MC Fireside Chats – September 4th, 2024 

SPEAKER_00:

This is MC Fireside Chats, a weekly show featuring conversations with thought leaders, entrepreneurs, and outdoor hospitality experts who share their insights to help your business succeed. Hosted by Brian Searle, the founder and CEO of Insider Perks, empowered by insights from Modern Campground, the most innovative news source in the industry.

Mark Koep:

Hey there and welcome. Welcome to the September 4th edition of Modern Campgrounds Fireside Chats. I am not Brian Searl. I’m Mark Koep. I am guest hosting for Brian today, and we have a wonderful selection of folks here to share and discuss things going on in the industry. So, I will allow each person to go through and introduce themselves, and then we have a special guest here, and we will dive into that conversation, too. So, first on my screen is Jeff, if you want to go ahead and begin, and then I have Sandy, Mike, Scott, and then we’ll go to our guest, and I see Casey is going to hop in here, too. Go ahead, Jeff.

Jeff Hoffman:

Hi, I’m Jeff Hoffman. My business is Camp Strategy, and what we do is try to help small to medium-sized campgrounds get in a better position.

Sandy Ellingson:

And I’m Sandy Ellingson, and I serve as an industry advocate between the RV industry, those that produce the rigs and our campgrounds, and the newly launched Hub for RVers.

Mike Harrison:

My name is Mike Harrison. I work with CRR Hospitality. We own and manage upscale luxury RV resorts and glamping properties, as well as storage and manufactured home neighborhoods. And we also do third party management for RV resorts and glamping. And happy to be a part of today’s discussion.

Scott Bahr:

My name is Scott Barr. I’m the president of Caring Consulting Group. We’re a market research company specializing in outdoor hospitality, as well as the RV industry.

Mark Koep:

Casey Cochran with Camp Spot, who does not have nearly as good of a background as some of these other people on here. With Camp Spot, we’re a campground reservation software and a campground specific marketplace. And then Luisana, if you’d like to introduce yourself and then we’ll dive into it.

Luisana Méndez:

Yes, absolutely. Well, thank you, everybody, for this invitation. I’m Luisana Mendez, based in Minnesota, and I lead the Whales Latinas nonprofit.

Mark Koep:

Okay, so Luisana, so as in preparation for this, the biggest thing I have is a language barrier. So my brothers, my brother, my son speaks Spanish. I don’t have a terrible Spanish accent. I don’t do it at all. What does your organization do? And what’s the background on it? Clearly Spanish. So, you know, go ahead.

Luisana Méndez:

Yes, absolutely. Well, I am Latina. I am from Venezuela. When I arrived in Minnesota, I just want to do something for my community. So we create Way of Latinas just to embrace Latino community, do outdoor activities. So we try to inspire and motivate people to get out, learn new skills, and also, you know, strengthen more the Latino community here.

Mark Koep:

So are you focused strictly on Minnesota or are you a nationwide organization? For now it’s just in Minnesota. Okay and where’s home base for you in Minnesota?

Luisana Méndez:

So principal in the Twin Cities but also we do activities around all the states because we visit different state parks.

Mark Koep:

Okay, so main purpose, and I was on your website, and the main purpose is to get folks outside that aren’t really exposed to it, right? I mean, it’s in a nutshell, you love the outdoors, you want to get more people out there. What do you find is the biggest hurdle for individuals in seeking the outdoors? Is it information, fear? What is preventing them from going outdoors? And what are you doing to open that up?

Luisana Méndez:

Well, I think the first thing is why we are here. So we are immigrants, we are refugees. So we come looking for a safe space to grow out, to start again, to new opportunities. Most of the people just focus on the first years in study or work or get a better life or try to navigate all the United States system. Recreations take maybe, isn’t the last thing in the list people is ready to do. But when people feel comfortable in this new home, so they can take this day, oh, well, maybe we can try something different. For sure, language barrier is a big thing. Another thing can be the transportation and also the lack of information. Most of the parks just provide the information in English, always a little difficult to navigate, and the website so people don’t get all the information at the same time. So I really believe Wales Athenas is a bridge between park systems and the community to try everybody go together.

Mark Koep:

So what’s the main trend line across the folks you’re working with? Is it Spanish language or Venezuelans? Who are you working with primarily?

Luisana Méndez:

Yes, like I say, immigrants, the first generation of immigrants and refugees, the different countries. We serve, I think, all the Latin American, different backgrounds Latin American. And that is beautiful. Even when we speak the same language and even when we are all Latinos, we can find difference between our culture, between our countries. And this is beautiful. And this diversity language made us super happy to share and exchange because maybe the expressions I can use in my own country in Spanish for our country can mean something totally different. So also we have to be so careful, explain between us what we want to say, what we try to say when we express some of the the things. But yes, I think that is the diversity group. And that’s the beautiful thing, Serbian people from Mexico, Chile, Peru, Colombia, of course, Venezuela. Yes.

Mark Koep:

So one of the things, I got a question for you. You mentioned immigrants and refugees. Can you define that for me? What is the difference between the two? You mentioned them differently. What’s the delineator there?

Luisana Méndez:

Yeah, some of the immigrants come from their countries with opportunity for a student exchange, maybe because they come for, go to the college, or they get engaged with somebody in, with one citizen in United States, or in different, or they come for one good job offer. versus the refugees, we come to this country looking for safe. So United States provide us the protection for beyond political asylum or refugee or these kind of things.

