MC Fireside Chats – March 29th, 2023

Brian: Welcome everybody to another episode of MC Fireside Chats. My name’s Brian Searl with Insider Perks. We are missing Kara today. She’s in another board meeting. I feel like she does so much for the industry that she doesn’t [00:01:00] even really need to host the show anymore, but we would miss her. If she didn’t. Just me going alone today.

But we thankfully have three extra guests here that are happy to join us on our weird kind of week five episode. That normally doesn’t happen except for, I think two or three times a year when that happens. And, we have an extra week and a month. Super excited to welcome. Kay, from Outerly we got Chandler from SkillAbove RvTesters, and Mike and Melissa Crow from Mitten Getaways Glamping.

And we’re gonna just kinda let them talk about their companies a little bit. But first do you guys wanna introduce yourself? Who wants to go first here? Don’t be shy. 

Kay: I can go. Hello everyone. My name is Kay Rodriguez. I am the founder and CEO of a company called Outerly. Outerly is rooted in this idea that we can beat loneliness with nature.

Every single city in the entire country, in the entire world has nature spaces, but oftentimes they are underutilized. Whereas we have lots and lots of people over overflowing at places like Acadia or the Grand Canyon or Zion National Park. And so our goal is to help [00:02:00] connect people in cities, to local places, to go outside as well as to each other so that they can go outside in real life with other people and develop communities around the outdoors.

Brian: Sounds like a noble goal. Thank you. Kay. Chandler, you wanna go? 

Chandler: Yes. So I am the founder and owner of SkillAbove RvTesters. We have seen that there is a need for tech tools, so tools for owners and for technicians that work on RVs. And so we have designed up a handful of tools and we have a whole list of consumer products that we plan on building to make the RV experience better.

Brian: Awesome. Thank you Chandler Mike and Melissa last but not least. Of course. 

Mike: Hi everyone. My name’s Mike Crowe and this is my wife Melissa. We are the founders of Mitten Getaway’s Glamping Company. We are aspiring glamping resort operators in eastern [00:03:00] Michigan currently trying to procure land for our resort.

Brian: All right. So let’s let’s start there, right? So let’s look at how first, why Michigan? Do you live here or live there? I should say it. . Yep. 

Mike: Yep. We’re lifelong Michiganders. 

Brian: So you wanted to be really close to the glamping property, so in case anybody had problems they could knock on your door late at night.

Is that the idea? Or ? 

Melissa: That’s our hope. , 

Mike: Yeah. As a matter of fact, we wanna live on the resort that we operate. 

Brian: It’s brave, definitely braver than I could ever do. But tell us a little bit about your adventure. Where, how did you get into the glamping space and decide that this was the path for you guys?

Mike: Definitely unexpectedly. We enjoy nature and getting outside. Doing trips around the state with our girls and equally by ourselves too, sometimes . But yeah, we had been looking for a home and we came across a large parcel of land, 176 acres of unimproved farmland that was beautiful and secluded and quiet.

And we said we’re not crazy enough to build a home here on 176 acres by ourselves, but maybe if [00:04:00] we can land hack or monetize it in some way that could work out so we could enjoy the nature. And we didn’t know much about glamping at the time or that there was a whole association behind it but we uh, eventually learned that there was, and our initial idea was to have a event barn on the property and some overnight stays. And we later realized that the peace and seclusion that we wanted would be interfered with by an event barn. That’s how, where we got married and we know that they can be a little noisy on weekend.

So we nixed that idea and. Went with just overnight stays so that people could get out and experience the peace and seclusion that we saw there. And unfortunately that property sold before we had a chance at it, but it inspired the idea. And now we are on property 15 ish looking at trying to secure it meeting with the sellers, in fact today to see if we can make a deal.

Brian: That’s awesome. So how does that, so how do you, how does that all go into it, right? Ob obviously I’m in this industry, I’m involved in Camping and glamping and all that kind of stuff, and I remember went [00:05:00] out and attempted to purchase a piece of land cuz we’ve already discussed some kind of a coward when it comes to people knocking on my door in the middle of the night

But what goes through the process of what do you look for when you’re looking for, obviously peace and seclusion as you talked about, right? But what are the check boxes that a piece of land must have for you guys?

Melissa: A few of ’em. One of ’em was we wanted a water feature. Whether it be a pond or a river. 

And then also we didn’t want a lot of houses around it, obviously . And then there were… 

Mike: W e definitely wanted those, we wanted enough space for there to be things to do on the property as well enough room for trails to at least get in a couple miles for hiking, snowshoeing, cross-country skiing, that type of thing.

We should mention we’re going for a year-round glamping resort so people can experience this thing called winter glamping as well. 

And yeah, those are, I think that about covers it. 

Brian: I’m all for it. Like winter, like I just went snowshoeing and I’m spoiled, right? Like 45 minutes from Band National Park in Calgary.

 But it was, I went snowshoeing, so I’m like, I’m all about the winter activities and getting out, like you just had this warm, so it’s just a [00:06:00] retraining of people’s thinking that you only do Camping. In the summer. , if you do have those activities or you’re in a location or you’re near a ski resort or things like that.

And there’s definitely ways that you can market to those people who go hunting or ice fishing or whatever, right? . . So that’s awesome. So what what is the plan? Let’s say you go to this cellar today and you close, right? How fast are you moving 

Mike: As quickly as possible? There’s definitely some government entities involved in the process.

Our first piece…. 

Brian: You don’t have to say that it’s being recorded. You don’t have to say they’re, I did. Stake out our own country, and just have our own government. And it would be much easier that way. 

Mike: The clock starts ticking. If we can make a deal and we have to do some things with the municipality, the township get a special use permit and get our site plan approved, get our permits get our financing as well.

So if it, what it looks like ideally is three to four months getting that [00:07:00] done and being able to break ground at the end of that period. 

Brian: Is there a risk, and this has always been, I’m certainly willing to take risks as much as a business owner too, just have a different kind.

