Road to a Million puts the buzz back in caravan parks

Despite the challenges domestic tourism has faced over the last 2+ years, regional caravan and camping has never been more popular.  Caravan Industry Association of Australia’s (CIAA) ‘Road to a Million’ campaign has leveraged this to drive off-peak bookings and support the many parks feeling the pinch. 

CIAA sat down with local Queensland park – Borumba Deer Park to discuss their experience of the campaign.  Borumba Deer Park is a family owned and operated campground in the heart of Imbil and took out the top spot for the Queensland ‘Road to a Million’ campaign in the month of August. 

” We’ve had a pretty rough trot with the flooding. Once we get flooded everything goes under and then we have to get campers out before they flood,” said Borumba Deer Park Digital Manager, Natalie Borchert.

“We’ve had to shut a few weekends here and there, but when the Road to a Million competition launched- we just got really excited about pushing some bookings and getting right behind,” she said.

To push the Road to a Million competition, the staff at Borumba Deer Park have made it even easier for their guests to enter, by offering to sign them up upon check in, especially elderly consumers. Additionally, all staff carry a Road to a Million QR code in their pocket so they can plug the campaign at any time. 

“RTAM has just given a buzz back into the place. The flooding put a damper on everybody’s spirit and morale- and we have such a great team so when the promotion came up we just got a bit competitive,” she said.

When asked how the park would respond if one of the Borumba Deer Park customers won the million, Natalie couldn’t hold her excitement.

“Well…. What would you do if you won a million?! We’d be ecstatic, we’re stoked they have the chance to enter in the first place. That’d be life changing,” she said.

The team at Borumba Deer Park really felt the competitive streak after the results for the first month came in.

“When we came second that first month, we were like ohmygod- what happens if we try and give it an extra push,”

“So we started doing automated emails, check-ins, pushing on socials- anything we could,” she said.

Borumba Deer Park isn’t the only spot thriving with help from the Road to a Million campaign.  Opal Caravan Park, a regional park located in Lightning Ridge also embraced the campaign and found themselves the New South Wales Top Performer for the month of June, seeing positive increases since campaign launch. 

The Road to a Million campaign keeps camping ‘front of mind’ to consumers this winter and aims to inspire and motivate Australians to take a camping road trip during the winter and off-peak months.  The campaign continues to soar with campgrounds around the nation responding with strong enthusiasm for the initiative.  Not only does it motivate Australians to take a trip they may have otherwise not considered, but it also promotes regional travel and mental wellness. 

For more on the Road to a Million competition, you can head to our website here.