Mark Koep:

Okay, very interesting. So this obviously could be a hot button topic right now, right? We’re in an election cycle and all that type of stuff. So one of the things that comes to mind here is that in order to And this may be, correct me if I’m wrong, but like assimilate, become part of the country. There is an appreciation of the resources and the natural space that’s in that country. And that’s a, that’s a large thing that you’re doing to invite people outdoors. What do you find when they first step outside and start going into the state parks and public areas within Minnesota and so forth? I would imagine there’s a sense of community and coming together that happens as you go through that experience. What do you see as people are invited out and they experience this for the first time?

Luisana Méndez:

Yes, well, I just started exploring the Minnesota parks for myself just because that made me feel happy, good, and I want to know more about Minnesota so I can feel more belong at this place. And I share everything in social media and I share all the details about parks and that I start the curiosity from people. So they ask me, can I go with you? Can you teach me how I can do the same? So when I start leading a group of walk or hike, yeah, I think the first thing was surprise. Oh, this is so beautiful. Oh, I don’t know this exist. But also I listen careful all the barriers they feel like they don’t want to walk alone. They don’t know how to navigate in the park. They don’t know how to read the maps. They don’t know if walking alone in the park can be safe, if they need to pay for parking, all this kind of information. And also, they don’t feel confident enough to do it for themselves. So people sometimes, when listening to somebody talking about outdoors, The first time for most of the people is, oh, I need expensive equipment in order to do that. So we teach people, no, you can start with your basic things. We live in Minnesota. We have six months of snow and very heavy winter. And yes, it’s super cold. So we teach people how to dress appropriately in order to be out for more time of the year. I think that is the biggest thing we do with them and how they express how now their life changed a little bit. So they feel more confident to go. They feel our activities is the great time they can spend on families. So it’s the same activity they can spend like, for example, a family with parents and kids. Oh, this is the the activity I can really engage with my kids because they are teenagers. Of course, they don’t want to be with parents.

Mark Koep:

And I’d invite the others to feel free to jump in with questions, but I’ll go with one and then others can jump in here. So are you running into any barriers as you seek the outdoors other than like language barriers and just non-awareness of how to participate in those activities? Are you hitting any other barriers as you venture out?

Luisana Méndez:

No, I think from the community, no. I think people just choose where activity or what kind of activity they want to try. We offer all year round activities for all seasons and most of the time, evenings or weekends, so they can choose which activity they want to go. And for the organization purpose, of course, we are a new non-profit. We are starting, you know, the grant process and getting resources for our activities. And I understand, and we understand, my community understand that it’s a process. And we hope we can have more resources to offer more activities for the community.

Mark Koep:

Okay. Anybody else have any questions? All right, let me ask the question. You mentioned you’re going for grant programs and so forth. What’s that process like? Who are you getting grants from and who’s funding your organization?

Luisana Méndez:

So, for the first year, we are doing a direct contract with different parts and agencies. So, they use a contract to lead a group. Another part is just a partnership with other agencies. They provide equipment, they provide training, and I just bring people. And now, starting the process for grants, so we are super excited because we applied for Together Outdoors, the roundtable grant. We can fund six camping trips this summer, and that was amazing.

Mark Koep:

That is amazing. All right, cool. So anybody who’s viewing this, who’s in the Minnesota area, if they want to reach out, invite you out to their properties or whatnot, how do they connect with you?

Luisana Méndez:

So they can find out through the website or through the social media accounts, Güellas Latinas.

Mark Koep:

Very good. All right. Well, thank you for joining us. The rest of the conversation, we’ll just kind of dive into open conversation. And so now I’m going to open the floor up and the leading question I’m going to leave you all with right now is we just finished Labor Day weekend. And the big news going into the Labor Day weekend, at least in my book, was the announcement by RVIA that we would, that they were expecting to see a 55% drop in RV travel going into last weekend. That number stuck out to me. It wasn’t 5% down. It wasn’t 5% up. It was 55% drop. Like obviously things have changed. So with that as the backdrop, what are you all hearing about what’s going on in the industry, both now and over Labor Day and as we go into this fall and winter season? Sandy, go ahead.

Sandy Ellingson:

I’ll let you go first. I’m sitting here going through in my head thinking, what can I discuss and what can I not discuss? So we’ve got some really good research coming up. Not to bring that up for somebody else that’s on our panel, but I did hear from several of my parks that were more resort oriented, that they had very good weekends. But there’s also been a drastic drop off after Labor Day. And so they are all very concerned about the fall season. We’re also seeing a delay in arrival of snowbirds, which is creating some problems in Florida. We’ve got a lot of snowbirds that normally come out of Canada and they show up around October, the first week of October, and usually they’ll stay through March, which is six months. And they’re now saying they are calling, trying to delay their arrival until December 1st. And most of them are saying things like they’re concerned about the election. They are hearing things on TV about rioting. And so they don’t want to be here during that. And so they’re thinking after the election, there needs to be a couple of weeks until everything settles down. And then you’re into Thanksgiving. So can they arrive December 1st? What the challenge for the parks then is that cuts off a third of their winter income. And if they keep that person that’s coming in on December 1st and staying through March, they’ve lost two months of their income. They’re not getting somebody to come for two months. So it’s a real struggle for them to try and figure out what’s the best tactic. And we’re actually going to do a round table on that next week to try and see if we can collectively come up with some really good ideas. So I do think, and I do think a significant amount of this is coming from the anxiety of the combination of the economy and the election coming up. I think we’ll see a return, but I don’t think it’s going to be until after the election.