But is there a risk in I bought this property and now I’m pretty sure I’m gonna get the permits. But now they change their mind and the council doesn’t wanna do it and they’re arguing with us. And then what happens? At that point? 

Mike: There can be a risk. And that’s one of the challenges that we’ve had with some other landowners in the past, is they would have.

Take their property off the market for a while to wait for us. That’s how we’ve structured our okay, our purchase agreements. And most of them are hesitant to do that, and they don’t wanna miss a sale from somebody else that doesn’t depend on the township’s approval. 

Brian: Is there any way to get and I’m just asking for a place of ignorance, right? Is there, not for you specifically, but do you know, is there a way that you can get pre-approval, obviously just a little bit more of a guarantee so you could move faster than our property? 

Mike: From all the township ordinances that we’ve looked at in our area it’s pretty straightforward that you have to apply for [00:08:00] special use permit three weeks in advance or more public notice goes out to area residents in a certain radius so that they can come and voice their opinions on it.

And then you present before the planning commission and hopefully they like you and your idea and your thoughtfulness of the plans. Then if you get approved, there you are. Presenting in front of the full township board afterwards to try and get your site plan approved. 

Melissa: Yes, tons of risks, but 

Brian: yeah, that all sounds terrible to me.

But I’m glad like you, cause I like to go glamping to be clear, so I’m very glad there are people like you who are willing to do it. , it’s not me. I move too fast. I would get so irritated. I would just go make a decision right now. . If I gonna stand right now, I’m gonna go to another city and I’m just gonna keep going.

But that’s me. I’m broken, I admit . Alright, last question before I wanna get to Chandler and Kay. So let and obviously you guys are welcome to stay in input and we’ll probably come back to you with some crossover questions later, but what does Mitten Getaways look like in your ideal, perfect world when it’s done?

Mike: Yeah our mission is unexpected getaways and tranquility. That’s what we want to provide. We have [00:09:00] hinged our business plan on a few differences from a lot of other glamping operators in that we wanna be one year round. Now that’s not a big deal to people out west, but here in Michigan there’s not a lot of campgrounds or glamping resorts that are year round.

So we want, we wanna do that. We wanna have a diverse offering of structures for people to stay in. Not all domes, or not all wagons not all tents, but a variety so that people can come back and have a different experience each time. And we want people to have lots of things to do on the property so that they don’t treat it like a hotel where it’s just the overnight accommodation.

It’s a place to go and enjoy and stay night overnight and have lots of things to do. 

Brian: Awesome. Hopefully we’ll be able to see it sooner rather than later. Have you guys back on and show us what you did? Yeah, I’d love to. I don’t know who wants to go next. Let’s go with Chandler.

Chandler RV testers. So Chandler, you gave us your brief intro, right? What kind of brought you to this situation where you said you do parts for, to repair RVs, right? 

Chandler: Yes, sir. So …

Brian: How do you get there? You get to [00:10:00] there where you’re like there’s a value to me having a company versus going to an ACE Hardware or a Lowe’s or something like that.

Obviously very specialized parts, but talk us through it is what I’m asking. 

Chandler: Yeah. So I am an instructor at the National RV Training Academy, and so I deal with owners pretty much on a daily basis. I, myself and our family travel around in our RV. And what we see is, if something breaks on our RV or something of that nature, I have the electrical background to override the device and make things happen.

Get our jacks up, get our slides in, whatever it is. So 

you can hack someone’s RV, is that what you’re saying? 

Not necessarily hack, but you can electrically override 

Brian: It sounds like hacking Chandler. I’m just saying. It sounds…

Chandler: But what we found is we might be at a campsite and our neighbors are just pulling in and they go to unhook from their truck and their jacks won’t go down or something.

Is messed up in that sort. [00:11:00] And so we. right off the bat, built a box that allows you to plug your drill battery into and allows the owner or a technician to be able to override the controllers that may be placed in your RV so that you can drive the jacks down or push your slides down or, okay.

Brian: So it was a stupid question of me to ask Lowe’s. I didn’t realize what you did, I didn’t do enough research in advance, but that sounds really cool and useful. 

Chandler: Yes and so we’re actually in the process. I got the renderings back from our engineer yesterday for our consumer based product that is going to be just that.

And we’re hoping that it will take place of the gold looking handle that comes in most of your campers to override your slides or your manual stuff. You’ll actually be able to plug in to certain ports in the RV and be able to run all of the stuff from your phone. 

Brian: So how often does this happen where people [00:12:00] get stuck… 

Chandler: Quite frequently. The Campground that I’m at now I’ve been out every single day dealing with certain issues with some of the newer slides. Some there’s slide out mechanisms that we all know about that are prone to failure. And so people’s slides get stuck quite frequently.

Brian: Interesting. I think that would frustrate me as an RV owner, but yeah. I guess it’s a business opportunity for you, right? Yeah. Like I, if there’s anybody that’s grateful that someone’s slide is stuck, it’s Chandler . Yes. Another one. . But yeah, so how did you get into this, right?

How did you decide that, and I know you touched on it briefly, but how did you decide that this is the path I wanna take? This is the, and is it just a one product thing? ? Or is it? 

Chandler: No, so we have multiple products. So let’s so how did I get into it? Okay. So it’s not like I decided to do it. Actually, I had owners asking me if there’s ways that they can do this, and I’m [00:13:00] like, absolutely.

Brian: Here’s a much better story you should say. I’m just gonna make this up for you, okay. On the fly. And you could probably use AI to make it better, but you should say I was in my RV and my slide got stuck hanging over the side of the Grand Canyon, and my wife almost died, but I grabbed her arm and then hooked up a battery by mistake, and we were able to reel her into safety unless I decided to make sure that no one else ever suffered the same fate ever again.

Chandler: That’s a beautiful story. I love it. 

Brian: You could sell way more like that. People would just Yeah. But go ahead. Continue, please. 

