Hey everybody,

I hope you all had a good weekend!

I most certainly did. I had the opportunity to actually kick back and relax a little bit, which was desperately needed!

I also had the opportunity to spend a little time shopping for camping gear which I haven’t done in a while.

Wow what a surprise I had!

It seems that camping equipment is not immune from the effects of gas prices and/or inflation. Tents, backpacks, lanterns, slepping bags, air mattresses and pretty much everything else have increased in price around 15 to 20% since the beginning of summer.

Now granted it’s kind of “out of season” for camping gear in most of your retail outfits so they are running any specials or sales but still.

Back in May I helped a buddy buy a new tent. He wanted a nice large multi-room family sized tent for him, his wife and their couple of kids. We hit the usual places that sell exclusively outdoor gear and then we hit the major retailers (Wal-mart, Target, etc…) and we were able to pick him up a very nice Eddie Bauer three room tent for a little under $150. They have used it three times already and are pretty happy with it.

Why did I bring that story up? Because yesterday I saw that same exact tent “On Sale” for $179.99!!!!

That was typical of everything I looked at while I was shopping. I was completely disgusted and basically didn’t buy anything.

When I got home I decided to do a little online investigation and see if those increase in prices would be reflected online. Thank goodness I did! I found several places that had the same Eddie Bauer tent in stock and were selling it for aroudn $160 including shipping!

So I expanded my investigation to include all forms of camping gear not just tents. It seems that the online retailers are also feeling the effects of the gas craziness but not quite as hard. The prices were a little higher but not as drastic as the tent scenario.

So I guess what I am saying is: make sure you shop around real-world and online before you decide to buy something new, you can save yourself a ton of money over time.

Till next time,

Eric