Mark Koep:

Mike, what are you seeing?

Mike Harrison:

Thank you, Sandy. Yeah, very, very similar information. I think our weekend was OK. We certainly didn’t see the drop off that I saw your post in the articles. We didn’t see anything like that. I mean, you might as well hit the DEF CON 5 button based on that information. But we didn’t see those. But to Sandy’s point, and we’ve been saying this for probably 18 months, you heard me talk about it, is the industry slowing in general. And, you know, Casey dropped off the call, but on, you know, CampSpot’s last data report, you know, they showed clearly a 5% national decline for occupancy for the summer. And then their forward 12-month look, and this is for all of CampSpot’s parks, right, so a couple thousand. It’s not, you know, completely accurate data, but it’s however much of their market share of the entire country. It’s the biggest single data point. just in terms of park occupancy. And every month for the next 12 months is down in occupancy for the most part, if I recall, except one year on year. So ADR is flattish or up, right? So maybe there’s a net neutral rev par, but, you know, booking window, as we all know, has shrunk. And exactly what Cindy said about snowbirds, you know, and that’s why, you know, all of our properties are in snowbird areas. So we usually get an indication before everybody else, how’s the year gonna go? Right. Because, you know, you know, if your booking trends are off, you know, in July, August, September, October, you know, for the upcoming, you know, Q1, then it’s going to be tough, you know, tough years. So our our. Our booking trends for the first quarter are OK, but it’s more indicative of we’ve known this been coming, so we’ve been working on it, we’ve been driving promotions. But our snowbird, you know, traffic to Sandy Point is absolutely down there. Time period is absolutely shorter, you know, which is an indication that it could be a challenging Q1, you know, for the industry for sure. Not surprised, you know, the Fed talked about dropping the interest rates again and they didn’t. So it seems like it’s imminent, but let’s see. And by how many basis points and what does that do? You know, Sandy mentioned the election, you know, what does that do? So I think everybody’s kind of sitting and waiting a little bit, you know, just to kind of see what, you know, what’s going to occur. But, you know, everything is cyclical. I think, you know, the overbuilding of all of the parks during COVID still has to be absorbed. But I feel, you know, we’ll still come out. It’s just, you know, we’re still comparing against 23, which is still better than 2019 in all the pre-COVID details. So it’s not doom and gloom. and, you know, the sky isn’t falling. However, a lot of the parks that were built during COVID because it’s, you know, an unbreakable industry, I think they’re all being surprised at slower than what their performance were ramped because it’s not, you know, that they didn’t open and they’re sold out, right? So it’s just some things we have to keep an eye on.

Mark Koep:

Jeffrey Scott?

Scott Bahr:

Yeah, I was gonna mention just Something that kind of relates to everything that we’re talking about in terms of where, kind of where the industry is overall, but there’s this gap to me between the outdoor rec enthusiast and people who are camping and glamping and staying at our, you know, the campgrounds and outdoor resorts. Throughout, I work with and have a lot of exposure to the people within the public lands. And for example, in here in the Northeast where I live, the White Mountains have been overrun with outdoor rec enthusiasts. The volume on the trails is higher than it was during COVID. On these trails, they’re putting 1,500 to 2,000 people a day on a trail. And these are areas that are not next to a population center. So people are traveling to participate in these activities. So why are they not staying? You know, that’s my question. I guess I should be able to answer that since I’m the research guy. But, um, and I have, you know, my own ideas on it, but I can’t, I can’t say with certainty what exactly what they are, but we’re not keeping those people. We’re not keeping them around. And I feel like there’s this big opportunity there for the industry to grab these people to capture them. I don’t know if you have to go to trail heads. and give people a flyer that’s come to your campground or not. But the fact of the matter is, is that the participation in the outdoors is higher, is higher, higher than it’s been. But yet we’ve seen this little bit of drop off in accommodations types and we’ve seen some changeover and reset to how people are staying. There’s a little bit more of a gravitation toward glamping, toward accommodations, toward other types of accommodations. So we know that that’s been happening to a degree, but I don’t think it explains everything and why we’re having that drop off. Road tripping is popular. People want convenience. They want to get out. I guess my whole point is I feel like there’s still this opportunity here. We just need as an industry to figure out how to grab and capture more of those people.

Mike Harrison:

And if I could supplement, you know, shameless plug for both modern campground insider perks and, you know, current consulting, you know, they just dropped their research report, um, you know, yesterday, which is indicative of what Scott said and kind of the driving distance and people searching more for free and how the search terms have different, you know, for the different kinds of, you know, camping versus glamping and, and all those kinds of things. So if you haven’t downloaded it yet, you can go on any of the LinkedIn or websites. um you know for their their new research report which you know highlights some of what scott says so you know uh great and it’s free so you know scott’s not going to shamelessly plug brian would plug it for himself but he’s not here so i’m happy to uh tell everybody it’s really good information check it out yeah and i’m playing with all the background stuff here so that’s the movement around sorry about that if i’m making you all dizzy um jeff you got anything to add on that yeah i i think overall

Jeff Hoffman:

The boom that we had is now leveling off. And in theory, out of every 10 years, there’s two great years. There’s two average years. And I think what’s happening is we’re coming into that. We’re above 2019, but there were a whole bunch of people that entered it. A lot of owners got really cocky when they were full. And rates went. So I’m going to be some adjustment on the rate side. And so they’re well run are still going to do well. It’s the ones that were living on the over demand that are going to start suffering. And also some of the ones and have to have those high prices are going to be suffering. So I do look for a little shakeout in our industry over the next year or two. I don’t think there are new parks, but the amount better are better than just building parks to build parks.

