Insurance for glamping

Mendocino Grove

BY MIKE GAST

Damian Petty, agent with Leavitt Recreation & Hospitality Insurance

Demand for glamping accommodations continues to grow across North America . . . along with insurance challenges for glamping owners.

“Glamping has a lot in common with regular camping, but there are a lot of differences too and that can make acquiring glamping insurance a challenge,” said Damian Petty, an agent with Leavitt Recreation & Hospitality insurance brokerage.

Most traditional campgrounds are straightforward facilities that focus on traditional camping experiences that include self-service

RV and tent sites. The quickly evolving glamping industry, however, can include large glampingspecific facilities with a multitude of different accommodations including luxurious tents, fullservice cabins, yurts, wagons, pods, and just about any other shelter an owner can imagine.

There are also small glamping operators who may have two or three glamping units to complement their primary business – such as a winery, farm – or just an empty patch of land.

The process is muddied further because there currently isn’t a specific insurance category for glamping. For now, glamping is lumped together with tradition camping, no matter the obvious differences.

“The spectrum of glamping businesses is unique because you have the small operators with just a site or two as well as the large glamping-specific operations,” Petty said. “They are often associated with other businesses like a winery and the owners can’t insure their glamping with their current business insurance.”

Two of the three glamping units at Own Rooted Glamping in Ramona CA near San Diego

If the combined businesses share the same legal name, insurance carriers are often reluctant to offer coverage.

“Our carriers might want to cover the glamping, but don’t want to pick up the winery part of the business or whatever else the owner might be offering,” said Petty. “That isn’t their specialty and that’s sometimes an issue.”

SELF-INSURANCE AN OPTION FOR THE LITTLE GUY?

Some small glamping operators with less than a handful of sites often choose to self-insure, taking the chance that they can handle replacement costs on their own should disaster strike.

“You have to ask yourself if it’s beneficial to insure if you only have a couple of tents,” Petty said. “In California, for instance, it’s hard and very expensive right now to get fire coverage. If you only have a site or two, it may not make sense. If you have 200 sites, you may not have an option not to be insured.”

Petty said fire insurance is still available in western states, but often at a high cost. “We are still able to place it, but it might be more than they think it’s going to be.”

Mitch Edwards operates three glamping units at his Own Rooted Glamping facility in Ramona, California just northeast of San Diego. His glamping operation is adjacent to his family’s small winery. He said he’d never consider going it alone with self-insurance and is careful to keep his winery and glamping businesses separate.

“We’ve been in the glamping business for about a year now, and it was a shock to see the insurance rates,” he said. Edwards pays about $3,000 a year to insure his three lotus tent glamping structures.

“The hardest thing to find was an insurance provider who really understood what we were doing,” Edwards said. He said he decided to work with Petty’s company because they had experience with other glamping operations.

Edwards also lamented that some locations in

Mitchell and Jaqueline Edwards in 2021 on the deck of one of the glamping units they were building

California are lumped into “high wildfire danger” districts when their risk of wildfires may be minimal. Ironically, Edwards’ “other job” is working as a firefighter for the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire).

“We’re hopeful that our insurance rates will begin to go down as the insurance companies get more data and experience with glamping,” he said. “That’s our hope, at least, as we continue to operate without any issues.”

LIABILITY CONCERNS

While glamping owners may have a few options when it comes to insuring against physical losses at their facilities, liability is a different issue.

Insurance information website SBCoverage. com says glamping facility owners are taking a tremendous risk of not just losing money by being under insured, but also putting their entire business at risk.

“The laws in every state are very strict in enforcing liability on the owners of business for the results of their actions,” the website states. “The question is, can you afford not to have insurance for your glamping business?”

In most states a jury is free to award whatever amount it deems appropriate, sometimes even exceeding the plaintiff’s damage request. For small operators, it’s also suggested you register your glamping business as a limited liability company (LLC) in your state. Otherwise, you could personally be held liable for judgments against your business.

“Whether you’re a high-end campground owner, an RV park owner, or you run a campground with one or more theme-oriented family hotels, glamping properties, or ski lodges, you’re in the hospitality industry,” said XINSURANCE President & CEO Rick J. Lindsey on the Xinsurance.com website. “The hospitality industry, including glamping, is known for being highly regulated so you must have liability insurance coverage to protect yourself and your property from frivolous lawsuits.”

Lindsey wrote that glamping is ”elevated camping,” which usually means elevated risks. “When it comes to protecting your business and protecting your customers, there is no one-sizefits-all solution.”

“The laws in every state are very strict in enforcing liability on the owners of business for the results of their actions.”

A LACK OF HISTORY

One issue that currently plagues glamping operations is the industry’s lack of history. Unlike traditional campgrounds, glamping operations just haven’t existed for long enough to establish a clear insurance loss profile.

“Right now, the insurance industry looks at glamping the same way they look at camping,” Petty said. That often leads to wild rate swings.

Mendocino Grove

In California, for instance, glamping operators could see rates as high as $70 for each $1,000 in revenue in high wildfire districts. In other states, that could drop as low as $3 per $1,000 for rural areas and perhaps as low as .25 cents per $1,000 for municipal campgrounds with nearby fire department coverage.

Chris Hougie of the 60-site Medocino Grove glamping park says he’s fortunate to be located along the California coastline, where high humidity makes the danger of wildfires remote.

“I would like to see insurance companies break out the risk of wildfires from normal insurance,” Hougie said. “I don’t think the maps they are drawing for fire districts are very accurate.”

Hougie also expects insurance issues for glamping operations to decrease as time goes by.

“I think there is way more monitoring in the glamping business than in camping,” Hougie said. “We have staff walking around constantly keeping an eye on what guests are doing. In the long run, that makes things safer.”

Petty says owners need patience and persistence to find the right insurance carriers. “Coverage is out there,” he said. “It isn’t always easy to find, but it can be found.”

“I think it’s going to take another three to five years to see if glamping loss issues are the same as they are in the camping industry,” Petty said. “Right now, I don’t think the activities associated with glamping are that horrendous. Generally glamping operations haven’t offered many of the high-risk activities that campgrounds might, like swimming pools or ATV rentals. But glamping’s risk management for what they do offer might not be as good either. We just don’t know yet because there isn’t enough data.”

Insurance provider XINSURANCE.com says glamping owners – both large and small – need to consider these factors:

• Insuring all your glamping accommodations in case of fire. • Commercial liability for your glampground. • Personal liability for anyone staying at your facility. • Liquor liability for serving or selling alcohol on glampsite property. • Alleged assault and battery coverage for protection against claims for assault and battery. • Insuring your guests from liability for injuries and property damage. • Insuring all types of equipment in your vehicles. • Insuring the vehicles used at the glampsite for commercial purposes. • True umbrella coverage to fill the gaps and exclusions in your current policy. • Communicable disease coverage for negligent exposure to any declared pandemic disease or pathogen, including COVID-19.

Mike Gast was the Vice President of Communications for Kampgrounds of America, Inc. for the past 20 years. Now, he’s on to new adventures, helping others tell their stories through his freelance company, ‘Imi Ola Group. You can reach Mike at mike.imiolagroup@gmail.com