Chandler: So I actually had a group of about five owners one day. I was overriding somebody’s equipment cuz I’m also, sorry, I’m also a mobile technician RV technician. And I was overriding somebody’s stuff electrically.

And I had about a group of five owners come to me and said, Hey, can you build me something just like this? And I’m like, sure. And so I did and they immediately sold and then they started talking to people. And then [00:14:00] people kept coming to me asking me if I could build the same device for them. And it was all people in motor homes with very large full wall slides and they had all suffered the same failure with their brand of slide mechanism.

Unfortunately when they need to get propane, they can’t just take their propane tank out like we do and go and get it filled. They have to drive their RV up and get it filled. If their slide mechanism fails, they need a way to drive it in so that they can drive down to the propane filling station and get filled up and then come back.

So I had owners buying this box from me just so that they could close their slides and open their slides to, to go get propane. So you kinda… 

Brian: That’s the best way to start a business, right? You fall into a problem and you have a solution and then everybody just tells everybody 

Chandler: That is correct.

Now, what we have done is now that we did that, I’ve had people come to me, technicians and say, , [00:15:00] we install awnings. Let’s just say we install awning fabrics. That’s their business is, they just go and install new fabric awning fabrics for owners, but it requires a second person to help them.

And so one of their complaints is it’s hard to find that second person that wants to show up every time you ask for help. And even if you’re willing to pay, they may not wanna show up. So they said, we need a way that we can do this by ourselves. So we designed up a tool that we use quite frequently so that you can install 22, 23, 26 foot long awnings by yourself.

So you’re, and so that was tool number two. 

Brian: Is there more? 

Chandler: Yes. 

Brian: Wait, how many are there before you go through each one of them ? Or is there three? 

Chandler: There’s two more, but 26 on the list.

Brian: Okay. Give us the two more real quick. Because they’re interesting. I find ’em fascinating so far, right?

They’re really good, like problem solving use cases. And you would [00:16:00] almost think that a manufacturer would wanna partner with you. 

Chandler: Yes. So we’re actually very new. We’re right at a year old. And we’ve done zero advertising. 

Brian: Now you have just, there’s three people that watch the show, , Mike, melissa, and Kay. 

Chandler: So we’re very new.

It’s all word of mouth. So we’re just trying to get as many of our products out there to help technicians and owners. Because with some of these tools, like the one that I just spoke about that helps with awnings is now it is going to help bring the cost of a replacement, a technician to come out and do an awning fabric replacement.

It’s gonna become cheaper because you don’t have to have a second person. Okay. And not to mention it’s faster. The next tool is a diagnostics tool for technicians and could possibly be for owners if they are handy in that nature. But some of our slide mechanisms and leveling systems that are electronic, they have sensors in them to know where the position of the [00:17:00] motor is.

And if that sensor goes bad, the motor may still turn, but the leveling system or the slide system doesn’t know where it’s at, so it just falls out. Okay. And some of these motors for these slide mechanisms are expensive. One for a slim rack is a little over $700 and there’s two per slide. So we’ve had technicians that have come out misdiagnosed and replaced a $700 motor.

Come to find out that’s not what it is. So we’ve designed up a tester that gives you a graph. You, it takes 15 seconds and it runs a diagnostics and it gives you a red light or a green light. And then you have a printout graph so that you can present it to the owner and be able to show them why the motor is bad and why they’re fixing to have to spend a seven, $700.

Because that’s a lot of money. Yeah. I, it doesn’t matter who you are, $700 for a motor is a lot of money. 

Brian: $700 for anything a of money. $700 for anything is a [00:18:00] lot of money. 

Chandler: Yes. And then we have developed a test tool for RV air conditioners and heat pumps. And it’s a diagnostics tool so that you can go out here, routine maintenance, if you go and get your air conditioner cleaned from a technician, they can basically do a diagnostics test on it and they can check the amperage draw and find out if if your air conditioner’s going out, you can actually see a trend and be able to tell if something is going wrong with the air conditioner before it actually fails.

Brian: Okay. So let me ask you this for the people who are watching this, which arguably are a. Campground owners and operators. Is this a, to me, this is a business use case to me. This is a, let’s package my five and maybe you said 26 tools eventually, but put ’em in together in little packages.

And resell them to Campground owners so that Campground owners can provide these optional services at their campgrounds for free as a value add. Which differentiates them. Yes. Or for a small cost. [00:19:00] 

Chandler: Yes. So we’ve actually already had multiple campgrounds reach out to us, especially like in the Pigeon Forge area.

They may have a storefront and they want to have our products on their shelves available for owners. So when they get their self into a situation that they need to go and they need a technician right now, but they, there’s not one available, they can pick one of these up and actually use it to get stuff in.

So actually our consumer based. A box that I was talking about earlier is called the rescue tech, and that’s what it is. It is basically a technician in a box, and of course it’s all controlled by your phone, which is going to have very detailed instructions, step-by-step instructions on how to use it.

Brian: Okay. So what is, now you say you’ve been saying consumer a couple times, is there a product for businesses that’s different or ….

Chandler: so when I say consumers, I’m talking about RV owners rather than RV technicians.[00:20:00] 

So our RV tech tools, so our technician tools are usually going to be the AC tester, the, what we call the diagnostics.

It’s the diagnostics tools. Our owner’s stuff is going to be like the rescue tech that is a consumer product in our eyes not necessarily a technician’s tool. But we have a ton of stuff on the horizon for the consumers. Some little neat trinkets stuff that’s controlled by your phone, like lighted signs that hang out in front of the RV.

Let’s just say you have a fifth wheel lighted signs for the pin box that you can control from your phone. So you can put your name or your site number. And it will also plug into the seven way RV plug so you can turn on your park lights if you want. Cuz what we’ve noticed is some of these campgrounds we have single women and they may not feel as safe with all the lights off around the RV. And so having a way [00:21:00] to be able to control the lights from inside the RV and be able to turn the parking lights on the outside of the RV might be handy. 