Mike Harrison:

You know, I have a question for anybody, and mainly the data guys, I have heard for years, you know, 2020 blue at record year, you know, this year is not as good as last year, but better than 2019. I’ve said it, you know, Jeff just said it, I’ve heard multiple, everyone says it. And my question is, according to what data? Like, how do we all make that statement? And I’m curious if the data guys can tell us, you know, what information are we all referencing when we say better than 2019? And if we’re just using our VIA stats, that’s obviously misleading, because that’s just RV purchases. That doesn’t mean, you know, success for, you know, the camping and glamping, especially when registrations are down. But Scott or Mark, I don’t know if you guys have any insights. When we say better than 2019, what are we referring to?

Mark Koep:

So what I found, I mean, it kind of goes to what you’ve talked about in the past where, you know, there’s, there is no industry data pool, right? So when I, when I say numbers, I’m actually referring to parks that I talk to. And, you know, I talk to parks all over the country. So I’m referring to that when I see it. And it’s definitely regional right now. There are some parks in certain States that are getting hammered like bad, and these are good parks. These are well-run locations where their numbers are below 2019. They’re actually down 2019. And it’s not just one park. multiple parks in different regions within that locale. Whereas if you shift into another region, they’re, you know, they’re okay. They’re not, they’re not down, they’re not up. But when I say all those numbers, it’s based on that parks numbers. And usually when, when you ask a park that number, they’re looking at revenue. What’s our revenue look like? What’s our bottom line look like compared to the past, right? So they kind of ignore average daily rates or expenses, all that stuff. What are we making at the end of the day? Are we doing better or worse than we were before?

Scott Bahr:

And for me, it’s overall participation figures that, you know, they’re estimates, obviously, we don’t count every head that goes into a campground. But we do overall estimates, we do a lot of verification on the incidents, and so on, we double verify everything we do. And we see that overall participation is above 2019. It’s on, if you took out 2020, 2021, 2022, even, if you just pulled those out, and drew a trend line from say 2014 or 2015, it’s a continuous growth of around 5 to 6% annually. That was the growth that we saw before. And that’s what we’re seeing now, generally speaking, compared to those numbers. Again, it’s down year over year, but it’s up. And if you plot that trend line, which I’ve done, it’s consistent. It’s consistent growth. It’s where you would expect had we never had the pandemic.

Mike Harrison:

That’s interesting. And one of the reasons I asked the question is a couple of weeks ago, I was preparing an owner’s report and I used and so Scott and Mark, Scott’s got a little more data, but Mark, that’s kind of what I’ve been doing is anecdotal a little bit. And so, you know, preparing the owner’s report and one of the banks said, and where do you get this information from? And so I reached out. I know I reached out to Scott at the time. I reached out to Camp Spot. I reached out to Ojai and same answer as always. um you know we just don’t necessarily have so I had to cobble together you know camp spots information I just referenced of the next 12 months I cobbled together some of what Scott said and I cobbled together Ojai and you know the uh annual report that they have and just really referenced you know a number of new parks and new sites but that’s they only survey you know a couple hundred or whatever the number is properties so that’s not good either and so that’s what I’ve been having to do is cobble together data so I think You know, since most of us are science nerds here, you know, we’ve always got to be careful when we reference, you know, information, because I think some of it’s anecdotal, unless we have sources. And that’s not a caution to you. That’s that’s to myself and to anybody else who always talks about it, because we try and provide good information and data to our owners and to our clients. And I was just curious if you had information that was really the main thing. Yeah. more than anything else. We always say against 2019 pre-COVID year. You know, it’s funny.

Mark Koep:

We were talking in the last show we did, Brian referenced the Google stats, right? Google is showing search traffic down. And we were internally, we were talking about it, too, because we see a decline in traffic at campground views that was earlier than normal. And does that mean that people aren’t camping a little bit? But I also think it means people are camping closer to home. And you don’t necessarily need to go search for campgrounds that are in your local area because you already know where they’re at, right? You don’t need to go use a search engine and find the RV park that’s down the street. So that, that skews the numbers. If you look at like Google stats or campground view stats, you’re going to see weird numbers where you’re going to see a drop because people just aren’t searching because they’re not traveling. a long ways, they know the parks that are more local to them. And so an entity like Camp Spot giving you raw booking data like that, or aggregate booking data across a bunch of parks is going to give you a much better data set to choose from, definitely. Yeah.

Sandy Ellingson:

Well, and the other thing we’ve got to look at is properly categorizing our parks. Because if you stick long-term state parks and 55 plus parks and partly seasonal parks and fully transient parks, and you throw all that data in together, the analytics are ruined because you don’t know what percentages, you know, it’s going to be completely different. The average daily rate, if you try to look at that for a long-term state park where that data is in there muddled with our transit parks, it throws all the numbers off. And nobody is really looking at that except for when Scott and them potentially do their specific report with KOA or something like that.

