Message Forums

I went for a look round my local Yeomans tent display yesterday.  I had been once earlier in the season and the display was a mess.  It looked like all the tents had just been left up all winter and no-one had bothered to tighten the guys, close the doors or fix the leaks.  Last year it was great so I put it down to it being early in the season and just some terrible weather.

But yesterday wasn't that much better.  They have one of the reef tents up so they are definitely new this year, but they are in a terrible state.  I wanted to go round and tighten the guys up and close doors to stop the wind and rain getting in.  I know customers probably leave them open, but if I worked there I'd go round and straighten stuff up at the start and end of each day.

On the plus side, it is the first time I have been in a Coleman tent and I was impressed.  It felt very sturdy and had lots of head room and I liked the canopy at the front.  I also liked the huge Maryland which I didn't expect to.  But the Tigris felt really dark inside and seemed to have no windows and I hadn't really noticed that looking online.  The Reef tent gave me a headache and the windows seemed really low - but I wonder if that was because the overall height seemed very generous.  So apart from the dreadful set up I found it interesting comparing the reality of tents with what they look like online.

Our Yeomans is at the local garden centre. they have a little sign pointing to a patch of land with the words ' Camping Exhibition'. There are 3 tents on that patch of land not one of which has any information about the 'exhibit'.

My local Yeomans store is attached to a garden centre and the display is very good, only one member of staff at a time but they manage to run the store and keep the tent display nice.

Must be a case of different people who run them and who cares or not.

Well done to yeomans at louth garden centre it seems

Ours is at a loval garden centre too.  I completley sympathise with members of the public letting kids run in and out of them without being careful - but that was the same last year.  If there had been only one or two tents that needed sorting I would have tried to do it myself or mentioned it to a staff member, but I didn't feel like I could go in and say 'the whole place looks a mess, sort it.'

The signs outside each tent were so faded they were hard to read, but the one I could read was selling off a 2010 faded Montana with a 6 inch rip in the ceiling (repaired) for £429.  I didn't think that was the bargain of the century.

There was a 2011 Montana pegged out in the corners but flat in a muddy heap on the floor.  It was labelled as a Bear Lake (it's where they used to put their Bear Lake) and I was insulted on the Bear's behalf ;)

The member of staff was very friendly but not over inclined to help me.  But when I asked if they would be getting any more SIMs in he said probably not until next season.  I got the impression they are selling stock down and just waiting to see what happens, so I sympathise with the general lack of enthusiasm.