand is and all those kinds of things. And then we lost Laura. I was just gonna talk to Laura about AI, so she keeps dropping off. There she is. She’s back.

Yeah, I think, again, I want to get to Martin, but I think the key with all technology, whether it’s AI or anything else that you’re talking about, is to incorporate it in such a way that it enhances the guest experience without taking away from the natural camping, glamping, sitting under the stars, emotional outdoor experience that we’re all trying to drive for people.

‘Cause that’s the number one priority. That’s why we’re different than a hotel. And I think that there are ways, we had these pushbacks, like we have AI chatbots that we offer, that we program for, parks. We had this pushback in the beginning where I don’t want, I don’t want more technology.

And my instant answer is will that technology is gonna get them their answers faster, get you booked faster and get them outside faster. Isn’t that what you want? Oh yeah. I guess I do. And so there’s all kinds of different ways that you just have to be thoughtful about it. I was having this conversation with Scott Bahr, I mentioned him earlier, we talk a bit, once a week usually.

But I was having this conversation with him about like, where’s that border between as we move toward all these crazy things coming, robots and drones delivering pizzas, and who knows what’s gonna come right. As we move toward that future. Where’s the line for you? Because him and I are both like outdoor hikers.

We like to hike to the big waterfalls and sit on the rocks and be immersed in nature and all that kind of stuff. And I said, Scott, would you like ever have a pizza delivered to you at the foot of the waterfall so you could just sit there and look at the waterfall for 30 more minutes instead of having to leave ’cause you’re hungry?

And he’s no, I probably wouldn’t do that. I’m like, I probably would. But like it depends on the experience. Is the drone quiet? Is it bothering other people? Does that then encourage 50 other people who don’t clean up after themselves to leave a bunch of trash there? So I don’t know, I think it requires much more thought and pontification and use case analysis of every individual thing.

But there are for sure ways that you can use AI and tech to enhance the experience, I think without taking away from what we’re all trying to provide, which is a little disconnection, I think, right? 

Alright. Martin? 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah, I was, yeah.

Brian Searl: Go. Oh, go Laura, please. Laura. Yeah, please. 

Laura Benaggoune: No, I was just picturing, a bot that was gonna accompany you along your day and your wellbeing journey and, I don’t know how I could bring it in, but trying to just accompany the guests through their day with some star gazing guides or, wellbeing guides that would.

Brian Searl: I think they’re gonna do that themselves. You’re gonna get me distracted again. I’m gonna force myself not to.

Laura Benaggoune: You don’t need to prompt. 

Brian Searl: I think humanoid robots and robot companions are a whole lot closer than people think. The only bottleneck is gonna be manufacturing. You can go look on YouTube at some of these companies that have ’em built already, but I think we’re gonna get to a point where the humans just travel with them.

Especially if you look at an elder care bot or something like that, that can be with an elderly person 24/7 and take care of them, if they don’t have a human to travel with them. Those elder care bots are gonna have to come to clamping and glam resorts and on vacation with them.

So there has to be a thought around that from the, do they need their own tent to sleep in? Do they need a charging dock? Do they need a, right? So it’s gonna be a fun world. I hope that there’s a way, I trust and I believe that there’s a way that we can balance that very carefully and not take away the beauty of the outdoor experience.

Martin, let’s go to Costa Rica. 

Martin Berrini: Yeah, I take a couple of notes that you were saying guys. When Laura say that you never invest too much on advertising. And let me say that the core of your business was that is a super nice place, but your place was born 20 years ago.

I think that if you don’t have a huge base of customers that follow you today is very much complicated and difficult. That’s why when Brian ask how do you feel about the it was different to run a business 20 years ago. And now I think that it’s mandatory today. That is my take.

Brian Searl: Yeah, it absolutely is. 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah. It’s dangerous to not go with it. 

Brian Searl: To not, sorry, I didn’t hear what you said, Laura. Build with it? 