Jeff Hoffman:

Hey, Mike. I know my reports, how I get my information is basically I compile my clients, and I have their information going back for as many years as they have. And that’s what I use for reference over. almost all of the United States, it gives me a pretty good view of what’s going on in each area. And that’s live data that a lot of times you can’t get it because I’m working with them and I have non-disclosures. I won’t tell you, but I can compile their information into my stuff. And that’s how I get the trends off of their live data.

Mike Harrison:

And that’s helpful. And that’s probably, I imagine, less than 100 parks. So it’s good. But I don’t know that that’s statistical enough. And it’s interesting, Sandy. I’ve been having this discussion with Amir. And we’ve been talking with Brian about exactly what you just said. Because if you look at ELS’s, oh my gosh, K1, I can’t remember what their quarterly file. Yeah. And our Florida parks ran 98% occupancy. Yeah, exactly. But if you look at the rest of the industry, they’re not running 98% occupancy. But again, to your point, long-term versus transient. And again, if you think about hotel statistics, what is corporate lodging versus a transient hotel and what the ADR difference is. And so Amir and I have been having that exact same discussion, too, about how you categorize and understand the debt. Because we have so many different roles at CRR. We’re owners, we’re consultants, and we’re managers. depending on what day it is, we put a different hat on. And so when we’re providing information for performance, right, that’s when we’re trying to be the most careful and trying to educate an owner, you know, you can’t use, you know, if you’re looking at ELS or suns numbers, you know, throw that away, you know, because that’s not what your performance is going to be, you know, and, you know, understanding what the debt. So that’s why we all, we constantly do what everybody on this call is doing, which is use as many data points as we can to make a best estimated guess you know what the indications are saying depending on segment depending on part of the country depending on park size depending on there’s so many depends and you know you hope you get it right so i mean i didn’t mean to go down a rabbit hole there i was just you know

Sandy Ellingson:

Well, there is a plan that will happen in next year to start building a data center that’s going to be available to every aspect of our industry to give us better reporting. And we’ll probably be testing it towards the end of first quarter. It will probably launch towards the end of second quarter. Most of you will be invited to be subject matter experts and to help do some of that development. But one of the interesting things about it is that it’s going to, it all came out of the hotel industry wanting to get into the campground industry, doing a little bit of research and then coming back and going, whoa, this data is terrible. And we all knew it, but nobody would listen until somebody like the hotel industry came in and looked at it and said, we can’t work with this data. And so now, because they have very clearly defined data sets, they’ve spent years learning how to manage and measure. And we haven’t done that. So I’m hoping that we’re going to learn some things from some of our hotel experts, people like you, Mike, that have that kind of a background, while still being able to give honor to the fact that campgrounds are different and you cannot measure us like you can a hotel.

Mark Koep:

And discussing that in one month, most will be at the glamping show, which will be taking place in Aurora, Colorado. So let’s let’s dovetail into the upcoming show season, because one of the one of the great things for a lot of the northern parks is Labor Day means your season’s almost over. And I know that people count down the days till they get to lock that gate and walk away from the park and chill out for a bit. And the first show of the season is The Glamping Show coming up, like the first big show. And we will be doing, or not we, but Brian will be doing this show live from The Glamping Show. And so some of us will be there. A quick show of hands, who will be at The Glamping Show? And with that, okay, so we got myself. So I’m gonna go to Scott. Scott, What are you looking forward to most at the Glamping Show and what are you going to be listening for as you’re there?

Scott Bahr:

Well, first and foremost, I’ll be presenting again this year. So on the first day, I’ll be presenting a follow-up to the report that I presented last year, just kind of a state-of-the-industry survey of operators that you know, we’ll have just, you know, kind of a basic overview of what, you know, we’ve seen just from from that set of operators that we surveyed. So they’re, um, you know, and they’re generous, they allow us to have a booth. And as a market research person, it’s always interesting to have a booth. That’s something something I hadn’t done till last year, because people don’t typically just walk up and shop for market research at a show like that. But we’re I’m looking to just connect with other people in the industry see together. I’m I’m gonna use the show as a way to gather information On what’s going on in the industry to talk to people? And really spend some time. I mostly listen I do a lot of listening but If you stop by my booth, I also might ask you to answer some questions on a little notepad or something, because I like doing that. It’s a great way for me to gather information and insights. Anyway, that’s what I like. That, for me personally, it’s just a great opportunity. I like the Glamping Show a lot. It has a very different vibe to it than some of the other shows, and it’s interesting. Different group of people.

Mark Koep:

Mike, same question to you. What are you thinking?

Mike Harrison:

Sure. We’re very excited. And as I mentioned, we have multiple hats. So I look forward to being an attendee. I love to listen to the sessions and see what’s going on, see the new glamping units. We’ll be there as a vendor peddling our third-party services from a glamping standpoint, as we’ve obviously got quite distribution experience with the glamping, and then also a speaker with the AGA also. depending on the audience, I get different perspectives from what I’m doing. But I agree with Scott. It’s one of my favorite shows. I love the vibe. I feel that there’s such an interesting mixture of folks. There’s John and Sally, who are opening up a five-site unit, and then the institutional-type capital that’s there, especially in the last couple of years as more players have gotten into the space. And then as we’ve seen, Hyatt and Hilton just made their announcements with partnering with AutoCamp and Under Canvas. it’s just going to continue to expand. It’ll be interesting to see how the show evolves and changes. That’s what I’m looking the most forward to because it continues to and it will continue to over the next couple of years as it becomes more broadly distributed and people understand glamping. As you see in Scott’s reports, glamping trends and searches continue to be up. I’m excited to see how it changes and what’s new and what’s exciting and how everybody’s interacting.