Brian: What if there’s actual danger out there? Can they put can they electrify the outside of the fence?

Does that people, if they try to come in, or, we can definitely other add-ons here. I feel like Chandler I could help you with. 

Chandler: Yes. We can definitely look into that. I feel like there’s a liability though. 

Brian: Chandler’s never gonna talk to me again after this. Go ahead. Sorry. No, go ahead. 

Chandler: So we, like I say, we have a long list of consumer based products, but our first goal was to get out some of the tech tools.

Right out the gate so that we can help the consumer. Cuz our whole goal is to help the RV owners and so if we can help the technicians be able to diagnose the problems faster, in turn it helps the pocketbook of the RV owner. 

Brian: Yeah. Cuz they’re charging by the hour or for whatever their time is.

Chandler: . And when we first started in our RV, I didn’t, I was unaware and we had people work on our RV and they [00:22:00] took longer than probably it should have to diagnose some of the issues that we had and it costed us. But we’ve decided that we wanna make some tools to be able to help the technician so that doesn’t happen as frequently to owners.

Brian: Do you think one day you build a robot who can do all this in one shot? , You sound smart enough to do it. I’m just saying . 

Chandler: I used to work in high speed manufacturing, so yes, I have. 

Brian: Nice, all right. I want to talk to you again, Chandler. I have all kinds of crazy ideas we can do, but anyway, let me move on to Kay and then we can jump in.

And same thing with Mike and Melissa. Kay from Outerly. I talked to you, I dunno what, last week, two weeks ago or something.

Kay: We introduced something like that.

Brian: But give us a brief info, but so what is outer and why does it exist? 

Kay: Yeah. So I. Rewinding a little bit from the social platform and the tech because all of this started actually with a problem that I faced when I moved to Chicago a couple of years ago in [00:23:00] 2019.

Okay. I had just come back from a year of traveling solo around the world, living out of a backpack. I went to 15 different countries by myself, and I was, and I hiked a lot obviously, and spent a lot of time in the most beautiful landscapes, and I got a job in Chicago, moved to Chicago in the summer of 2019, and I asked all of my friends who were Chicago natives, Where can I go hiking here?

And they would gimme one of three answers. Lincoln Park the Lakefront and Millennium Park, all of which are very obvious and not very wilderness. E they’re beautiful, but they’re just very in the middle of the city. And so I said, seriously, none of you know where I can go hiking in Chicago and nobody could tell me.

So I put on my boots, got in the car, I go on Google Maps and I look for green patches on Google Maps, and I just drive there and see if there was a trail. And in the process I posted a few blogs on a WordPress blog. It wasn’t even name, it doesn’t really even exist anymore. Just about places to go outside in Chicago.

And within three [00:24:00] months we had about 15,000 readers reading those handful of articles every single. And I said, okay, clearly they’re not here for me. Chicago must really want to know where to go outside and there isn’t a good resource to do that. Fast forward a couple of cities that I’ve lived in.

Previously, I posted some content about those. I hired writers from all over the country and we were able to scale just in just over a year to about 150,000 unique visitors per month on the site. It was awesome. It’s now called Urban Outdoors. You can find it at urbanoutdoors.com or if you look up hikes in basically any city across the us you’ll probably find us.

But during that process, I learned from our readers. I’d get e emails from readers all the time saying, I really wanna do these things, but I don’t know anybody who will go with me. Can you tell me how to meet other people to go outside with? And the only option that was of consistent across all the cities was Meetup.

However, meetup can be really hit or met. For, especially for outdoors and for beginners who don’t know if they’re the [00:25:00] same speed or the same experience level as some of the other people in the meetup group. Even I’ve hiked thousands of miles across the world. I have been rejected from meetup groups because they thought that I was not an experience enough hiker.

And so I said clearly these aren’t inclusive platforms. There isn’t really a good, easy way to meet other people in your city who like to go hiking or do outdoor activities, and so I’ll just build one. So I have spent the last 11 months learning to code, learning to build so that I could build what is now called elderly Outer spun out of Urban Outdoors and is a, an app where you d people in DC which is the pilot that we’re running right now, can log in, they can find activities to do in the DC area.

We’re currently working on building the largest database of DC area outdoor activities. and they can also meet other people who wanna do those same activities as them. Currently we are about hopefully within the next couple of minutes, actually, we are about to cross 150 users on the [00:26:00] platform after launching late last week.

And we are in the wor in the process of negotiating our first B2B contract here in the city. So it’s been a busy couple of weeks, but Outerly is live here and we’ve got a very emphasis all to reach a hundred thousand DC area users on the platform by Earth Day. We call it a hundred K before Earth Day.

Brian: Okay. So what qualifies as an outdoor activity? Is it helping someone repair their awning like Chandler like, or is that. 

What are the most popular outdoor activities? Because you’re saying I wanna find somebody, and I know this is early and I know you’re still getting users, but what do you have a feeling will be like the most popular types of things people are looking to pair up for?

Kay: Yeah. People want most of the people that we’ve talked to are hikers, they’re walkers. They like going to nature places and moving their feet. So that is overwhelmingly what we’ve seen. However, we have also gotten a lot of interest from climbers, from people who paddle, so kayaking, stop canoeing and also from, what am I missing?[00:27:00] 

Climbing sup, ski Snowboard, and Camping. Those are the official verticals, but. Our definition of the outdoors is a little bit different than let’s say if you see a North Face ad and it’s somebody hiking up a mountain and stuff. We define an outdoor activity is as an intentional activity done outdoors, whether that’s walking around the sidewalk, whether that’s going to a park and hanging your hammock and sitting in it, whether that’s reading a book at a picnic table or whether it’s summiting a 14 or in Colorado, or going to another country and doing a back country track.

It all falls under this umbrella of outdoors for us. And frankly, this is new in the outdoor industry. For a long time it was the outdoor industry is very much, the outdoors is the most hardcore, the most epic, the most difficult activities count as outdoors and everything else is not outdoors.