Laura Benaggoune: To not go with the new, to not move with the markets and how, and the new tools that we have. It’s really dangerous not to go with it. 

Brian Searl: And yeah, but it’s also, 

Laura Benaggoune: To try and count on the old ways.

Brian Searl: I think it’s equally dangerous to forget about how the old ways of thinking things were done sometimes too, as we’ve covered and talked about on this podcast already, right? I think it’s dangerous to lose that personal connection with your guests because then by its very nature is one less reason for them to be loyal to you, because who knows when there’s another glamping site out of two or 300 built in can that has the exact same type of bell tents.

But if they know Laura, and they’ve been coming to Laura and they used to be a kid and she won’t take down the picture on the website of them entire costume then they’re like, all right we’ll come see you, Laura. Maybe that’s one more chance to get ’em to take down that picture of me in the Tiger costume on the website that she thinks I love. Sorry. I’m just kidding.

So Martin, tell us about what you have going on in Costa Rica from Argentina to Italy. Did I get that right order? Argentina, Italy to Costa Rica. Is that the right order?

Martin Berrini: Yes. It’s Argentina, Italy, Costa Rica. That is the order. Mainly we moved to Italy because what I said before, not the love for travels.

So now in Costa Rica, we are based here, I am stay at Colina Secreta glamping. That is our first project. The second project was Taylor Tenth. That I think that you are looking now. And now we are working with my partners from South America, Latin America in a sort of entry level campaign.

Glampea La Fortuna, let me say Glampea is a quite new project. We are very motivated about to push in the project because we really believe that it’s very good. Because from my point of view, if you think about the guest of the people that arrive the customer of glamping they arrive in two ways.

You have a guest that arrive, let me say top down, that arrive there from the luxury hotels and they want some experience to live with luxury on the jungle or everywhere in the desert. And you have another kind of a guest, let me say a sort of bottom up. That they came from glamping, from camping, sorry.

And I think that you have two different population, at least when you have a place like Colina Secreta that we have. So I think that there is a great opportunity for glampea to train, to teach all this camping that they want to make the move to glamping. And they don’t know, maybe they don’t have the tools.

They don’t know exactly how to do. So the idea is to create a brand to push all these people that they don’t know exactly how to do it in the future. So glampea is mainly that, it’s a triple impact project. We believe very strongly in the social impact, the economical impact, the environmental impact.

So we are teaching people that is entering in the project about that. 

Brian Searl: So talk to me about your site in, you have a site in Costa Rica, you’re building a site or you have a site? 

Martin Berrini: Yeah, we have a partner, speaking about just glampea, right? 

Brian Searl: You can talk about whatever you want, man. 

Martin Berrini: Yeah. Yes, I am asking out.

Brian Searl: Whatever you want. It’s like a family friendly show, but mostly whatever you want. 

Martin Berrini: No, don’t worry. Sorry. Sometimes I need to ask you again because it is not my first language, English. No, what I said we are at Colina Secreta Glamping. You can find it there. Colina Secreta.

That is my main project. Another project, maybe there is a sort of confusion. Colina Secreta Glamping is a luxury glamping hotel in the Caribbean side of Costa Rica. And Glampea is an entry level glamping project that was born with the idea to help camping owners to enter in the business because I think that we can help on that. Also with the team of the guys of Glampea, we work also as advisor, as a advertising agency.

So this is our first one in Costa Rica, Glampea La Fortuna, that are the belt tents that I remember that some of you girls say about the quality. These are super nice a strong work to find the right suppliers in China. That is part of my work on Taylor Ten. That is my other business. So very busy time.

Brian Searl: If there’s another website you want us to show, please send it in the chat. That’s just all I had looked up before the show you can send it in the private chat if you wants to pull it up.

But I’m curious. And I think it’s different in the UK probably. But I’m curious to hear all of your guys’ thoughts because I don’t really know, but especially in Costa Rica, I think, this is my question.

