PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — As summer vacations begin, RV rental season is on fire. The pandemic is lifting, but many people are wary of cruises and air travel. An RV dealer in Montgomery County says business is booming for his rental fleet.
"It's crazy," says Pete Cozzi of Fretz RV in Souderton, PA. "It started last year, and it just has not let up.
Cozzi says sales and rentals started picking up last fall as retirees began snapping them up to visit family, and demand stayed unusually high through the winter months. Usually, he said, he puts part of his rental fleet “to bed” in the winter, but last year he never had to do that.
Now, he said, people are rearranging their vacations just to get into an RV. On Tuesday, Cozzi said, he booked a rental with a man who changed his rental dates from July to August.
"He rearranged his entire vacation because that's when he could get a unit," Cozzi said.
He says if he could put another 15 to 20 units in the fleet, he'd have them all running.
Related
Cozzi says rentals and sales tripled last year — and he believes he could quadruple them if he only had the inventory. Fretz ordered a new fleet last summer, but they won’t be delivered until this October because demand is so robust.
“I've had multiple B and C rentals that are going for 30, 35, 40 days — so, I mean, just across all around the U.S.," he said.
Class C motorhomes are the kind with a cab in the front that looks like a van. Class B vehicles look more like camper vans.
"My C-class are booked almost the entire season, which is families. They can house up to eight people in there. ... Where the B-class is really for two or three," Cozzi said.
Related
With pandemic fears still lingering, people are tapping into their long-range plans, he said.
“This one fellow I just booked, he's going out to the Grand Canyon with the family. So it's like a bucket-list trip, expensive trip," he said. "I see people saying, 'Hey, this is something we talked about doing, in four or five, six years from now, but we're doing it now because it just seems to be the right time.'"
And the season doesn’t end on Labor Day, either, Cozzi says. Many retirees head north in the fall to Maine or the Adirondacks for the foliage, then head south in the winter.
LISTEN on the Audacy App
Sign up and follow Audacy
Facebook | Twitter | Instagram