Industry Reacts to Affinity Group's Acquisition of Camping World
by Don Magary, editor

Response to the announcement that the Affinity Group is acquiring Camping World brought mixed reactions from the RV industry. For the most part, the industry category most vocal about the acquisition were RV dealers. The RV manufacturers that RV News interviewed were for the most part only vaguely aware of the deal. Suppliers were generally cautious in their comments and did not want to say anything for the record. Warehouse distributors recognized their customers, RV dealers, could be impacted by the move, and dealers, in some instances, expressed a fear that the Affinity Group had crossed over an imaginary line.

Those dealers that felt the acquisition was not in the best interest of their businesses cited an accumulative effect of competitiveness from the Affinity Group's companies such as the Good Sam Club, and that the addition of Camping World to the family of companies is part of a pattern of competing with RV dealers.

The Affinity Group's holdings in the RV industry include Trailer Life, Woodalls Publishing. Coast to Coast, Camping World, and the Good Sam Club. In fairness to Affinity we think it is important to remind readers that the Good Sam Club is a profit center, a business, as opposed to an organization such as Family Motor Coach Association (FMCA), which is governed by members and managed with the help of a professional staff.

RV News believes that the acquisition of Camping World by the Affinity Group is among the biggest industry stories of the 1990s, especially in the RV aftermarket. We also believe that reporting industry reaction on how this acquisition is perceived by various industry segments is important. Reaction fell into three basic categories ó those that think it is great, those who are taking a wait-and-see approach, and those who have reservations because they feel it directly effects their business.

For RV News, however, we are in a delicate position since RV News is a direct competitor of RV Business magazine, another of the Affinity Groups magazines, and our report could be interpreted as an attack. We are basically an industry news magazine, and certainly this story qualifies as news.

We have attempted to be unbiased in gathering reactions for this report and present a balanced view of the varying opinions. We think we have done that. However, in terms of weight, the balance tilts toward those industry members who have reservations about the acquisition simply because they were more vocal in their opinions than those in other categories.

RV News did not report all the reactions based on our interviews. We did, however, report on all those instances where reaction was positive or wait-and-see and only those reactions that expressed reservations were omitted. We did that because of space limitations as well as not wanting to continuously repeat thoughts already expressed by another person. Our format here is to present each interview pretty much in it's entirety, allowing those interviewed to express their views.

And now for reactions.

It's Great for the Industry

Dan Gamel, president of a multi-store RV dealer operation in California, said, "I think it is great for the industry. If Trailer Life is willing to put a little more money into the marketing of aftermarket services, it's great. Any time something is purchased by a bigger company such as Trailer Life buying Camping World, they get a little more aggressive ó and anything like that is good for the industry.

"I'm pleased for Camping World and I'm pleased for Trailer Life.

"It's an absolute natural and I'm pleased with that. I like to see everyone do well. I like to see the competition in the same town I'm in do well. I have a guy here in town named Paul Evert. He makes me work. He makes me think. I like that sort of thing. It's not personal to me, it's the way I make a living.

"I think it's great for the industry and the consumer ultimately wins, they have more products available to them." Continued