There’s an RV event called Open House where all the various RV companies open their doors and show off the latest and greatest. In fact that was supposed to be happening just recently and got canceled for the second year in a row due to COVID.
The point of this is when I was selling RVs the owner of our dealership came back from Open House and was excited about having signed-up the then-new MPG line of travel trailers. Part of the reason for the excitement was the fact that these trailers featured king-sized beds and barreled ceilings with an interior height of 6’11”.
Enough of our customers worked in the logging industry and fit the stereotype of tall lumberjacks that having a brand of RVs with larger beds and higher ceilings made a tremendous amount of sense.
What happened
After we got our initial shipment of these trailers, we weren’t sure we had made such a good decision. Those first trailers came along with a decent number of issues and, as the warranty manager, I had to deal with Cruiser in what could best be described as a miserable process.
To be fair, they had just been taken over by Thor and were in transition from a system that must have been designed in the 1930s to one much more at home in the 1990s. However, this was 2016, so they were still behind the times.
While I have no idea if they’ve improved, although I assume at least their warranty system has survived the migration, I did get a request to take a look at a new Cruiser RV MPG model, the MPG 2550.
Favorite floor plan in the Cruiser RV MPG
In many ways this is one of my favorite floor plans for a mid-sized travel trailer. You’ll see this layout in trailers like the Northwood Arctic Fox 25W and the Coachmen Freedom Express Ultra Lite 252RBS, for example.
I like this because you get both a dinette and a couch. Also, there’s separation between the living space and the bedroom, but you can also open the whole thing up and it just feels larger.
Specs
This is one of those cases where you look at all the specs on paper and say, yeah, that sounds pretty darned good.
After all, the Cruiser RV MPG is spacious inside and features a king-sized bed with a Serta mattress, no less. They use Azdel composite in the wall construction. Even the bed structure is framed in welded aluminum, which is a plus.
There’s also a clever under-floor storage compartment in the front pass-through storage. That’s something I hadn’t seen before. But it’s a good idea for those things you rarely want – like a jack or something like that.
I also like the larger 30” main entry door, the fact that there are no heat ducts on the floor, and many, many other features.
These also come with a three-year structural warranty, which isn’t a bad thing. Also, the exteriors are gel-coated fiberglass with a fiberglass front cap, to boot.
In summary
So, what’s my recommendation? Have you ever taken a bite of something and you happened to get a bad sample? For example, an apple with a worm in it or a certain brand of hot dogs that hadn’t been properly stored? Then, if someone asks you what you think of those apples or those hot dogs, all you think about is that bad experience?
That’s what I feel here. My sample of units was only the initial five that we ordered, so it’s statistically small. But the experience was so bad that now I’m not interested in another bite.
Maybe the Cruiser RV MPG has improved
I could be totally off-base and these may have improved to the point that they are on par with other quality brands. So I would suggest you do some of your own research if this floor plan is something you’re interested in.
Part of that would be to ask the dealership about the warranty process and how responsive Cruiser RV is to warranty claims. I would also look at overall fit and finish and test everything out.
Or, you could also look at the two other models that I feel are similar and from brands whom I have a lot of faith in.
Tony comes to RVTravel having worked at an RV dealership and been a life long RV enthusiast. He also has written the syndicated Curbside column about cars. You can find his writing here and at StressLessCamping where he also has a podcast about the RV life with his wife.
These RV reviews are written based on information provided by the manufacturers along with our writer’s own research. We receive no money or other financial benefits from these reviews. They are intended only as a brief overview of the vehicle, not a comprehensive critique, which would require a thorough inspection and/or test drive.
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Good, honest review.
I agree.
However, I do not like the storage under the front pass-through. As Tony mentioned, whatever you put down there had better be stuff you’ll never need because you’ll have to haul everything out to get to it. And if you don’t need it, why bring it?
I like the picture showing the loo straight down the sight line.
What a useless piece of nothing: okay, so the reviewer has had bad past experience and is unimpressed by the newer model. but I always thought a review was supposed to provide the pros and cons of a product, to help a buyer make an informed buying decision. Here I see only positives with no identified cons, yet only a two star rating. This makes no sense. I, too, like the layout and understand the good bits, but what is it the reviewer doesn’t like? Is it just this model, is it Cruiser’s products generally? Is it the construction, the finish, the service…? He needs to finish what he started.
Greetings, Patricia. Thanks for taking time to weigh in on this review. I almost gather from your response that you looked at the star rating and not what was written. As the warranty manager for a dealership it’s not just one bad experience with one trailer, but a culmination of bad experiences with the products and how Cruiser handled the warranty claims that ultimately got us to not order any future product. I haven’t seen any real evidence of the company making big strides to correct this so I can’t, in good conscience, recommend MPG despite some decent features.
I had hoped that that was evident in the story but I appreciate your opening the door to letting me re-state my views here.