It’s just nothing. And we’ve, we learned through hundreds of customer interviews [00:28:00] that’s. Actually very ex, it excludes a lot of people who would wanna go outside, but they might not feel ready to go summit a mountain or plan a trip entirely around outdoors. So we’re really trying to redefine what outdoors even means and make it feel more accessible to people who live in cities who may be under the impression that they have to fly all the way out to Utah or Arizona in order to go outside.

Brian: Makes sense. Okay. So where does Outerly expand to from here? If you had, if you, let’s say you get a, what was your goal? I saw on LinkedIn 150,000. Is that just in DC or total .

Kay: A hundred K before Earth A in dc. 

Brian: Yeah. So then what, how quickly do you expand if this takes off? 

Kay: Yeah, so once we have our DC use case kind of locked and loaded, and we figure out, all right, this is how we can launch in a city, these are the things that worked, these are the things that didn’t.

Our goal is in the fall to launch in seasonally fall seasonal cities. So our next tranche will be Phoenix. The DFW [00:29:00] area and Houston all of which we have several thousand wait list subscribers. We have several thousand readers on urban outdoors per month in those cities. And so we’ve already tested demand for this kind of thing, and we just need to go over there and plop it down so that we can get the communities on board.

Brian: When are you gonna launch in Michigan? Because we need to pull up people to go glamping, . 

Kay: Yeah. Detroit is on our roadmap actually. It is one of the cities where we do have a presence with urban Outdoors, and we do have wait list subscribers, so hopefully we’ll do a mid. So Chicago and St. Louis are two of our biggest cities in terms of weightless subscribers, and we’ll probably do one big Midwest launch Chicago, St. Louis, Minneapolis, and Detroit. So likely next year. 

Brian: I don’t want in the summer for sure. Pressure, but they’re literally closing on land today. Maybe . 

Kay: It’ll be perfect. They’ll have plenty of practice before the Outerly community gets to go check it out, 

Brian: all right. Okay. So yeah, it’s really interesting the solutions that all of you guys are creating.

And we know glamping is big and it’s taking off and I think it’s got a [00:30:00] long, successful future here, right? In the United States at, in some capacities. We’ve talked on the show before to guests from the UK and from Europe where they’ve adopted that stuff already.

But it always amazes me the different types of entrepreneurs that get into the scene who wanna do different things and have different ideas and different imaginations. And really it’s amazing that all of that works in. . You could have a terrible idea that doesn’t work. But for the most part it’s still an infant and, infant tile or whatever, I can’t think of the word, small infancy, small markets that has a lot of room to grow, not a lot of competition around you, stuff like that. So the sky’s kind of the limit here to see where you can go and experiment and really by the time it gets crowded, I think you guys will have a headstart by having everything refined.

And just like Kay was saying to figure out what doesn’t work so that I could do what does work. Is there a future where there’s multiple locations for Mitten? 

Mike: Possibly though it’s not an absolute need or vision for us right now, 

Brian: Yeah. But I think more going with the theme with Mitten being, all of you guys really contributing.

We have a comment here in the chat. I dunno, when it came in from Vivian, who I believe was saying about you, Chandler love how we’re working [00:31:00] to provide solutions for those living in RVs. It’s also my first time hearing about the National RV Training Academy. I think I’ve heard about it before.

I may have even crossed. Who are the founders of that? Do you? I feel like I’ve talked to them before. Oh, you’re muted Chandler. I can’t hear you. 

Chandler: Can you hear me now? Alright. So actually my uncle is one of the founders Terry Cooper. 

Brian: Yes, Terry. And I’ve talked to them on Zoom, like probably 2018 or 2019 I think.

Cuz they used to be involved with RV report, right? 

Chandler: . So yes and. . I’ve been there for approximately a year and a half. I was asked to join their team and be one of the instructors. And so yes, about a year and a half, and that’s really where I found the need. People were coming to me, owners were coming to me asking me, what can you do to help me?

Technicians are coming to me asking me, what can you do to help us? So that’s how it happened. 

Brian: And we’ve talked on this show before about how there’s a shortage of [00:32:00] technicians. We’ve had, I think, quote from the RV, t a on ti on here. They’re trying to train and recruit more technicians and things like that.

Is there a point in, and maybe I’m treading into dangerous territory, and you can say, I don’t wanna answer this question now, but is there a point where the manufacturer realizes that maybe they just need to make better slide outs? And I know what that question is, so it’s okay if you don’t want to answer it.

And I definitely don’t wanna name anybody by name, but is there a point where there’s a responsibility to say because if it’s happening at the volume that you’re saying it’s at, right? That you’re at a Campground and it’s happening four or five, eight times to different people, is there a point where they say listen, this is obviously broke.

Chandler: So there is manufacturers already very recently that have noticed the incline of problems and have started to switch to different manufacturers for different slide out mechanisms. I know one major manufacturer in particular has taken notice of [00:33:00] the slide mechanism out of Arizona called Vroom which is a very nice package.

But yes, I’m sure at some point the manufacturer of most of these flat out mechanisms will take note and start trying to make better products. that will last longer. Now, I know that these are moving items down the highway and they get beat down the roughest roads. I don’t know if you’ve been through Louisiana lately, but it’s not the best on a camper.

And we travel back and forth from Florida to Texas quite frequently. So we pass through Louisiana every time and it definitely takes us toll on all the mechanisms on the RV. 

Brian: And to be fair, there’s a lot of moving parts. No one’s trying to throw anybody under the bus and say, the manufacturers are doing this on purpose or anything like that.

But I’m just making sure that at some point, like there should be data that gets back to them that says, here’s what’s happening. And then obviously most of them would choose to fix it if the [00:34:00] number. 

Chandler: Yes. And so we, we have seen that Now there are some slide mechanisms out there that are better than others.

