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Purchasing Camping Gear

Purchasing camping gear is really a personal thing. This post was prompted by an experience I had while purchasing camping gear as a wedding gift for my daughter and her new husband. They are the couple who have everything for the house and so on, so we wanted to find something that they would appreciate and use.  They like camping and had been borrowing other people’s tents and camping Purchasing Camping Gearequipment when they went away for a weekend of camping.

This was going to be a wedding gift, which is a sort of odd gift when you think about it, but then what else do you get for someone who already has everything they need for the house and the yard.

Purchasing Camping Gear and Tents

We went to a number of stores looking for tents mainly. But also some of the basic stuff like pots and pans and gear to pack it all in. We found the best gear to be at stores such as Mountain Equipment co-op and other outdoor sports kinds of stores, however it is very expensive and we were limited in what we could purchase for what we wanted to spend. We ended up finding a nice 4 person tent on sale at one of these types of stores after a bit of negotiation.

Did Not Fit Their Requirements

We presented our gifts and our kids were really excited about receiving the tents especially since that meant they did not need to borrow a tent any longer. My son-in-law, who has had more experience camping than I have, politely let us know that the tent really was not large enough. After all we purchased a 4 person tent so why would that not be large enough?

For those of you who may not know, a 4 person tent is just large enough for 4 people to sleep snugly and no room for any gear, clothing, backpacks and the rest of the gear you normally have at a camp site. So off we go to try to exchange the tent we purchased for another one.

Exchange and Comparison Shopping

Well there was no problem returning the tent, and getting our money back, however the prices for larger tents were more than we wanted to pay. We decided to head off to Canadian Tire, Wal-Mart and Zellors. These are all department stores here in Canada, however Wal-Mart of course is world wide.

The prices and selection were better for the larger tents and we were able  to buy a tent for around the same money that actually sleeps 8, with windows and with a canopy covering the opening. What a deal, they were happy and I was too since I got a better deal for the same money and a bigger tent!

Always Comparison Shop

This is a rather long story to really say that it pays to shop around no matter what the product, including tents and camping gear. Shop around and unless you are a really a fanatic about the gear you use, buying from stores such as Wal-Mart is just fine, since you will save a lot of money!

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2 Responses to “Purchasing Camping Gear”

  1. you can purchase a lot of used camping gear ob sites like kijji and others. this way you will not spend much money to find out if you like camping or not. A good way to try it out.

  2. We camp in hotels, no roughing it for us. We just want to wake up in a nice bed, have a shower and a good breakfast

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