Camping World and RV Store Parking

[happy2rv]

OK, I don't want this to become a Camping World bashing thread, but after a couple of recent trips I felt the need to vent. No matter your feelings about CW prices or policies or politics or whatever, there is a convenience and usefulness in the expectation of being able to find a well stocked store with common RV service and camping supplies, a known quantity if you will.

On our way to Asheville we wanted to pick up a membership to Passport America since the campground we selected for the weekend had PA rates available and the savings would pretty much pay for the membership. So we decided to "run in" at Knoxville and purchase the membership with the book to use that evening. We were towing the 35' travel trailer but I didn't give it a second thought. After all, it's camping world, they expect campers of all sizes to be coming to shop and for service, right? So we pull it up on Waze and away we go off the interstate to Alcoa Highway and into the Camping World parking lot. That's when the trouble started. Directly in front of us is a closed gate leading to the new RV sales lot. To our right is a parking lot full of new RVs with no open parking spaces and to our left is the showroom building with parking along the front. There are plenty of signs advertising RV sales and collision centers, but no signs directing parking. So the only logical choice at this point is to turn left in between the fence and the building which we do without any problem. Someone was backing out to leave, so we stopped to wait for them. Fortunate because as he was trying to maneuver around us he stopped to tell us that there was no exit and no turn around at the other end of the lot. OK, now what? Since we hadn't gone too far down the front of the building, we had no problems backing out to the entrance, but there's no way we're backing into the Alcoa Highway. So I sit there while my DW goes in search of someone to open the gate. She managed to find someone and get the gate opened but then there was no clear path through the new RV sales lot. They had some very helpful folks directing me and watching me but they had to go get a forklift and relocate a fifth wheel RV so I could pull through and exit the other side of the lot.

I've been to the CW location in Nashville many times and they used to have dedicated customer RV parking. But they recently moved down the road to a new location and no longer have RV parking. I wasn't towing the trailer this time but there really wasn't even sufficient parking for regular vehicles.

If stores that aren't explicitly RV related can do such a wonderful job of catering to RVs, you would think that a store that exists to sell RV parts and services would bend over backwards to accommodate us. At the very least, if you aren't going to have RV parking don't lead us into nearly impossible situations to get out of like the one lane dead end tunnel at the Knoxville store. Cabela's gets it. Cracker Barrel gets it. Even though Walmart doesn't have dedicated RV parking, even they get it. By making it convenient for RV customers to park, you make it convenient for them to spend their money on your goods and services. Make it difficult and we will pass you by. I promise if I had known it was going to cost me more than an hour of frustration I would have paid the full rate at the campground. Had I been able to park and shop, I likely would have bought much more. I needed other supplies but I waited until I disconnected at the campground and went to Walmart instead. Instead of shopping, I spent the whole time trying to get the truck and trailer through the lot and back out to the highway.

I do want to say again the staff was very helpful and apologetic and went out of they way to move things around to make a path, but they shouldn't have had to be.

[beemerphile1]

The local CW has lots of customer parking, unfortunately it is used as overflow parking for all the new rigs that don't fit on the sales lot. That doesn't leave much space for customers.

[Lakeland_Bob]

Well I'll be darned. Learn something new every time I look in here!

[DiskDoctr]

Ozlander wrote:
Now you know CWs business plan.

"BUY YOUR RV FROM CW."

"DON'T BRING IT BACK, EVER"

Hahahahaha!!!!

Sarcasm or not, this is the funniest thing I've seen here for a LONG time! LOL :C

[wa8yxm]

Have been to at least one where I had to be very careful about pulling in and out (38' A plus towed) but I made it.

I do agree not all are layed out that well.
The one in pooler Ga I do not think i'd wish to visit with the Motor home. With the little Neon no problem but when As I recall turnarounds were tight.

