Microlodge and Microlodge camping opportunities for the astute entrepreneur and/or established business.

Can you market the Microlodge successfully? Will you install them on your site or park? Please read this page and then give us a call before you budget for the 2010 season! Talk to Keith on 01279 725 345

The tent camping and mobile home holiday sector of the leisure industry has had little or no competition until the last few years when Tipis and Yurts were re-introduced and Pods invented. Tipis, for all their ancient lineage, have proved to be a dead duck as far as tour operators are concerned, and there doesn't seem to have been a huge take up even by the small businesses, ie. one, two or three unit market either. Forget Tipis, let the Red Indians claim them back.

Yurts are a different matter altogether as the pick up of those both in the UK and France to a lesser extent has been reasonably high, with more small businesses offering them nearly every week. Yurts have caught on with both the buying public and holidaymakers, and of course, they offer good value for money and a respectable return on investment. Little or no pick up from tour operators or larger camping hire companies though.

Pods? Pods seem to have gone very much the same way as Tipis and there aren't so many parks or camping sites offering them for holiday use. Why? Well we are in a recession for a start and if tour operators have parks and sites full of tents and/or mobile homes with some life left in them then it stands to reason that they are not going to increase their overdraft to buy some Pods to hire out in what is really an unknown market to them.

That leaves us with Micro Lodges which are a quite recent development, so new to the camping and leisure marketplace in fact that only a handful of sites are offering them for holiday use, and we must make a statement here: At present we are not promoting Micro Lodges for holiday use per se, we are using our pages to try and persuade the tour operators, holiday companies to get involved in a brand new concept in the camping market. Obviously, the above statement about companies not buying Pods at present due to possible financial constraints applies to Lodges as well, but there differences between the two which make Lodges much more appealing.

Micro Lodges are similar in design to Pods but bigger and, the manufacturers state, far better. They also represent a respectable return on investment - the stated figure is 150 days hire to recoup all your investment. That means you could recoup your outlay the same season, and still offer the public a really good deal!  

The longetivety of these Micro Lodges is far and away in excess of anything else on the market at present, so in years 2, 3, 4, 5 and onwards all your take is your make (apart from overheads). Micro Lodges do not depreciate or deteriorate the same way that mobile homes do. Seem an 8 year old mobile home which has been used for hire recently? Apart from the bedraggled looks they aren't worth a carrot and site owners want them off the pitches because they make the place look bad. Not so with the Micro Lodge which can look nigh on as good in 8 years as they do new.

Stain the woodwork now and then and the life span of one of these Lodges is as long as you wish it to be, and certainly you would have worn out several mobile homes before your Micro Lodge is ready for the recycling bin! How much does a mobile home cost you? Do the maths and you can see the financial benefits of the Micro Lodge on your sites.

There are several models of the Micro Lodge and the range starts with the Hobbit House, the Romany Caravan and the Wild West Wagon, best seen on the manufacturer's site  and also one of the few sites where the lodges have been physically installed - don't let that sentence put you off because these lodges are the latest thing - get in now for next season while you can because we have a gut feeling that this company is going places!

Read about the Hobbit House