Manufacturer Discusses Evolution, Personalization & Texture Of Towables At Hershey RV Show
The teardrop trailer is an ever evolving structure of American culture. It had its heyday in the vintage past before the advent of bigger than life motor homes. There however is now a steady movement of aficionados back to this simpler time. Little Guy Trailers, situated in the lot of the Hershey RV Show between such companies and Woodland Park & Fleetwood, maybe a smaller outfit but maintains its identity. For many, their trailers and RVs are ones of personality with the miniaturization of life’s luxuries being able to fit a smaller package. Little Guy Trailer’s Chief Brand Officer Chris Baum sat down with The Buzz underneath umbrellas with their line of Tabitha trailers, made for women in the background, to discuss customer understanding, the importance of community and the changing face of RVing.
The Buzz: Identity is a changing thing in the RV industry especially with something like Tabitha which caters to woman. What was the design approach?
Chris Baum: Our product lends itself to that, especially with women. [The Tabitha] has a different style and a different look to it…non-traditional. [These trailers] have a lot of personality to them. This is not going to be intimidating to somebody where you have to worry about slide outs and everything else. They are also going to be able to tow them typically with the vehicle that they have. You can do it with a simple SUV. It is 17 or 18 hundred pounds. A Subaru can pull it. I was just at a show with a woman. She had just bought a new SUV. She loved her car…wouldn’t trade it for anything…and she came to the show to buy something. People love their cars and they buy them for a reason. You don’t want to have to go buy a different vehicle just so you can camp. [For Tabitha], we partnered with Girl Camper and Jeannie Peddick. She goes and does these Girl Camper events at colleges around the country, and, actually our dealers, after they do a Girl Camper event, they become Girl Camper certified.
The Buzz: What does that mean?
CB: That means the sales staff have been trained about how to talk to women about camping and to show them the ins and outs of it. I was at an event…a Girl Camper college event…and there was a group of women…they call themselves “Weekend Widows” because their husbands work all week…and then on the weekends, they are watching football. They’re playing golf. They’re doing everything except spending time with their wives and so the women want to be able to get out and do stuff even if she just wants to go to a local campground to read a book, listen to some music or just get away on her own time.
And the Tabitha has everything necessary?
CB: We have a three way refrigerator. We have a stove and air conditioning. We have an instant hot water system. You can take a hot water shower in these things. And they’re set up as such so the cabinetry is like…I don’t want to pigeonhole it…but female friendly. Specifically on that, we partnered with the people at Mary Jane Farms Magazine. They got in touch with us about designing a trailer and were involved in the design process of it. We decided to call it the Tabitha. We have had a lot of success with it.
The Buzz: Were these kinds of trailers always an idea of the brand or a recent evolution?
CB: Dutchmen initially produced and manufactured it. They gave the line-up in 2008 so it was going to be a perfect evolution from our smaller tear drops into a little bit larger tear drop where they kind of look like the big brother and little sister.
The Buzz: Can you speak on the evolution of the tear drop age bracket and not just the female shopper the Tabitha is targeting?
CB: That has been great for us because our demographic is truly all over the board. You have young people starting out who could never afford a big RV or something like that but they still want something cool. They want something with the amenities they have become used to. We have USB charging ports…and they come Bluetooth ready…so a lot of modern conveniences that the young people are used to having. We integrate all the way up to older people that have tent-camped all their life but want to get up off the ground. We got the bathrooms for the middle of the night [because] you have to get up more in the middle of the night when you’re older. It is a dry bath so you have a tank toilet and a shower which, as I said, is provided by an Instant Hot water system that runs off either propane or electric. A couple years ago…I am a huge Ohio State fan…my daughter goes there…we went to an Ohio State/Michigan game and it was 17 degrees outside. Inside the trailer it was 72 degrees and we both took hot showers and that was just running off the propane.
The Buzz: How did you get into this arena?
CB: I came from the corporate world. Little Guy has been around for 15 years. About 3 years into it, a close friend of mine, who is the owner of the company: Joe Kicos…they were just starting to grow a little bit. And he needed a good sales. I was miserable doing what I was doing in the corporate world. I never really camped…it wasn’t my world but it was sort of cool…and was something we could build from the ground up.
The Buzz: What have you learned about the outdoors?
CB: How passionate people are about it. How passionate our customer base is. We have almost 115,000 people who follow us on Facebook. There’s owner groups…Tabitha owner groups. [On top of that] there are over 60 teardrop organizations around the country. We have an event called Tearstock at a local campground in Ohio. We had almost 200 trailers this year. They come from Tuesday through Saturday. We have live music. We do wine tastings…craft beer nights…all of that…and they just hang out together for a week and tell their stories.
The Buzz: You have seemed to have found the right identity in terms of your customer base.
CB: We are very close with our customer base. We are close with our dealers. Not a lot of manufacturers listen to what the customers are saying. They are going to build it and you are going to sell it. We do the exact opposite. We have a dealer advisory [board]. We have 10 or 15 dealers we are very close with. When we are thinking of doing stuff…we go to them…and get their thoughts…but some of the best ideas for our trailers have come from our customers. They reach out to us and say “Look what I did! Look at this! Check this out! You should do that!” From having drink holders on the walls in the trailers to sliding screen doors and all the different amenities, [we try to make it] very comfortable.
The Buzz: What does your daughter think of something like the Tabitha?
CB: She is not a camper but she likes our stuff better than others because they have more of a personality…an identity to it…people can customize. People name them. If you go to their Facebook pages, people name their trailers.
The Buzz: From your perspective, what has fueled this new teardrop revolution?
CB: The idea of camping is that you spend 90-95% of your time outside the trailer. I think people are figuring that out. Plus it is more important for people to leave a small geological footprint out there. And more people are into that now. With our stuff, you can go virtually anywhere. You don’t have to go where they tell you to go. If you want to go off the road and go to a state park and you just want to go camp somewhere, you can do that. [Also] we have handles on the front of the trailers so you can wheel them around. They are that light. This country is a beautiful country. There are so many neat places to go. [A good example] is Andi Lee. She got rid of everything…closed her apartment down and she has been living in one of our trailers for 100 days chronicling her journey around the country. It is amazing.
Tim Wassberg
A graduate of New York University's Tisch School Of The Arts with degrees in Film/TV Production & Film Criticism, Tim has written for magazines such as Moviemaker, Moving Pictures, Conde Nast Traveler UK and Casino Player. He enjoys traveling and distinct craft beers among other things.
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