We’ve had a lot of conversations recently with owners as the economy has changed a little bit in the United States and we all have our opinions and where it’s going and not going, we’re really globally with inflation. But there’s been a lot of behavioral shifts in the United States over the last few years to people not buying as big of rigs to buying, smaller vans and class A’s or class C’s that have typically been more popular in I think Europe.

And there have been a shift from maybe some of the parks this year, especially who are marketing to more transient people, to those who are staying a little bit longer term because that demographic has switched. I’m curious as we see some of these parks in the United States switch toward maybe attracting more locals who are coming out for the weekend or wanna stay a couple months or in the northeast, near Boston or New York are living in these areas versus traveling cross country. 

Do you see the same in Costa Rica or is it mostly foreigners who are traveling to Costa Rica to stay in place?

Martin Berrini: Yes. Yeah. To give you an idea, we have more than 80% of after, of our guests at Colina Secreta than arrive from Europe and USA. That is our main activity. Later we have another 20% that is local people, Costa Rican people that normally camping is not that frequent here in Costa Rica.

I don’t know why. Maybe the weather, the rain. So we are receiving people that they arrive from luxury hotels, on very nice hotels that they want to have experience in the jungle that way we have a lot, they are so important for us because we have clear seasons separated. So Costa Rican people is all year long here, and we are working also with them.

We don’t forget them. We need to make targeted campaigns for that because it’s a different population, it’s different people, different language. But I think it’s very important. But I’ve been in UK many times and we don’t have a camping or glamping movement so strong than in UK.

Brian Searl: Is it similar over in the UK? Is it mostly locals you guys are attracting at your properties or. 

Vicki Jones: Yeah. I would say that 80% of people come from over an hour’s drive. And I can probably count on one hand how many foreign visitors we’d had to our site. We just get lots of local, yeah, from nearest cities.

So they’ll come because they have a very small garden. Bear in mind, our houses in the UK are fairly small, very small gardens. And so a lot of the time the kids want to go camping. The parents aren’t particularly enthusiastic about camping and so they want to try glamping. So we get a lot of first time glampers, but yeah, very few that are from overseas. It’s all just yeah, local generally. 

Martin Berrini: It’s absolutely different. Imagine that this, what I said before is people that came from the base, from camping, a sort of button up and it’s people locally. That’s why it’s sometimes it’s complicated to aggregate data of number of amping everywhere because it’s so important to understand who is your customer from where your com, your customer, your guest is arriving. And that’s all.

Just a little bit more to what you say, Brian, that glamping is different to auto, right, before. In my opinion, we as a glamping owners, we have, we need to offer much more than tent on a bed. We are creating experience, so it’s so important to manage our, let me say providers, our external stakeholders. These people, that is so important for us. So we make a strong work also to choose the right people that will offer the experiences, let me say, to operate or rafting, serve classes cooking lessons and so on. Because it’s more than universe, glamping much more than a hotel. I am agree. 

Brian Searl: Yeah. And I think there’s ways to do that. There’s a common argument that’s not incorrect, but incomplete, I think that once you get to a certain size, like in Vicki’s size, I think you said you had nine locations or seven?

Vicki Jones: Seven. Seven, yeah. 

Brian Searl: Yeah. Seven. Like I think it’s, there’s a common refrain that’s not incorrect, like I said, of it’s much easier to show seven people, all the hospitality and all the personalization and get to know them than it is 400 or a thousand or whatever.

And that’s not wrong, but it’s also incomplete for the reasons that we talked about technology, but also just for the idea that like, this has been done already. Like you can’t say it’s impossible if somebody’s already done it. And if you look at a luxury hotel resort that yes, maybe they have more staff, but you should be able to have more staff at 400 or a thousand sites too, right?

Maybe not as much because they’re charging a little bit more at a hotel or resort. Maybe you’re underpricing yourself. But like I think at that point then, there’s clear evidence that they can curate those activities. They can curate those experiences. They can make that memorable stuff.

