[00:00:00] Speaker A: Sa all right, ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to season four of the camp guys podcast. My name is Jay Oliver. I'm the executive director here at Crowder's camps, and today, we want to be a resource for people who do not have resources. When we started up 10 years ago, we reached out to a couple camps and wanted just needed them to give us all the information they could about camp ministry. Some did, some did not. We want to give out every single nugget we have to anybody that's listening. So hopefully today in this, it will help grow your camp ministry. Today, sitting at the table, I have a few friends of mine. I have Noah Oliver. He's our director of experience. What's up, everybody? Noah, I know you're excited to be here today. Your very first podcast with us. Congratulations. Next we have my director of development, Nate Flowers. Nate, how are you today?
[00:01:23] Speaker B: I'm good. It's good to be back. Me and Jay started the podcast a while back. I took a break for a little while, and we dropped it. Covid happened holds shebang. We're excited to be back.
[00:01:33] Speaker A: Yeah, we got. We have. We've had a ton of people say they want the podcast back, said they have listened to it. So hopefully today this can be a resource. So let me start with a little bit housekeeping. Nate, what you got today?
[00:01:45] Speaker B: Well, so first, a lot of people. Maybe this is your first time listening or you haven't listened since season one. I just like to give a little disclaimer. The camp guys as a name is not meant to be chauvinist.
[00:01:57] Speaker A: No, it's not.
[00:01:57] Speaker B: We believe in camp gals, too.
[00:01:59] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:01:59] Speaker B: And you will hear from some camp gals at different points throughout the show. We just called it the camp guys because that's Jay's Instagram handle, the camp guy. And we just started there.
[00:02:08] Speaker A: Well, you know, guys, for a long time. Hey, guys. That means girls, boys, right? Right.
[00:02:14] Speaker B: So imagine you're just walking into a room saying, hey, camp guys, and just pretend that that could be anybody. So I always like to give that point out. And the other thing is, is if you have a question, if you want to answer publicly or privately, if you just want to know what we do or you want it answered on the show, you can email podcast at crowders with an S campswithanescom
[email protected] give you a little bit of reference. We are a. We run two locations right outside of Charlotte, North Carolina.
We run about 10,000 campers a year, is our volume. We are a nonprofit Christian camp. We are non affiliated with a denomination. Maybe that'll give you a little bit of background where we're coming from. We operate both group based camps, meaning a youth pastor booking. And we operate camps where mom is signing their kid up to come to camp. So we operate both. That's our background. Just so everyone knows where we're coming from before we get started. And hopefully this will be a good resource. No matter your background or if you're working in camp ministry right now or you're working in church ministry or if you are in college thinking about going this direction, maybe this will give you some great information to get started.
[00:03:16] Speaker A: Yeah. So let's get to it. So we're going today. We're going to talk about the money. So how do you raise your revenue from year to year? That's a question a lot of camps have. A lot of camps are stuck. So let's go back to last year's Final four national championship, ncaa. Who was it? The team that stood out amongst everybody.
[00:03:36] Speaker B: I couldn't.
[00:03:37] Speaker A: Who was it? Who was it? The NC State Wolf pack.
They come up. They basically won. I believe they won the ACC tournament. I'm not sure was a second place. We might have to fact check it. Okay, you can fact check it. But anyway, their story was they came out with a stay saying why not us?
[00:03:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:03:55] Speaker A: And so there's a lot of camps out there that are just stagnant, they can't grow. And I'm sure you've asked yourself, why not us? Because you look at some camps across the country, they're building a thousand seat auditorium, cabins left and right and just growing like crazy. So why not us? Why can't we grow? And just off the top of your head, Nate, what would you say one setback is that we found over the years of just why can't we grow?
[00:04:20] Speaker B: I think number one is, I think Dave Ramsey originally said this and I'm going to say it again. Sometimes you need to kill the sacred cow.
[00:04:28] Speaker A: Okay. All right.
[00:04:29] Speaker B: So what that means is if you think about a lot of Hindu culture, eastern cultures, cows are sacred. There will be people starving on the streets, but a cow walks down and nobody will eat it. It's a sacred cow. Everyone, nobody touches it. It's like the sacred thing. What's that thing in your program that hasn't changed for 10 years because it's some sacred element?