However, they’re not the prettiest looking ones, so it’s usually, function over beauty style. Yep. And the problem is if we put something ugly on the side of an RV, it deters people from wanting to buy it. So if we put something pretty on the side of the RV, it may not work as well, but people are more apt to buy it.

I’ve seen one slide mechanism in particular that is very well known and works very well, but unfortunately as ugly as it is, people would end up taking it back to the dealership and say that they thought it was broken because it didn’t look right or this, that and the other. And so the manufacturers of these RVs are saying, I don’t really want to use that slide mechanism because people don’t wanna buy our RV because it’s attached to it.

Brian: Why do you feel like there, why do you feel like there has to be a trade off between these two things? . 

Chandler: There doesn’t [00:35:00] have to. That’s the reason why we’re building our own slide mechanisms right now. 

Brian: Oh, okay. All right. So there, so this is on the 26th list, or this is a whole different list? 

Chandler: Yes. This is on part of the 26th list.

Brian: All right. 

But if you build your own slide mechanism and it works, won’t you put yourself outta business? 

Chandler: Hey, you know what? If it makes the, if it makes the life of the RV better, great. 

Brian: No, the correct answer is yes. But you still want to have it just in case. Even though it’s 99.9%, you just still need a battery.

See, I can teach you Marketing Chandler. We can do good things. But yeah, like I, and the same thing with Kay, right? We’re talking about, I was thinking about when you were saying it, I moved to Chicago and I was, I dunno if you said you were lonely, but you were looking for people that took places to go hike, things like that, I think.

But you touched on loneliness, I think, in your intro or before the show or something like that. But, and then I was thinking right after that as the pandemic, right? For. , which was admittedly shorter in the United States than it was the rest of the world. But it’s very interesting, I think how people have changed their perception of loneliness since that’s been a thing.

And I think that there’s more perception and awareness of [00:36:00] apps like you and a willingness to take part in that and not even be a little bit lonely. 

Kay: Yeah, I would actually go as far as to say that the loneliness epidemic is like a public health crisis. And the reason why I say that is not to send up alarm beacons and whatnot, but because there have been studies that have shown that prolonged loneliness can lead to early death, it is as unhealthy for us smoking 15 cigarettes a day.

You can have respiratory problems, you can have digestive problems, cardiovascular problems, all from the fact that you are consistently lonely over years and years. And so for us, And especially here in cities, it’s like we have all of these spaces where people can gather, but we’re not using them.

Instead, we’re sending people across the country to go visit national parks that are frankly way overcrowded and overpopulated to the point where they have to close trails in order to accommodate people. Where, when we have plenty of beautiful spaces in our [00:37:00] cities. An example of, a great example of this is met a woman here in DC she has lived across from our big DC park called Route Creek Park her entire life, 40 something years.

And she has never gone on a trail in that park, but she walks around the park every single day. Interesting. And I asked her, why don’t you go outside? Why don’t you go out on those trails? And because I don’t know anybody who will go with me. And I don’t know my way around in there. What if I go out?

What if I go in there and I get lost and I don’t come back out? How will I know where to go? And so I took her of course. And it just really sparked this idea of can nature and can the outdoors be a solution to the loneliness problem? And I guess one other thing…

Brian: I wanna push back on one thing, right?

Because I agree with you. I think in some cases on the loneliness is toxic and all that, but I also think it’s the type of loneliness. Is it something you’re willing to do? Like me, when I started a business I started a business for 12 years. Being an entrepreneur is lonely, but I’m also not unhappy doing that either.

So I think there’s [00:38:00] a correlation there to some of the studies you’re talking about.

Kay: I think we’re talking about alone versus lonely. So alone is I am not with other people. And sometimes you’re intentionally alone. I can be introverted sometimes, and so I’m intentionally alone. 

Brian: But you can be in a room with 20 people and be lonely still.

Kay: Exactly. Yeah. Okay. So loneliness is more of an emotion or a condition or a state versus alone is a situation or a circumstance. And so I’m talking about punch you in the gut. Loneliness, not necessarily aloneness. 

Brian: Gotcha. And I fear you were, I just wanted to clarify. 

Kay: Yeah, no, totally. And I think a lot of pe there, that distinction is not clear.

There’s a very fine line. One thing that I will say is that from our audiences, we’ve talked to hundreds and hundreds of people and we learned that 75% of people would go outside more frequently if they could easily find somebody else to go with based on those interviews. So it is a big problem and [00:39:00] it is restricting access to the… 

Brian: I’m the same way, right? If, when I was in between girlfriends or whatever, or didn’t have, moved to a new city, I just moved to Calgary, right? In 2021 during the pandemic actually, , I’m the same way. Like I, I enjoy, I will go outside alone. It doesn’t make me sad to do that, but I do definitely enjoy going places with other people and experiencing those things with other people.

And so there are trips and things that I haven’t done. Like I could go to Europe on a solo trip, like like you did to go hiking. And I would have fun, but I know I’d have more fun with somebody else. So then my mind is let’s wait until I have a girlfriend or somebody who likes to hike or a good friend who can go with me or whatever, because I will have a better time with two people.

And so it’s a catch 22 for me. 

Kay: No, that is a very commonly held idea. It’s yeah, maybe I could go outside, but especially for people who are new to the outdoors, right? There is a group of people that exist that are outdoor veterans will call that like they’ve been going outside, they’ve been skiing, hiking, et cetera since they were, [00:40:00] since they could walk.

And then on the other side of that, there are people who, like me, I never camped until I was 23. I didn’t summit at a mountain until I was 22. I had never really considered myself an outdoorsy person. I didn’t even participate in my university outdoor recreation club. Like I was never, ever outdoorsy until I realized that the outdoors is such a healing and grounding space.

And it’s not that scary once you get out there and it’s not, there aren’t that many dangers if you know what you’re doing. But for me…

Brian: Maybe it depends on where you were. I talked to a guy in the middle, the tent in Forest in Belize who makes glamping tents and he was like talking about the giant spiders and the snakes 

Kay: I hate spiders, so I would not like that. But but there’s just there’s reasonable risk or like you can. , you can….