I used to stay before IHG, Intercontinental Hotels, ruined my beloved Kimpton brand. I used to stay at Kimpton everywhere. Every hotel was different. They only had 60 of them, but they had 60 and they were still able to accomplish that. There’s very few Campground glamping brands that have more than 60 locations, as it stands today in 2025.

So I think it’s possible is what I’m trying to say. I think there’s more thought and more care that needs to go into it. And again, like, I just think that some of that has gotten lost in the name of, and maybe not as much, and I don’t, maybe as I keep saying maybe not as much in the UK. I don’t know that, just one of those things that rolls off my tongue, but it feels like it started to change here in the US more when some, and there are great investment companies that do not do this, but some of the investment companies came in and it became a little bit more about the dollar than it was used to. And it’s hard to quantify a margin on greeting your guests like it is there.

We all know it’s there, but it’s hard to quantify it on a spreadsheet, right? I don’t know. Hopefully the whole industry can go back toward the toward the Vicki’s and the Laura’s and the Martin’s.

Laura Benaggoune: I must add in the winter. We only run our cabins in the winter and we do a lot of self check-ins. But I think with, just with the messaging and with the experience has clearly been curated by myself or by our team and what the experience that they have and the feel the things that we offer around the site, even if they’ve checked in without seeing us, the whole sort of range of messaging that’s happened beforehand.

I can still offer that. I can still offer that personal service without even being there. I’ve done it from France.

Brian Searl: Yeah, for sure.

Laura Benaggoune: And I’ve got five people in cabins and they’re all like, oh, Laura’s a great host, but I wasn’t even there. So that’s an interesting.

Brian Searl: Yeah, it goes back to, I don’t know if they said the same phrase in the UK, but when I was growing up, like it’s a thought that counts. 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah. 

Brian Searl: All right, we only got a couple minutes left here. Do we have any final thoughts? Martin, you wanna start? 

Martin Berrini: Oh, for example we have a challenge with Glampea because how to manage a winter time, the cold what the people said, what is the feeling. Your guests arrive also in, in winter which is the occupancy rate, summer, winter. I am curious to understand and to have a chat on that very brief if you want it. Big key.

Brian Searl: Laura, do you have any thoughts? 

Laura Benaggoune: Do you run in winter, Vicki? 

Vicki Jones: No, we close in the winter, so we go through to mid-October and then reopen for Easter.

Lots of reasons. We are on the Summerset level, so it is just mud basically in the winter. So we prioritize guest experience over, we could open and we could make some more money, but I would hate to put someone in a position where they just hated the experience because they were muddy and cold and wet.

Martin Berrini: Okay. Okay.

Vicki Jones: So we just close and then reopen for Easter and it’s harder closing because you have to shut the whole site down. You have to drain all the water system so then nothing freezes. You lose momentum with the marketing. So you really have to keep on top of it. But yeah, for our site particularly, it’s the best for the guests.

Brian Searl: Laura? 

Laura Benaggoune: For us it was a big bonus being able to run through winter. It just wasn’t enough for us to, we’re small enough that running just in the summer wasn’t quite enough. But yeah, we’ve learned to embrace that mud and the rain and we tuck people into their cabins with their log burners and, it is a difficult balance to make sure they have a nice experience even in the wet and the rain and the mud.

Brian Searl: In the stereotype of the UK, the same as Vancouver and Canada. It just rains and it’s muddy all the time? 

Laura Benaggoune: Yeah. Yeah, pretty much.

Brian Searl: So you just have the cold in the winter then Vicki, there’s this one thing that you had worry about. 

Laura Benaggoune: Nothing better than the long fire in the. 

Brian Searl: Martin, is there winter in Costa Rica isn’t?

Martin Berrini: No. The point is that I have not just Colina Secreta. We are building this business lab that is Glampea, it means after camping. So we are making them the possibility to have access to very nice tents, belt tents to have some support in advertisement, in technology processes and so on.

