Camping World Holdings, Inc. reported almost doubling annual revenue since the end of 2016, with 2021 revenue topping out at $6.9 billion.
Marcus Lemonis, Camping World chairman and CEO, said the revenue growth can be traced to the company’s used RV sales growth — doubling from $703 million to $1.7 billion in revenue. He also pointed to high margin products and services, the company’s Good Sam branded services and plans, and the company’s more-efficient structure developed during the past two years.
Lemonis said Camping World grew business benefitting from an installed RVerbase, such as used RVs, service and repair, aftermarket products and services, and Good Sam. Lemonis said the company anticipates more responsible manufacturing processes by RV OEMs in 2022 to ensure the market is not flooded with inventory.
This year, the company plans to accelerate acquisitions and new store openings. Lemonis said Camping World’s goal is to open 15-20 locations each year. Lemonis said 20 such deals are already lined up in 2022.
Additionally, Lemonis said the company plans to operate 30 standalone Camping World SuperCenters in the next five years. The pre-owned supercenters will feature 150-200 used RVs with more service capacity than a typical Camping World dealership. Capacity will include areas such as two collision booths, 12-14 traditional service bays and four to six renovation refurbishment bays.
“The retail experience will also look a lot different,” Lemonis said. “While it will have necessities of supplies inside of it, it will focus on refurbishment, installation and repair, high ticket items that come out of our retail business; awnings, towing systems, satellites, all those things that customers need to pimp their RV or do what they want to their other units.”
Lemonis said an obstacle in the company’s used RV business is the company’s limited aged inventory definition. The dealer group prefers to keep inventory on the lot for less than 120 days. He called the group’s used business the “biggest pivot that our company has ever had,” and said the company sold 126,000 total units (new and used) in 2021.
“We saw that growth happen in 12 months that we had never seen before,” Lemonis said. “Because our management team said, ‘Look, we are not mad at any manufacturers or suppliers, but we cannot wait for inventory. And we cannot play this margin game on the new side if things ever return.’ So how do we take matters into our own hands and how do we finally differentiate our company from every single other peer that we get compared to, including the manufacturers? We become a huge juggernaut.”
The CEO said Camping World plans to expand its service bays from 2,600 to 3,100 across all locations. He noted each bay contributes about $250,000 gross profit annually but staffing the bays will be a challenge.
“Our goal is to try and create far more technicians than we have bays,” Lemonis said. “So, we have started to identify specific regional locations across our country where we are bringing people into an educational platform and an apprentice platform.”