Brian: pair up with somebody who’s a spider expert on the hourly app. . Can defend you.

Kay: Yeah. Exactly. So that’s, it’s like putting myself in the shoes of somebody [00:41:00] like me who has never been outside whose parents didn’t take them outside, who doesn’t have a family that likes to go outside.

Or a partner who likes to go outside and saying, how does that person, how does that person become a once a week outdoorsy person? That’s the problem that we are trying to solve. And our hypothesis is that through connection is how we solve it. 

Brian: For sure. So I don’t disagree with you.

So what do we have? We got, I don’t know, we got 14 minutes left. What do we have to talk about guys? You guys are all the guests hosts, I nominate you right now. like what? Seriously, what’s like what’s cross your desk in the glamping industry or the RV industry or I don’t know the outside industry cuz that’s everything now.

But what is cross your desk That’s interesting that you wanna talk about. 

Mike: I actually wanted to ask, Kay, your emphasis is on major cities. What type of radius of activities do you go out from those major cities? 

Kay: Yeah, so we are starting with DC proper and then we’re doing five mile radius and then 15, [00:42:00] then 25, and then a hundred.

Okay. So we’re like building our database from the inside out just to like kind of 80 20 our efforts. But yes, eventually what I would like is for this to be a sort of overarching like ubiquitous platform for any city, but a social, all trails we’ll say where there is a database of outdoor activities all over the place.

But you can easily find somebody else who wants to do those things either within your network or within your network’s network. 

Brian: And so in your app, is it just preparing or you mentioned all trails, is it trail data and information too or? 

Kay: Yeah, so we have an activities database.

Right now we are not doing trail routes, but we have all of that information. We did a big GIS project mapping out every single trail in Washington DC proper. So we have that information and we unfortunately, like the platform that we built this early app on is not, we can’t use it yet, but we’re sitting on all of this data [00:43:00] that we can pull into our custom mobile app once it co goes live and people can actually choose their own adventure.

So unlike all trails where it’s like a defined trail, our hope is that you can say, alright, I wanna take this trail to this trail, navigate me. And it’s basically choose your own adventure. And that helps people like this woman that I’m met who wanna go into Rock Creek Park but don’t know their way around, they can say, okay, there’s a trail here and here that will lead me back to my house in one hour.

And that’s really where we see that data playing a piece in this whole thing. 

Brian: Can you do cool things like Waze where you add little features that differentiate from like Google Maps or all trails? I’d like to know where the bears are in real time. The one I’m scared them because I’ve been trying for two years to see a bear up here and…. 

Kay: just drive up and down the ice fields parkway until you reach a traffic camp.

Brian: Seen a bear on the side of the road or in Yellowstone or in whatever. Yeah. [00:44:00] And I don’t really want to. But not bears, but like other, is there other things that are on your plate right, that add value to that trip that maybe aren’t focused on because they’re not focused on the outdoors like you are or the outside?

Kay: Yeah. I would just say like our product roadmap and all the features that we’ve thought about, so the choose your own adventure, we have some safety features that we’re launching specifically for women who’ve told us. I don’t, I wanna hike by myself, but I don’t wanna be out in the woods with no, with nobody knowing where I am.

Okay, great. Let’s create a feature around that. Like all of the features that we have put into this brander vision are from people who wanna use this, who don’t see another way or another avenue to find the information. And we listen really hard and we prioritize based on how many times we hear something, how easy it is to execute, all of that type of stuff.

But to your point about like having landmarks, that is also something that we are incorporating. So stay tuned in the next few months, . 

Brian: Awesome. Anything else guys? [00:45:00] Mike, ask a question of Kay Chandler, you’re on deck here. You gotta come up with a brilliant idea for us. . 

What do you wanna say?

Chandler: I guess from hearing from you and Kay, it sounds like both of y’all are not RVers, you’re more you’re tent campers. Is that correct? , 

Kay: actually I built my company living outta my sprinter van. So I’m not an RV, but I’m a van. I’m not an RV. So I know the world of being under my van, like feet sticking out, tinkering with stuff.

Like I’ve done that so many times. 

Brian: I’m not an RV because I can’t afford one yet. , no one will advertise. But I’m working it, it’s in the plans. Chandler.

When it comes and I buy that RV, I’m gonna know already that my flatout will break and I’m gonna be mad when I buy it.

Chandler: I’m come find you. No, you know when y’all both have talked about tens? I, it’s just, I’m not that hardcore when I’ve gotta have, I’ve gotta have a roof and I’ve gotta have wheels. And water.

Brian: You need to go to Mitten Getaway. 

Kay: You go. What I was gonna [00:46:00] say, Chandler is another potential opportunity for you, and I don’t know if you’ve already thought of this, so just tell me to shut up if you have.

But I know that there’s a, like RV marketplace called Outdoorsy for people who don’t own RVs, but they rent, they can rent RVs from people locally who have them. So it’s like peer-to-peer RV rentals where you’re going, these are people who dunno what the heck they’re doing with an RV. They don’t know how to drive it.

They don’t know what they’re doing. And so I wonder if there’s an opportunity for you to basically connect into that, like the peer-to-peer rental or just like RV rental space for people who are like, I dunno what the heck. 

Brian: You need to sell 2000 to outdoorsy can have a box where you can check like $5 for a rescue package.

Like you can choose a car seat in the back of a rental car or gps. And then they’ll quickly pay off for that stuff. 

Chandler: Yes. So that’s actually been a thought of ours. I have probably …

Brian: you’re billionaire to be clear. We all want a cut of it. . 

Chandler: We have actually started with a [00:47:00] tablet sized box. so that it’s easy to read and it would be for the person that has never dealt with an RV.