[00:04:49] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:04:50] Speaker B: Let's ask the question. If it's a sacred thing that you haven't touched in 10 years, is it the reason why you're not growing for some people, it's your facilities.
[00:05:00] Speaker A: Let's talk about facilities for a second. So if you're running, if you only can house 100 people and you're going to tap out at that capacity of growth revenue. So is it your boards holding you back from building another cabin?
[00:05:13] Speaker B: Right.
[00:05:14] Speaker A: Is it your worship space? You know they do make tents, right?
[00:05:16] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:05:17] Speaker A: You know, there's. There's ways around this where, especially in June and July, there's ways around this to grow without having to build a building. Yeah, our first three to four years, our worship building was a tent. People don't realize that. Now we finally have our worship building.
[00:05:32] Speaker B: But there are a lot of camps listening right now who probably do outdoor worship consistently. Right. That's how they do it. And I would say at that point, you're not really limited. Right. But sometimes it's a program, sometimes it's people in your organization.
I find it sometimes that the issue with growth is that the people on the ground making things happen. The people that are with the campers all day, the people that are cleaning the toilets after the campers, they have the perspective of we can't handle anymore. Yeah, they're overwhelmed. The fact is, most of what we do in camp ministry, it's not sustainable year round. It's sustainable for a season. Right.
[00:06:06] Speaker A: Summertime.
[00:06:07] Speaker B: And so a lot of times, if you have those voices in your ear consistently, then it can really hold you back because you're hearing all the time, we're overwhelmed. We can't handle anymore. We can't handle anymore. And then I would ask the question, is, is that true?
[00:06:21] Speaker A: Yeah, I. So let's jump. So these, these listeners, they're listening, they want those nuggets really fast. Yeah. So we got a capacity is number one reason why we can't grow. So if we increase our capacity, then we can grow. Well, we got some people thinking right now, well, we're more scholarship based. So how do you grow a camp ministry when you're more scholarship based than you are? Just revenue. Let me book this group. What do y'all think?
[00:06:44] Speaker B: Well, I think for scholarships, you're talking about an ability, an issue where you can't raise camper fees at all. You can't really touch it.
[00:06:52] Speaker A: Well, they want everybody to come for free.
[00:06:53] Speaker B: Right. And I would say the number one thing is you have to activate the community.
[00:06:58] Speaker A: Exactly.
[00:06:58] Speaker B: You have to activate the community around you. Find local people, or even just the broader community in your state and region that are willing to help support, that believe in the Power of camp. Believe in what you're doing, quite frankly. Even if you need to change your program.
[00:07:11] Speaker A: Yeah, I know.
[00:07:12] Speaker B: You need to change your program to fit with these funders who will pay the bills.
[00:07:15] Speaker A: I know. I did a seminar breakout at 3ca conference called my fundraising sucks. And you are not getting your voice out to the community. You know, if you are that scholarship based camp and you raise money for scholarships for all your kids to come to camp every single year, you're still not getting Yalls vision out to the community because there's people there that can help build more. More cabins, more capacity. And sometimes we are just so weak because we won't ask.
It's not about what I want from you. It's what I want for you to experience as a donor. That's good. The next thing I see is just constant improvements. You know, you got some camps we hear people talk about. This camp had old mattresses and bed bugs and things like that. You have to, if you're going to grow your revenue, you have to bring some type of eye candy, if you will, to the table every single year that people see the improvements that you are moving towards a goal of being the best that you can possibly be. I know for us, our operations guy orders 50 new mattresses every year. Do I like paying for those 50 new mattresses every year? Absolutely not. But I know it goes to make improvements to our camp and our campers backs. Right? Yeah. Are feeling that.
[00:08:27] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:08:28] Speaker A: You know what I'm saying? So we can move ministry. They got to sleep well.
If they don't sleep well, they're not going to come back. So we got a couple of things here. We got our capacity, we got improvements. And now I think efficiency. And efficiency also is a number one key to growing your revenue. If groups come and everything's confused and discombobulated, they want to see an organized process because their vision is to be organized. You know, they plan for months for their retreat, they plan for months for their camp to come into your place. Or a parent has prayed for months that their kid will have this incredible experience and they get here and you're disorganized. If you want to grow your camp, you've got to step up and have the efficiency, the right organization skills and hire the right people to be in place.
