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If a friend of mine was thinking about taking up camping, I'd lend them our older tent and other kit for a weekend so they could try it out without spending anything on equipment.

A lot of people find that things they'd never even considered mean that it's not for them - insects, trek to the lavs/showers, hearing every noise (one of my friends spent two nights absolutely terrified of every sound and says she will never sleep under canvas again, not even if her house was destroyed in an earthquake - it had never occurred to her that there might be a sound insulation issue!), cooking outside in the rain and so on.

I'd be peed off if I wasted even £100 on kit for something I only did once.

I friend who has never camped before until last sunday, bought the 4 man tent starter pack from argos for 89.99.  The tent withheld the gail force winds we had the first night, which i was surprised about.  The got 2 regatte double airbeds, which seemed fine. 2 single and 1 double regatta sleeping bags, which was alot thicker than the cheapie tesco's ones.  They also got a light, which didnt work, and a suit case stove. 

I didnt think much of the tent tbh, but thats only cos i dont like vis a vis tents, and i like to be able to stand up too.  But the main thing is they enjoyed themselves, and even if they didnt, they still can use the airbeds and bags when they have friends stayiing over, and if there is a power cut they have a stove to boil a kettle and a light to be able to see.  So if you work out what all that would normally cost, then the tent is only a few quid.

The regatta range in argos doesn't seem so bad, better than the halfords range anyway. We've seen loads of those and i wouldn't even want to get changed in one of those the material is so flimsy and you can more or less she right thru.

Go outdoors have offers on from time to time their 2.99 sleeping bags are crap, the airbeds are alright when cheap (we use self inflating mats now) so even if you went to a well know camping store such as them you could still end up buying tat.

I don't think i'd have a problem with the regatta range but we camp from April and finish usually in October so it personally wouldn't suit us, but from what i've seen on the sites they seem decent enough and anyone thats starting off camping learns and builds their stash up as they go along.