And so basically it would be a step-by-step guide on what to look for. And it will basically have a built in trouble tree. So you tell it what kind of slide out we’re dealing with and it asks you what your symptoms are and you go through this trouble tree and it helps you diagnose the issue and be able to repair it.

Hopefully, if we can’t repair it, then override it and it’ll walk you through how to override it. 

Brian: So here’s an interesting question and I’m gonna switch it just for a second into ai, cuz that’s my obsession right now. How long is it before these voice assistants, like the good voice assistants, everything’s trash on the market.

But if you played with chat t p t, you’ve seen how it has conversations with you. How long is it before that voice assistant is in an RV tied to the systems that can diagnose all that stuff and say, your slide out is screwed. We’re [00:48:00] calling Chandler. 

Chandler: I will tell you, it’s gonna be a very long time if the RV industry stays the way that it is.

They’re not like the automotive industry. So the automotive industry figured out a long time ago that we need a central brain and a central port so that we can do diagnostics. We don’t have that in the RV. 

Brian: No one has that or is this curtain manufacturer done?

Chandler: No. So like, when I say RV, I guess I’m really talking about tools.

 Fifth wheel or a bumper pool, they have a bunch of different modules, leveling modules, slide modules, and if you have three different slide outs, you may have three different slide modules, and most all of them do not communicate to one port and give us a diagnostic support. So that means you have to plug into each individual module.

To test things. And so until the RV industry can get everything together like the automotive industry and give us one single court and [00:49:00] have all of the different modules communicating to each other, then we, it is gonna be very difficult to do. That’s actually one of the battles that we fight right now.

Brian: What do you think is stopping them from doing that? 

Chandler: I asked myself that same question quite frequently. I don’t know, speculate, guess I’m gonna say money. 

Brian: That’s exactly what I was gonna say to you. And to be fair, like I, and to be fair, we don’t know, like we’re, again, we’re not criticizing any manufacturers here.

I’m not one, nobody on this show is one. Nobody’s saying it’s easy to do. It could cost a hundred million dollars to do for all we know. But it’s worth having the discussion cuz if no one else does, then maybe no one else asks. 

Chandler: Yes, I would love to see the RV industry transform into what the automotive industry has been for the last 30 years, where everything is organized, everything.

There’s schematics, there’s diagrams, there’s things to help you [00:50:00] out when diagnosing issues. And there’s only just a handful of RVs that I even know about that you have the opportunity to even get a schematic. Which, just tells us that they’re all just wired. However, the guy on the production line wants to wire it.

Brian: That doesn’t really inspire me to want to go buy an RV, Chandler . I’m saying it’s accurate. To be clear, we obviously need somebody from a manufacturer on here to tell us, and I don’t know if they would, but. To be clear and we’ve done a lot of speculating on RVs, obviously they’re very popular, they’re very good.

They sell a lot of units, a lot, way more people are happy with ’em to get their slides out stuck. So we just wanna make sure that we say that we’re not trying to pick on anybody. We’re just trying to speculate and solve issues and make the, ultimately make the consumers happy, right? So they get outside more or maybe they get frustrated enough of their slide out so they sell it and then they go glamping.

I guess either way, we worked.

Mike: We did think about having [00:51:00] a space for RVs on our site. It just depends on the land whether or not there’d be an appropriate fit for it. Cuz we recognize a lot of people. drive their glamp around with them. So they don’t necessarily need a.. 

Chandler: So what is the definition of a glamp?

Because I thought that’s what we were in a camper and we were always hooked to water. Always hooked to electric. 

Brian: There is no definition. That’s the thing, is a buzzword right now, but there’s not really, it’s pretty broad, but it’s,

Mike: it’s actually in the dictionary. The Miriam Webster dictionary glamping is Camping with accommodations more luxurious than Camping, 

Brian: Which is so Chandler’s. And you’re right. And I’m right. Yes. We’re all right. 

Chandler: I don’t know if Kay’s right. have to hear. 

Kay: I’m more often than not. 

Brian: Okay. All right, we got a minute and then 45 seconds left. So does anybody wanna say anything else? Final thoughts? All right. I appreciate you. Oh, go ahead. 

Kay: I just gonna give a shameless plug.

We’re still trying to get our hundred K by Earth Day here in [00:52:00] dc. So if any of you who are watching or any of anyone in DC who likes to go outside, please share Outerly with them. Yeah, we’re really trying to make it a big community at DCers who like to go outside. So that’s all I got. 

Brian: But also, you’ll be in Michigan by Friday.

You’re in Michigan then. 

Kay: I need to clone myself first. 

Brian: Thank you guys. Go ahead. Yeah, please. 

Mike: We’ll, shameless plug ourselves as well. We love having people follow us on this journey. It’s we’ve come to find it’s unique. A lot of people tell us that people already have the land and decide to start a glamping resort on it rather than.

Try to find land to start one on. Feel free to follow us. We try to make our story fun on social media and through our monthly newsletter. We’re at mittengetaways.com. 

Brian: Chandler, go for it. Where can they find the, do you have a website, Chandler, or is it just we have to stumble across Chandler in Florida or texas?

Chandler: So it’s as easy as rvtesters.com. 

Brian: Oh, good domain. I like it. Okay, . So thank you guys. I really appreciate you, Chandler. It sounds [00:53:00] like you got some great, innovative products. We’d love to have you on. Maybe when you get to, I know, 10 or 15 or 20 or whatever, so you can tell us about at least cool little things.

Definitely when you build your robot, for sure. Mike and Melissa, looking forward to having you guys back on. Maybe we can see the resort when it’s built. Good luck later today. Hopefully you guys close that deal, if that’s what you want. Thank you. Kay. Get to a hundred thousand. Expand to Michigan and the world.

In that order, . 

Thank you guys. I really appreciate joining us. Another episode of MC Fireside Chats. We’ll be back next week for Open Discussion Show and we’ll see you. Thanks. 

Kay: Thanks everyone. Thanks Brian.