Mark Koep:

That’s excellent. Sandy.

Sandy Ellingson:

Well, I love to go to, because it’s still kind of new to watch the trends and see how things are changing year to year. That’s what I go and look for. I don’t like to sound ugly, but we have to, if we’re in the campground industry, we do have to see the glamping side of things as a competitor. And because Yes, we can provide glamping inside our campgrounds and you know if you’re K away, you can build your own glamping you know parks, but for the most part, our mom and pop parks. If somebody takes a glamping night, it is a night potentially taking away from a camping night because. I’m a camper, but I’m also a glamper. So I’m the pot calling the kettle black because yes, there’s times when I’ll look at someplace I’m going and I’ll decide, you know what? I can take my rig and it’s going to cost me $500 in gas. And then this is what my stay is going to cost. Or I can take my car, which gets 60 miles to the gallon. It’s going to cost me very little in gas and I can stay in a really cool glamping site. Right? So I like to go and watch and see. I like to hear what the individual people that are providing glamping sites are. I was floored last year to learn that 80% of the glamping market is owned by individuals with sites on their own property. It’s not parks. I went into it thinking, you know, parks would have more glamping units than individuals. And it’s not the case. So, you know, learning this new market, watching for the trends, learning, listening to how to market against some of those things for my campgrounds, because I do ultimately, you know, my passion is my campgrounds. So those are the things I go and look for.

Mark Koep:

Sandy just stirred the pot on that. And I’m going to lean into that one there. It’s an important point. And that is, and it’s not just individual glamping locations, but it also applies to people’s perceptions of harvest hosts and in hip camp. Well, I guess hip camp serving those individual locations and it could be a hot button issue. So anybody else want to chime in on that? What Sandy just brought up about the potential competition between an RV park or campground and a glamping resort or a glamping spot?

Mike Harrison:

Yeah, I’ll chime in. I don’t think it’s competition at all. I think you know, rising tide raises all ships. Outdoor hospitality industry continues to grow. And it’s no different than the hotel segment where, you know, a JW Marriott isn’t necessarily competing with a Knights Inn, but they all have their place, right? Or, you know, a 40, you know, room boutique hotel isn’t necessarily competing with a Palomar, you know? So I think there’s a place for everyone. And, you know, we all work together to get better. It just helps the overall industry. When you have choice, And when you have distribution, it’s going to drive competition, which is going to drive innovation, which is going to drive usage. So I think the more that is, the more education it is of the customer, it’s just going to help the industry overall. So I don’t think there’s conflict. I think it’s exciting. I think there’s you know, opportunity and enthusiasm.

Sandy Ellingson:

There’s a difference between conflict and competition, though. I don’t think it’s conflict. And I love glamping and I love camping. I just do think, especially in this environment, to not acknowledge it as a point of competition. But, you know, because you’re looking at all the different parks, you’re trying to decide which one has the best amenities, which one has the best rate. Now you throw in glamping sites, and yes, it does become, it’s a decision point, and therefore it’s competition.

Mike Harrison:

I want all of them there. If a person has a fifth wheel or a pop-up trailer, are they going to stay in a three-night covered wagon, or are they going to bring their own?

Sandy Ellingson:

Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Been there, done that. That’s what I’m saying. I’m the pot calling the kettle black.

Mark Koep:

And I all agree with Sandy on that one, because that is a decision site even in our travels. Do we take the RV or do we stay in cabins? And in our case, we’re generally going to stay at a campground. But do we stay in a cabin or a glamping unit? And our decision cycle is exactly what Sandy said. We do the math on it. What’s the cost of gas, the cost of travel, the cost of food, comparing it to an RV trip, and how long we’re going to be out, and so forth. And I can agree with her that it’s not a conflict. There is competition there within that.

Mike Harrison:

Good. Still spending money.

Sandy Ellingson:

Yeah.

Jeff Hoffman:

I won’t be attending my partner, Greg. And we’re bringing out some clients. Look at what’s possible. We’ve attended, or I have, a camping show. to just keep my thumb on the pulse of that industry. You know, it’s one of the trending areas in this industry. It can go, it doesn’t have its own direction yet. It’s building that. So I just like to stay on top of it to see where it’s headed, because it can go in different directions from this point.

Mark Koep:

Well, I’ll add that the venue that David found for that glamping show, you couldn’t have found a better venue for it. That building in the outdoor area that they set up is, you know, anybody who’s even interested in the glamping industry, just go out for the outside vendors and check out all the different units. There’s always, I mean, Sandy, is this not true? There’s always something that you’ve never seen before set up out there in the yard.

Sandy Ellingson:

Yes. I love it. I wish I had an unlimited checking account because I’d buy one of all of them.

Mark Koep:

All right. So then after the glamping show, we have the National Association or Outdoor Hospitality Industries National Show, which will be in November. It’ll be during the election period. So that’s going to make things interesting. But in the lead up to that, we’ve got two folks here that are offering money for votes. I think that was you said, Mike, right? Money for votes or are we just No? No, he’s just running. So Jeff, Mike, go ahead and give the audience their reasons for voting for you in the upcoming elections for Ojai.

