By Chuck Woodbury
In a week’s time, we ask our readers about a half dozen questions about themselves through our RV Travel Reader Polls. Most questions are directly related to RVing, others help us understand who you are so we can better serve you. Here’s what we learned last week through surveys in both our RV Travel and RV Daily Tips Newsletters.
In preparation for me doing live online appearances on some Saturday mornings that you can just click to watch while reading this newsletter, I asked if you would prefer I do them on Facebook or YouTube. Well, YouTube won by a huge margin, so that’s what it will be.
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What poll really surprised me this past week was how many of you answered the question “If someone offered you a great price for your RV would you sell it?” Wow! Of the nearly 1,700 readers who responded, 41 percent said yes, with another 24 percent saying probably. I expected more people to respond like Gene Bjerke: “Only if someone made a ridiculously high offer (unlikely). We really like the one we have, even if we owe more than we can afford. We’ll keep running it until the wheels fall off.”
I assumed far more readers would have an emotional attachment to their RV and answer something like, “No way, I love my RV too much.” Only 14 percent of readers said they would not sell.
If you’ve been to an RV show lately you’ve likely noticed that there are TVs pretty much all over the place in new model RVs, indoors and outdoors. So how many TVs does your RV have? That’s what we asked the readers of RV Daily Tips. Well, apparently there aren’t as many as we thought. About 40 percent reported they have two sets, 15 percent have three, and 9 percent have four or more. Only 5 percent don’t have even one.
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Okay, enough about TVs. Let’s discuss newspapers. How often do you read one? That’s what we asked last week in the RVT newsletter. Oh, it pains me that of the nearly 2,400 of you who responded, only one-third of you read a daily newspaper every day, and 51 never read one or “hardly ever.” Alas, confession time: Even though I love newspapers, I, too, do not read one every day (20 years ago I would read two). The Internet has stolen me away. . .
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Have you noticed that many RVs these days have more than a couple of slideouts? Well, it turns out that more than one-third of you have three or more. Of the nearly 1,500 readers who responded to our poll, 23 readers, or 2 percent, have five. We’re wondering: When will six be commonplace? Or have RVs maxed out with five?
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And here’s the shocker of the week, although I can’t say I’m terribly surprised. We asked how many readers ever “camped” with an RV at a NASCAR event. An overwhelming 92 percent of you said “no.” Only 2 percent replied “often.” The NASCAR gang, it seems, is not our RV Travel crowd – a different breed of RVer, I think.
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In Thursday’s RV Daily Tips newsletter we asked about your employment status, and no big surprise. We know that RVing Millennials are not exactly swarming to this newsletter. They’re too busy river rafting, mountain climbing, and making YouTube videos about how other Millennials can become expert RVers just like them. Yeah, our crowd isn’t quite so young – 79 percent are retired, with only 10 percent working full time (and I think most counting the months they have remaining until they get their gold watch — like that happens any more!). Only 1 percent of our readers are work campers.
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Finally, our RV Pet Vet columnist Deanna Tolliver asked her readers last week how many had microchipped their pets. Doing so dramatically cuts the chance of a pet getting lost. Well, it turns out our readers are good dog people but maybe not so good to their cats. Right about two-thirds of dog owners have, in fact, microchipped their little buddies. But only 17 percent of cats got the same treatment. I urge you to read Deanna’s column this week, “Don’t lose your pet! Get it microchipped!“
Do you have a question you’d like us to ask readers? Let me know. Chuck (at) RVtravel.com
Chuck, I think you left the question to selling your RV if the price were right. Many of us assumed that if offered more than it was worth, would we let it go? My reaction is everything is for sale except my wife. If they want to pay me more than I can replace it for, it’s gone.
I agree with John.
If the question was worded…Would you sell your RV for market value or SLIGHTLY above?
You may have got very different results.
I love your polls…very interesting!!
As you said, the readership isn’t the NASCAR RVers. Now is that (maybe) because of the cost to do that and the level of income from those of us who read this?
Very interesting polls, indeed. I learned that I’m your Ultimate minority reader here: employed, poor, under 50, and only use my single TV if there’s too much lightening to leave camp (not RV resort). I’d rather DIY than go to a shop. Guess I’m not your audience?
Our readers differ in many ways. Each one chooses to read our websites and newsletters based on whether they feel it’s valuable to us. So you, indeed, are our “audience,” just maybe 10 or 15 years younger than our average reader.
Fear not, we were there with you when we were younger and stilling having to work. We too are DIY folks and many RVers are there with you but not necessarily ones who answer surveys.
Hi Marilyn, I honestly think it’s more of a lack of interest than anything else. I realize a ton of people follow it, but also a ton of people dont.
The poll about micro chipping your pet most likely is not accurate because if you have both dogs and cats, you had to choose which one you wanted to respond about. The poll had no option for having done both. I believe that those of us who travel with both furr-babies and purr-babies do chip both and so the cat % would be higher.