The summer of 2016 was
certainly a great one for us at Voyageur's View, as we dealt with more and more
families and just generally great individuals of all sorts. We had far too many
rainy Saturdays, so our overall numbers were certainly down compared to what
they have been in the past, but as we make a concentrated effort to provide a
better camping experience for all, the experience is becoming a better one for
our guests, our staff, ourselves and we'd like to think, our community. But our
transition hasn’t been an easy one...
When Christopher Ingraham
first came to town last summer I spent some time discussing with him how our
campground had once been known as a "party" campground and that we
had really been doing our best to make it more favorable for families and just
anyone who was looking for a great camping experience and he asked me,
"How? How do you go from a party atmosphere like that to a family friendly
one?" and that question certainly gave me pause.
Ten years ago we decided
that we had had enough of the crazy antics of some of the individuals who kept
coming to our campground. We were certainly starting to get older (although I
was only 23 at the time), but more than that, we knew that we had a beautiful
facility that our parents had worked so hard to make a reality and we didn't
like seeing people come in and destroy it. I would also say that it was pretty
safe to say that a lot of the community did not respond favorably to our crowds
or our operation. We knew that we didn't want to keep running it the same way,
but the question first arose then.
How do you turn a
"party" campground into a family friendly one?
Well the answer had to
start with the problem. How do we eliminate the individuals and groups who just
want to come and destroy the place, party and leave? For those of you who
remember how the place used to look mid weekend, there would be tents all the
way out to the road and garbage would be flying all over the place as the
clientele at that time did not care how the place looked. So we started with
that issue. We started by cutting back the number of sites that we rented for
our busiest weekends a little each year. We then would make golf cart trips
around the campground to remind people to make sure they were using their
garbage barrels and bags so that their garbage wasn't blowing around
everywhere. It seemed like a pretty simple request, but when we would come back
later, the garbage would still be flying all over the place. So our next step
was to tell these individuals that they now had 30 minutes to pick up their
garbage or they would be told to leave our campground.
I know it seems a little
harsh, but we needed to take a stand against the elements that were ruining our
beautiful park and garbage was certainly an easy thing for individuals to keep
track of, and after getting a warning such as that, it should be easy enough to
get your crew to grab a couple pieces here and there and pick up your site. But
if they didn't have it picked up in the allotted time, well, you never get
anywhere with idle threats, so we evicted sites.
It is important to note,
too, that at this point we still were not taking any sort of damage deposit for
our sites; it wasn't until our sister started insisting on taking a credit card
imprint to make sure the sites got clean that we had any other sort of recourse
than to remove individuals. If you ever drove by after a long weekend and saw
our crew out picking up heaps and heaps of garbage, it was all done by
individuals who paid less than $12 per site.
I could go on and on
about the horror stories of how asking people to pick up their garbage would
even lead to fist fights and the involvement of the very awesome Sheriff's
Office we have here in Red Lake County, but suffice it to say that without
steadfast determination to vastly improve the atmosphere of our campground,
there is no way we would still be around.
Our security personnel
back in the day (which usually consisted of our dad, Ryan, myself and few
awesome local friends) really should have been getting hazard pay. They didn't
take a lot of crap from the really bad people they were dealing with, but
because of that, they made it known pretty loud and clear that certain behavior
would no longer be tolerated at our facility. Patrick Swayze's Road House
character certainly could have been inspired by some of these awesome guys that
we had working for us!
So we kept dwindling the
numbers of our campsites until we got to what we felt was a manageable number,
where we didn't need a staff of 10 - 12 guys at night to ensure things weren't
getting burned down and our security crew got a bit tamer.
We next had a great crew
who had some military and law enforcement background who took the reins for us,
as we had started to see a decline in the individuals who were only coming to
destroy stuff and started to deal with more individuals who had serious
attitude problems. This group of security was awesome because not only were
they good at conversing with our guests, but when a problem did arise they knew
the legal code and were able to assist our local law enforcement in not only
making sure any perpetrators were being caught, but that they were also being
prosecuted.