And we are going to open some at least three or four glamping sites in Argentina and Chile. And we had a very strong winter, so the idea is always you have to think about and to balance. It’s convenience, to close winter or if we want to have more earnings, we have to take it winter open.

So it depends of the place, depend of your latitude in Argentina or Chile or Peru. But in countries, for example, it is not easy to, let me say no five people, but have employees just part-time. So we are working on that on Glampea and so that’s why it was my question.

Brian Searl: Alright, any final thoughts? We gotta wrap up here. We’re a little bit over. I wanna make sure we’re cognizant of everybody’s time. But Martin, any final thoughts and where can they learn more about Glampea?

Martin Berrini: Sorry?

Brian Searl: Any final thoughts and where can they learn more about what you’re

Martin Berrini: Yeah, no, I think it’s yes. In the last 20 years glamping grows very steady and I think that it will grow again. But everyone is using glamping the word glamping, right? As a marketing, right? And I think that the world of glamping is under threat, is under risk because everyone say, this is my glamping. This is my glamping.

And I notice a shift, for example, in some big luxury hotel that they are shifting to a luxury camp. So the idea is to help all this Camping that they want to make to go ahead and help them in the process. It’s mainly as the objective of the, that, that project. 

Brian Searl: And where can they find out more about Glampea?

Martin Berrini: Sorry?

Brian Searl: What’s your website? Where can they learn more about? 

Martin Berrini: Glampea is, we are online just as a main page, but we are working on the project. This is, it’s a business lab. We are just starting six months ago. 

Brian Searl: Okay. Congratulations. We’ll look forward to checking back in with you and see how things are going.

Martin Berrini: Okay.

Brian Searl: Vicki, where can they learn more about Tractors and Cream and any final thoughts? 

Vicki Jones: Yeah, so we are yeah, if you just put in Tractors and Cream into a Google search, you’ll find all our socials and yeah, we’d love for you to check us out on YouTube. We’ve got five years worth of videos of us building the site, building domes vlogging the season. So at the moment I’m vlogging like every single day, what happens during a busy summer season.

So if you’re thinking about starting a glamping site, it’s quite useful to know, like whether you are cut out for the lifestyle business that it is, rather than just thinking about, oh, it sounds really, the amount of people you probably get it that say oh, you’ve got the most amazing job. I’d love to start a little glamping sign myself. 

Brian Searl: Everybody wants to retire and own a Campground over here.

Vicki Jones: Yeah. So we’ll have a look at the YouTube channel and then you can see if it’s definitely something that you really wanna do.

Martin Berrini: Yeah. Yeah. 

Vicki Jones: I’m always happy to chat to people. I love connecting with other glamping site owners, so yeah, I would love for you to get in touch on any of the platforms. 

Brian Searl: Thank you for being here, Vicki. I appreciate it. We just lost Laura, we just lost Laura, who’s, I was gonna say goodbye, but. We’ll see if she pops back in. I don’t know where she went, but alright, thank you guys for being here.

Hopefully Laura will show up, if not Laura, from Welsummer Camping. What was her website again? welsummercamping.com with one L for those of you who are in North America and spell things weird. United States we tend to do the UK English in Canada as well. So welsummercamping.com

Thanks for being here, Laura, sorry we lost you at the end. To Martin and Vicki, thanks for being here as well. I think we had a pretty good show, pretty good discussion other than the kind of weird tangents I went off on AI once in a while. Thanks for indulging me and it was great to learn both about more of your businesses and hope to see you guys in the future.

If you guys aren’t sick and tired of hearing of me, for everybody who’s watching the show, I’ll be hosting another podcast in 55 minutes called Outwired with Scott Bahr. We’re gonna delve into the future of campgrounds, how things are gonna look in 10, 20, 30 years with robots and drones and all kinds of cool stuff.

And if not, we’ll see you next week on another episode of MC Fireside Chats. Take care guys. We’ll see you later.

Vicki Jones: Thank you.

Martin Berrini: Thank you so much.