Donna Genie (speaker) explains that forecasting is essential for campground business decisions—hiring staff, buying land, expanding, or adding amenities—and emphasizes that accurate, solid financial records are required as inputs to produce reliable forecasts. She warns small and family-run businesses often lack access to forecasting expertise and may make costly mistakes, and offers assistance to help evaluate potential decisions before committing.
Do you ever wish you had a crystal ball to take a look at? What would happen to your campground if you were to make certain moves? What would happen if you hired a manager? What would happen if you bought that piece of land that's coming up for sale next to your park and expand it? What would happen if you added in some new amenities, added a pool? What would your pricing need to be? These are all perfect scenario questions to look at in forecasting. We assist with forecasting, but in order to forecast, what do you need? You need solid numbers. So all of your financials up to that point have to be solid in order for you to make a forecast and know that your numbers are telling you the right story. So, for example, if you build a house and you do it on some gravel pit that you're not really sure is a great foundation, the house is just a waste of time. It may fall in, it may stick around for a little while, but you really would like to do it right. And doing it right means you have to have solid information for the inputs to get solid information from the outputs. So anytime you're considering adding an employee, buying a new parcel of land, expanding, adding in a new amenity, these are perfect scenarios for us to be able to help look at the effects on the business. The one problem we consistently see in small businesses and family owned businesses is they don't have that person to turn to to help them make that good decision. So instead they just dive into the pool without knowing how deep the water is. That can be a tragic situation. You could end up swimming and be okay, but wouldn't you rather have a solid knowledge of what you can expect before you make that move and not make the wrong move and have to pay for expensive mistakes? That's where we come in. So please take that time to make sure that you have accurate information to move forward with those big decisions in your business. We're here to help with those situations.