Who wants to come back to
a place where you actually have accountability anyway?
We seriously can't thank
all of the crews that came before enough; they paved the way for our new breed
of security guards, who are certainly more on the customer service realm of the
spectrum than anything else. They are as personable as you could hope for and
they also have a background in bouncing at bars around the area so they have
had their share of dealings with intoxicated individuals.
It doesn't really seem to
matter what you do, or where you camp, chances are you're going to run into
individuals who have had a few drinks. Ninety-nine percent of the time, this is
not an issue, most people are pretty fun loving and respectful regardless of
their impaired state, but every now and again, we still get groups or
individuals who push the boundaries a little too far, and only in extreme cases
do we ask any of these groups to leave the night of an incident. Our general
rule now is to make sure the group is in bed, not being a pain for the groups
around them and then we go and speak with them in the morning to tell them that
they are no longer welcome at our facility. We then speak with the groups
surrounding the problem site and let them know what the situation is, and try
and reassure the other groups that this is an isolated incident rather than the
norm. More times than not, we will also refund the groups around the problem
site so they know how seriously sorry we are that they had to put up with the
rude behavior of the other campers.
So after explaining all
of this to Chris, we then had a few weekends where we dealt with some real
jerks. They were removed from our facility for various infractions of our rules
and were certainly very rude to our staff and other campers while they stayed
with us and on their exit from our facility.
In the past we would deal
with these individuals while we were removing them, lose a night or two of
sleep over it, and then just get back to dealing with great individuals. But
those times of only dealing with these jerks at our facility appear to be over,
as the new generation of (excuse my French) assholes, are now taking to the
internet to bash our (and I'm sure every other) company for not allowing them
to do whatever the hell they want.
We saw it all this year
from false allegations of sexual assault, to made up user names and emails to
leave multiple reviews to hurt our overall rating, to a really classy group who
tried to target the family market by claiming they had been down to our
facility with their families and had a terrible experience because of our rude
staff and terrible facilities.
The good news is that we
have a lot of individuals who come to our facility once a week (if not more)
all summer long. Groups who have been coming since we opened in 1985, who once
brought their wedding party but now bring their grand kids. We also know that
we maintain our facilities better than most campgrounds because the thing is
not a business to us, but another part of our family. As far as our staff goes,
these reviewers better watch out because we have the absolute best kids that
work for us. Saying something bad about them is not a wise thing to do. We have
always been a family business and those kids (a lot of them are kids of
individuals who will read this) are like little brothers and sisters to us
(maybe kids as we're no longer that young I guess!).
We've tried to provide a
family type atmosphere to our guests because our end of the operation has
always been a family atmosphere. The kids that worked for our parents in 1985
still come back to check on our dad as well as tell stories of our mom. They
come to see the place where they probably had their first job, and second
family. We'd like to think that it's the same reason that our guests return
year after year, and week after week.
For years we had it
listed on our website that we did not recommend our activity for families on
the weekends due to the crowd we drew. There are still remnants of that crowd
that we are working diligently on removing (damn the reviews!) but this year we
re-did our website and removed that as well as told a little more of our story,
to let people know that we are a family run operation that encourages family to
take part in our activity.
Maybe it was the fact
that we lost our mom far too early or the fact that when that happened, those
same wonderful kids that we consider brothers and sisters took over the
operation for us so we could grieve. Maybe it’s the fact that although many
businesses are brick and mortar, ours has many moving parts including a heart
that beats stronger everyday with the wonderful guests and staff we get to call
friends and family.
Ask me how you change a
"party" campground into a family campground and I certainly won't
have any direct answer, but for us it's always been one and we won't stop improving
the atmosphere until it feels the same way for all of our great guests.
Partiers, Internet Trolls, and everything else I'm sure we'll see in the years
to come are but side notes to the unbelievable people we get to serve and work
beside every day. Plus, there is no state more beautiful as the one we live in,
and the natural beauty of Red Lake Falls certainly sells itself, just ask
Chris, Bri, Jack and Charles Ingraham!
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