[00:09:13] Speaker B: I think sometimes we don't think about how many different times we have to touch a camper registration or a group booking or however it is you run your camp. There have been times in the past and sometimes this can be a Software thing. But we would spend a lot of manual effort to book a group or to book a camper for camp. Right. A camper signing up to come to camp. And it is a multi step process and we touch that registration multiple times. We're manually having to send emails consistently to talk to parents. Yeah. Whenever that happens. What happens is that your limit for growth is limited by that person sitting in the office chair.
[00:09:48] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:09:48] Speaker B: You can only grow as fast as that person can type.
[00:09:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:09:51] Speaker B: And what we found was that we got to figure out how to automate some of that because it was the. The lid on the trash can, if you will.
[00:09:57] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:09:58] Speaker B: Right.
[00:09:58] Speaker A: And we found some great softwares which we'll get into later.
[00:10:01] Speaker B: Right.
[00:10:02] Speaker A: That we can share with you guys that we think are really jam up and great. Last thing I messed up on this. I've tried to reach some big groups for retreats and camps and etc And I've come to the fact that I can only grow as much as my surroundings have the capacity to bring.
Does that make sense? So we're near the Charlotte metro area. You might be near Greenville, South Carolina or Nashville, Tennessee. You have to look around and say what's the average size of these groups that could potentially come even sororities. Even if we booked a secular group from Appalachia State University or UNC Charlotte, whatever it is, we have to look at what, what is their capacity to bring? In our book it's like 150 or 200. Is that kind of max limit? So why. Here's a question for you, camp leader. Why would you build a 600 seat auditorium if your max booking capacity around you?
Oh yeah. By the way, forget about local people not coming to your camp anymore because of transportation cost. They are. They would love to only drive 30 minutes to go to camp or retreat, but your facility is not good enough for them to come.
Wow. That. That is. That is ultimately issue now. If you have people driving four to five hours away when your camps on the way they pass your camps exit on 85, you're doing something wrong. Either a, you've not invited them for a tour seen as believing.
[00:11:32] Speaker B: Right.
[00:11:33] Speaker A: Or you've not given the information out or you're not doing the improvements to compete.
[00:11:37] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:11:38] Speaker A: And I think we all need to compete.
[00:11:40] Speaker B: I think that you have to really identify whenever you look at your camp programs and how you're trying to grow. How. What. What is the real, real demographic you're trying to hit and when. For us, we have two different types of bookings whenever we're talking about groups booking here, whether it be on a weekend retreat or a summer camp with us where we host them for a summer camp.
Most groups, like what Jay said, fall into that 200 person range. We do have quite a few that are over 400. Right. That are large. But in reality, there's not that many of those size groups knocking on the door. What we found was that we're turning away groups of 200. So whenever that, that sets a path for growth for us, like that's the path. Right. We know we've got to hit, figure out a way to get that group in because those. That's who's knocking on the door. For some people, you've just got individual parents of a certain age group for whatever reason in your area. A certain age group right now is just really surging. A lot of suburban areas have a lot of millennial parents right now having kids. And so these younger ages might be surging right now, but later your teen camps in 10 years might be busting up because millennials are waiting longer to have kids. You have to look at your area and figure out what is the biggest need, who's knocking on the door the most that you can't accommodate. And that will set your path.
[00:12:56] Speaker A: Yeah. So here you go. Here's your nuggets. Number one, identify the demographics of who you can reach and their, their, their amounts, their capacity. What kind of improvements are you doing?
What kind of efficiency do you have? And last one, what kind of relationships are you building? We try to build great relationships. Get some. We got loyal people. We've got people been here for 10 years straight in a row. And I think it's just the fact that we, you know, camper first mentality here to serve you guys. So good luck in your endeavors. Check out the next podcast coming up. Hope you can grow. God bless you. See you.
[00:13:32] Speaker B: Adios.
[00:13:55] Speaker A: Sa.