Mike Harrison:

Yeah, I prefer not to do that. I mean, there’s really not supposed to be electioneering, so I’m not going to pander for a vote. But all I would say is get out and vote. Exercise your rights.

Sandy Ellingson:

Well, I would say for both of you gentlemen that they could not have better representatives because you guys are plugged in. You care about our industry. You’re extremely knowledgeable and know what’s going on. You have the experience. So I would definitely recommend people vote for you. How about that?

Mike Harrison:

So is Sandy one of Jeff’s super PACs? Is that what I’m hearing?

Sandy Ellingson:

He deposited $50 to Venmo in my account this morning.

Mark Koep:

And to that point, you know, so somebody may be watching this and have no idea what we’re talking about. So if you don’t wanna plug yourself, at least plug what you’re running for and what that represents for Ojai.

Mike Harrison:

You wanna go ahead, Jess?

Jeff Hoffman:

Mike and I are both running to be board members of the Outdoor Hospitality Industry Board, which is the national association. and what a board member does is represent campgrounds to the operating section of Ojai, which is the national organization offers discounts and different things, funds some studies that will come out, offers 20 groups. They have a school that Starships 2 was provided by one of the members we had that as he passed the Starship fund to fund anyone that wants to go to our school at West Virginia. I don’t know, that is good because it manages and sets direction. And I think the way they set up this new election, it allows us to get The people that have applied are younger and more active. And I think it’s a great direction that we’re heading to get more involved in this. Because there are 16 people for eight spots.

Mike Harrison:

No, it was actually, it was over 30 originally, right? And so what I would add to that is You know, there’s obviously, for most people to know, been a significant change, the significant change in how, you know, what Ojai used to be, which was ARVIC, and, you know, represented the states, and states had membership to ARVIC, and then, obviously, Ojai became a national association to itself, and the state associations, you know, decided to do what they’re going to do. So, I think it’s an interesting opportunity because it changes, obviously, as Jeff mentioned, the way the board operates, where it used to be a state representative also, where you’re representing your state. That isn’t the case now. And if you look at the, you know, candidate list, there’s some impressive people on there. And I think what the opportunity is, is whomever, you know, people vote for, you know, the people that are being elected are passionate, knowledgeable, committed individuals to moving the industry forward. And what Ojai does is education, it’s resources, it’s member benefits, it’s legislation and lobbying, and all the things to do that, you know, make, you know, your park or campground as well as the industry move forward nationally. Uh, which I think is imperative, right? There needs to be, you know, more of a presence tourism funding, you know, on state and national levels that, you know, traditionally, maybe only hotels get, um, you know, and then obviously mark work with the Arizona state and a couple other states to get, you know, funding and grants for outdoor hospitality, but it’s not wide enough. So I think that’s where the opportunity is here is, you know, continuing to move the outdoor hospitality industry forward. And, you know, whichever candidate you choose, you know, you’re going to make a great choice for a passionate individual who can represent, you know, the general membership.

Mark Koep:

And heading into this last 10 minutes here, I don’t have a topic, I don’t have something to talk about. But what I was thinking is I was going to ask is, what do you all as you shake your crystal ball? What how do you think the next three months are going to shake out? And how does the next year look? And what are you focusing on over this time period, as you both work through your business problems and whatever issues you’re dealing with, and also prepare for what comes next? Shake your crystal ball a little bit. Tell me what you’re thinking about.

Sandy Ellingson:

So for me, what I’m talking to my parks about is to take this time while it may be slower to invest in education and also to try some things that they may never have been willing to try in the past. There was some really great information that came out from the KOA report this past year of some new things that just shocked me. Car camping, walk-up camping. I mean, you know, who would have ever thought we would have something called walk-up camping, right? Because we have occupancy to spare right now, it might be interesting to test some of these things and do some quick because people do winter camp right so even I have parts that they’re closing for the winter because I can’t have their. their water on, but we can do some day camping, some walk-up camping, some things we’ve never tested, but just create those opportunities over the weekends for people to get out and do things in new ways. And then secondarily, what I’m encouraging my parks to do is spend some time thinking about ancillary income streams. We started this four years ago after hearing a keynote and I was just really inspired by it and my parks that have really embraced ancillary income streams have found a way to buffer the occupancy because of the decrease in occupancy because they have ancillary income streams. So those are the two things I want to focus on and I want my parks to focus on between now and the end of the year.

Scott Bahr:

Um, well, you know, I think the next couple months are gonna be pretty decent. Um, I think, you know, there’s gonna be a good leaf peeping season in the northern areas, especially I think, uh, look for a solid October. Um, there’s talk that the leaves may peak early, just so people keep an eye on that. The the winter camping as Sandy mentioned we’re gonna have some more information coming out on that soon on winter camping and snowboarding So our snowboarding see you’re in my heads that it was in the 40s here this morning. I’m already thinking about them like anyway snow birdie It’s a so you’re looking at that there’s so, you know, keep an eye on for that information coming out in the next few weeks, hopefully. And what, you know, I think for us, the focus really is we’re doing a lot more in the moment kind of research. We want to get more information from people. We’re focusing a lot on talking to folks right kind of at the point of contact, as well as doing a lot more interviews with people to gain some context in what’s going on out there. Because as I mentioned earlier, while there’s all these challenges, I’m viewing it as these opportunities and where is all that headed in terms of those trade-offs and where things are going in the next year, which I think we’re gonna see things settle back in here within the next year I really do I I just it just feels that way to me so yeah, I’m Usually as the research guy the glass is half empty, but I’m going glass half full today write it down Most most everybody that knows me knows that I don’t have a crystal ball.