[happy2rv]

CW does sell PA memberships, https://www.campingworld.com/passport-america-1-year. As to why to buy it at CW as opposed to online, I hadn't decided until we were on the road whether or not I wanted to join. We were on the first day of a two week trip and already on the road. After I decided to join, I thought it might be easier to get the book with a physical temporary membership card than trying to join online while on the road, the same day we wanted to start using it. Turns out it might have been far easier to join online even if we were on the road.

We are mostly weekend campers with a few longer trips thrown in here end there. Even though we almost paid for the membership with the couple of nights we stayed near Asheville, I'm still on the fence as to whether it will be useful/pay for itself in the long run since the options closer to home are limited.

[Lakeland_Bob]

I can relate to the parking issue. But I can't help but wonder if I am missing something- why go to CW to join PA? They have Good Sam and I can't find anything that indicates they sell their competitors membership.

But if you want to join PA you can do it on line,

[bobsallyh]

The year or two old CW on I-15 in Idaho Falls is a complete joke. Ever since CW started selling RV's the parking has gone away. Another outfit that uses the same plan is U-Haul.

[DutchmenSport]

Yea, as we travel from Indiana to South Carolina, and sometimes on to Florida, we've learned not to stop at Camping World along those routes when towing the trailer. We learned the hard way too. We don't stop at Camping World any more (anywhere) when towing the trailer for this very reason. Which we do miss, because we use to stop in on our travels all the time. But the logistics of maneuvering the parking lots with trailer in tow is simply not worth it any more.

So, we plan our visits to Camping World (either Richmond or Greenfield, Indiana) a couple times a year now on a week-end when not camping and the trailer is home.

[BB_TX]

Agree with above, it is not an exclusive CW problem. Most RV places I have been into had the parking lots stuffed with new RVs with very little room to maneuver a towed or large RV in/out of their parking lot.

[Ozlander]

Now you know CWs business plan.

"BUY YOUR RV FROM CW."

"DON'T BRING IT BACK, EVER"

[D_E_Bishop]

This is not a CW exclusive. A super market chain by the name of Trader Joe's, has the worse parking lots. The original is less than five miles from our S&B, the one close to us and the one in Hollywood are so bad even the employees openly complain about the parking.

They now have a security guard(for a different reason)and he guides people in and out. The handicapped spaces are 10 to 20 walking steps from the store entrance, the canopy at the entrance hides the lot ingress when backing out of those spaces. As if just that wasn't enough, during the the last grocery clerks strike, folks became so accustomed to shopping TJs that they continued shopping there, the LADOT put in bike lanes on the ingress and egress street and and removed a traffic lane, so now cars are backed up on the street and there is no storage for folks making left turns are blocking one of the lanes from the other direction.

It is a business decision to buy those stores because buying vacant land and building a new store with planned parking is too spendy.

[Optimistic_Para]

This is by no means an RV only situation. I used to work at an auto parts store (independent) that was next door to a Honda dealership. We had dealership customers parking in our lot all the time, occasionally even a couple of the mechanics who worked next door. They had every possible parking place crammed full of cars to sell, didn't leave enough open spaces for their customers, or even their own staff.

99.9% of car dealerships are owned by ex car salesmen, who are fixated on selling as many cars as possible. Many of them wouldn't even have parts departments or service bays if they could get away with not having them - the factories REQUIRE them as a condition of having a dealership.

[mike-s]

Can't get your rig out of our parking lot? Why not trade it in on a new one? Can we tell you about our financing plans?

[Sam_Spade]

It is a business decision for sure.....made in a vacuum, it seems.

CW gets paid to store new units until they are sold. In the spring, it looked to me like they were storing enough of them at many of their locations so it appeared that CW was acting as a distribution point for other dealers. And that resulted in NO parking....or almost none.

Lately, the situation seems to have improved somewhat.

But things like this should not be surprising, given that Marcus said a few years back something like: We don't really make any money on selling physical things. Most of our profit comes from the sale of intangible things....like road service and insurance and marketing your personal information to other companies.