Spring - InsideOutdoor Magazine

the Use
Intelligence
Gear
Real-Time Visibility
Throughout the organization
High Staff Turnover
Capital Constraints
Camping’s Cool Gear, Lukewarm Outlook
by Martin Vilaboy
Store-Level IT Investment
Meeting High Customer
“Steady, consistent, predictable”: those certainly are terms Expectations Federal & State Taxes Generated
that could describe the camping market during the past several by Activity Category, $Billions
years. “Flat participation” is another way to look at it.
Camping 0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70
$36.4
Bicycling
And it’s hard to see the latter as anything other than negative,
or at least worrisome, when considering the massive role Snow SMBsports All Retailers
$8.8
Percentage $17.7 of Respondents
Trail $11.2
camping sales play in the outdoor specialty sector. Camping-related
Paddling $4.8
activities, for example, annually generate almost as much Source: Fishing Gartner Group
$4.1
0.5 1
retail gear sales as snow-, trail- and paddle-based recreations all
Wildlife viewing $2.7
Influence
Hunting $2.2
combined, say figures from Outdoor Industry Association. The
Source: OIA
federal and state taxes generated by camping are more than
double those generated by bicycling, which is the number two Camping, for many, is thought of as a “family activity,” and
activity in terms of tax dollars generated.
How surveys Winners support Focus the on anecdotal Customer-Centricity
assumptions that “camping” is
Looking at the sheer numbers of participants, camping ranks
Educate
largely
and empower
reliant on families setting up a base next to their cars.
behind only hiking, biking and fishing, according to OIA’s most our in-store In a 2005 employees OIA survey, for example, eight out of ten “car campers”
90%
recent participation figures, while the annual spending on durable
using technology
and about two-thirds of those who camped 67% away from
goods per camping participant is second only to skiers their Add self-service cars (63 percent) said they go camping with other family 86%
customer-facing Technologies
among the primary categories of outdoor activities, at about members. We’d venture to guess that a goodly chunk 67% of the
to Improve
It’s all about our product
$440 a year compared to skiers’ $480 a year.
mix. If families we build it, found they at America’s campgrounds are what would 81% be
nels
considered will come. “traditional” families – two parents living together 80%
U.S. Outdoor Activities Markets Comparison, 2006Focus on a
with
more convenient
a couple of kids and maybe a dog.
77%
87%
12%
customerexperience
64%
Participants Gear Retail
Category
The problem is a shift in some U.S. demographics that’s
(000s) Sales ($M)
Improved in-store
71%
leading security to fewer and fewer traditional families to draw from.
65% Camp-based recreation 23% 12% 45,161 $8,676
69%
More According personalized to figures from the U.S. Census and The Brookings
Hunting 12,800 $6,886
73%
Institution, attention from both the average number of persons per household
47% Fishing 36% 16% 32,900 $6,416
our Employees
58%
Bicycle-based recreation 59,837 $6,230
in the U.S. and 0% the percent 20% of family 40% households 60% compared 80% to 100%
total U.S. households have been in decline for well more than
71% Trail-based recreation 26%
55,834 $3,340
Retail Winners
a decade, with those All declines Other
Snow-based recreation 15,587 $3,125
expected to continue into the
5% Paddle-based 51% recreation14%
23,596 $2,668
foreseeable future.
Source: Retail Systems Research
Source: OIA
Then again, maybe camping as a category really hasn’t had
40% 34%
a fair chance. For at least the last two decades, after all, the
In other words, for most general outdoor stores, camping
61%
53%
remains the 33% primary 6% reason why most folks walk through
the doors, and with those campers come all manner of addon
and impulse 38% sales. 9% Even for the more niche-enthusiast,
sport specialty shops, it’s certainly not unusual for hard core
Annual Durable Goods Expenditures Per Participant
$500
rtant
climbers, Not paddlers very important or anglers to visit a campground as part
of their play, so if camping is not a good part of your marketing
$400
and merchandising strategies, an opportunity likely
t Important
is being missed.
$300
Yet since OIA began tallying participation rates in
1998, charts tracking how many people go camping and how $200
often have been nothing but flat, with virtually no period of
sustained growth.
$100
Certainly, it’s not hard to understand the powers working
against camping’s popularity, such as some recent trends involving
$0
“done in a day” adventures, close-to-home pursuits and
“outdoors as a gym.” At the same time, some much larger national
trend lines aren’t exactly making the outlook any rosier for
future participation.
Bicycle
Source: OIA
Water Sports Camping Trail Snowsports
34 | InsideOutdoor | Spring 2008