Mike Harrison:

I have my magic eight ball and Right. So, you know, so what will the next 12 months look like? Will it be better than the previous 12 months? Yes. Magic 8-Ball said yes. What if I asked it again? Yes. Yes again. So Magic 8-Ball says it’ll be better. But, you know, what are we focusing on? You know, we always tell our leaders, you know, you focus on what you can control, not what you can’t control. And what we can control is effort. And so, you know, one of CRR’s hallmarks is the word grit. Right. And, you know, you try and try and try, you leave every last bit of sweat on the court and, you know, do what you can do. And, you know, we just got through our thousand calls of summer initiative, you know, where every leader had to make, you know, prospecting calls and, you know, yielded over 100 grand worth of business. Right. And so I think that’s, you know, one of the things that, you know, we always want to focus on is different top line initiatives. And then the second one we’re doing now is reputation management. So our scores are outstanding. Coachella has a 4.9 on Google. River Sands has a 4.8. Very, very, very highly regarded parks, but it doesn’t mean we can’t do more. And because in these tougher times, what differentiates you from everybody else is the reputation management and what you offer to your customers. And so that’s our focus for September is driving more reviews and seeing if we can get a 4.9 to a 5.0, I don’t know. you know, or what it might be. But that’s what we’re really focusing on is top line and reputation management.

Mark Koep:

Very interesting. So, Mike, before I jump over to Jeff real fast, if you can share some secrets, what specifically are you doing to help drive that reputation?

Mike Harrison:

Well, I mean, the deliverable obviously has got to be a no-brainer, right? I mean, you have to have outstanding people, outstanding processes, you know, but if you’re asking about techniques to get more reviews, You know, there’s certainly, and those are, you know, some of the things that we’re providing to the teams are, you know, tips and techniques and best practices. You know, in every one of our post-stay emails, we provide the Google link. We have little, you know, Google and TripAdvisor cards at every front desk with the QR code. We physically ask our associates, you know, if their name gets recognized in a survey, they get, you know, an incentive. We also have a guest survey that we send out to every single customer afterwards. It’s different than the post-date email. They all have the Google link in it. So it’s an intentional effort to make sure that we’re asking for those reviews to drive more.

Mark Koep:

I love it. Thank you, Mike. Jeff.

Jeff Hoffman:

Yeah. As far as future growth, I would like to go back to where we started. with Luasa and just say that I believe a lot of our growth is going to be in diversity that we haven’t really embraced and we’re starting to and we’re starting to see an increase in all areas coming out to do camping. not just the traditional campers. So I do think that this is an area that has to be embraced and driven for us to keep increasing our growth because they are, everyone is, the United States is growing and we need to meet those needs, so.

Mark Koep:

And Luisana, you can close this out. What’s your thoughts on the next few months, the next year for the camping and outdoor industry?

Luisana Méndez:

Yeah, well, the first thing I am so fascinated with this conversation. Listen, all this perspective from the industry, hospitality industry. I am very glad I am in Minnesota. And I feel very attractive for the to go to the bar for what the bar can offer or the place can offer. And always the bars are full here. try to set out or doing the Reservation for camping is super hard. We need to do three months before we want to go I never did a glamping. So now I am very interesting for glamping And I don’t know I am very thank you for this opportunity to share about where’s Athena’s we will focus and keep growing the organization offer more activities for our community and keep exploring parks and different stages. We did last weekend our first trip out of Minnesota, we go to Wisconsin, from Boston Island, and that was magic. And we for sure have people who want to travel and different national parks and different parks in all the countries. So I think I will focus on what other things we can offer for our community.

Mark Koep:

So what I’ll encourage you with too, with your organization is start connecting with some of the private RV parks and resorts that are out there. You’re going to have a different experience and you may end up enjoying that too. So I’d encourage you and your organization also reach out to some of the private parks and go stay at them and experience those places. You may find that they offer stuff that the state parks don’t, and they may have sites available for you too.

Luisana Méndez:

Yeah, absolutely.

Mark Koep:

All right. Well, this has been modern. campgrounds, fireside chats. I didn’t blow everything up. We succeeded for an hour. I think our guests, um, if you’re out and about at the glamping show at the national association events or the other trade shows that are coming up here, stop us all and say, hi, we’re friendly. We don’t bite except no, nobody on here bites. So you’re good. And, uh, thank you all for Scott. You’re going to bite somebody. No, you’re good. Thank you all for joining us. Everybody have a good day. I’ll close this out right now.

Jeff Hoffman:

No, thank you.

Mark Koep:

Thank you. Bye bye.

Luisana Méndez:

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00:

This episode of MC Fireside Chats with your host, Brian Searl. Have a suggestion for a show idea? Want your campground or company in a future episode? Email us at hello at moderncampground.com. Get your daily dose of news from moderncampground.com. And be sure to join us next week for more insights into the fascinating world of outdoor hospitality.