Scalded_Dawg
New member
Really great photos! Oh, and a sweet trailer too.
My New American Built Adrenalin Rush - Preview and Review
- Thread starter jonharis
- Start date
kb7our
Explorer
Did the new thread ever get started?
jonharis
...................
Sorry I missed this. PM sent.
jonharis
...................
I wanted to give a long overdue update. Probably have not logged in, or even lurked on Expo for 6 months. I have wanted to give thoughts on the camper and on the business for some time now. I am still the happy owner of Adrenalin Camper number 001. The camper has and continues to exceed my expectations. I currently have well over 100 nights in it in all types of conditions. The issues I have are few and pretty typical, I would think. I have a slow leak in one of the air bags. Several small rips are occurring where the screens meet the canvas. I've blown two of the struts for the flip over lid and have had a hard time sourcing replacements (more on that later). And I've had some problems with the Dometic stove (not Adrenalin's problem). I did do a little damage to the camper where the mast for the hand winch is mounted. Driving through Cisco wash on the Kokopelli, the mast hit my rear mounted tire and bent. I knew this was a design flaw and never bothered addressing it but now will need to. I plan on putting the mast on some kind of pivot so that it can be folded down for travel. This issue was the result of an extreme angle difference between the camper and the truck and would not occur with most users. Other than those few things, the camper keeps rocking, night after night and mile after mile. I will also say, that this is not a good camper for those who live in wet conditions. While it is rarely an issue for me, the camper is very susceptible to water pooling on the canvas in various areas and ultimately getting into the bedding and interior. Putting it away wet almost always leads to some dampness and several people have had issues with mold, I have a small amount on mine myself. Again, in dry climates, it's not an issue and can handle a rain storm well. I just wouldn't want one in the south or the northwest.
Now to the unfortunate part. Ric and family with Adrenalin have moved back to Australia due to Visa Issues so these are at the moment unavailable. I would love to see someone from the US pick up manufacturing or import because it is truly a great product. I can't speak to the details for Ric's departure but I can make some observations about Adrenalin as a customer. Adrenalin seemed to suffer from several of the problems that small manufacturing businesses run into. Ric builds a great product that speaks for itself. On the flip side, the business and marketing end were run poorly. Many of you know other established trailer manufactures that have great reputations for responsiveness and community involvement. This is hugely important to me. During the purchase and subsequent hopeful repurchase of a camper, emails and phone calls were often not returned. Adrenalin had no presence at off-road oriented shows. They did no advertising in enthusiast publications, they did not attend enthusiast events, they were never active in community forums. Most of the exposure that Adrenalin gained was from this thread which is proven by it's SEO rankings and view count. I really hoped that Ric would focus on the product and let someone else focus on selling the experience. In this day in age, consumers want answers right now and want responsiveness. While Ric was still in the states, I talked to numerous people who were having the same issues. I feel that he worked so many hours building the trailers that he didn't leave any time for follow up. There has also been a white washing of Adrenalin's Facebook page. Several negative posts have disappeared. The better thing to do would have been to address them publicly like most other manufacturers do. I see this cycle of great product-poor execution happening over and over again in the industry. Teh fact is that you can make an average to good product and with stellar customer service, you will succeed.
I truly do hope that there is a future for Adrenalin here in the US. The camper is a great fit for couples who don't want to climb on top of a roof or families with children. I for one feel lucky to be one of the few who has the honor of owning one.
Now to the unfortunate part. Ric and family with Adrenalin have moved back to Australia due to Visa Issues so these are at the moment unavailable. I would love to see someone from the US pick up manufacturing or import because it is truly a great product. I can't speak to the details for Ric's departure but I can make some observations about Adrenalin as a customer. Adrenalin seemed to suffer from several of the problems that small manufacturing businesses run into. Ric builds a great product that speaks for itself. On the flip side, the business and marketing end were run poorly. Many of you know other established trailer manufactures that have great reputations for responsiveness and community involvement. This is hugely important to me. During the purchase and subsequent hopeful repurchase of a camper, emails and phone calls were often not returned. Adrenalin had no presence at off-road oriented shows. They did no advertising in enthusiast publications, they did not attend enthusiast events, they were never active in community forums. Most of the exposure that Adrenalin gained was from this thread which is proven by it's SEO rankings and view count. I really hoped that Ric would focus on the product and let someone else focus on selling the experience. In this day in age, consumers want answers right now and want responsiveness. While Ric was still in the states, I talked to numerous people who were having the same issues. I feel that he worked so many hours building the trailers that he didn't leave any time for follow up. There has also been a white washing of Adrenalin's Facebook page. Several negative posts have disappeared. The better thing to do would have been to address them publicly like most other manufacturers do. I see this cycle of great product-poor execution happening over and over again in the industry. Teh fact is that you can make an average to good product and with stellar customer service, you will succeed.
I truly do hope that there is a future for Adrenalin here in the US. The camper is a great fit for couples who don't want to climb on top of a roof or families with children. I for one feel lucky to be one of the few who has the honor of owning one.
drodio
Entrepreneur & Lifehacker
Jon -- so sorry to hear about it but thankful to hear an update.
I agree with you completely about the importance of fast and responsive customer service. As a tech guy in Silicon Valley, one of the most important rules for startups is to be close to the customer-- to listen maniacally to feedback and iterate quickly based on they feedback. And in fact if there is one thing that consistently separates the hugely successful startups from those that fail in Silicon Valley, it's this characteristic.
In the expo world I too see manufacturers they are obsessed with building a quality product, but that do so at the expense of being responsive to current and prospective customers. With social media tools a) giving customers such a strong channel and b) making it so easy for manufacturers to have an intimate channel of communication with their user base, there is no reason a manufacturer can't be leading class in this area. Literally the only thing it takes is a dedication of time-- as little as 30 minutes 2x a day, although ideally twice that. But it's the best investment of time a manufacturer can make.
I'm writing a bit of a thread hijack manifesto on this because it resonates so much with me and pains me so greatly to see high quality products like Adrenalin fail to gain traction in the market. The most important first step is definitely to make a high quality product. But that's not the *only* step.
So to all you OEMs out there:
- have an active Twitter presence. Respond to @mentions within hours, not days.
- have an active FB page. Respond to comments in hours, not days.
- take videos of what is going on in your shop every single day. Explain your product. Explain how you welded a corner a certain way, and why. Explain why you sourced a specific material. Etc. You might think this details don't matter-- but they are exactly what matter. You might think your video has to be slick and well produced. I'd much rather see a raw, unedited real video with real content in it. The stuff that is so mundane to you is incredibly compelling to others.
- when a customer comes to pick up your product, video tape the visit. Your customer will value having a video of how to use the product that is customized for them, and s/he will likely allow you to post that video out to social channels. Nothing sells a product like an excited customer picking it up.
- Jon is absolutely right: never, ever delete a bad comment, no matter how much it upsets you. A bad comment is simply feedback that people care enough to say something. Use it to make your products even better. Engage the person in conversation and try to turn the frown upside down. Don't be defensive. Feedback is a gift. Your only real problem is when people don't care enough to give it to you.
- bonus: when you get questions on social media channels, answer them with a personalized video and post it publicly to the channel. Prospective customers will be blown away that you took 5 minutes to respond to their question.
- bonus #2: start your own forum to let your current and prospective customers talk about your products together-- and be very, very active there. Post all the content you post to social channels there too. Train your customers to get excited about coming to your forum to learn more about what you're making.
If you do make your own forum: when a customer asks you a question over email (like "how much does it weigh?") instead of answering the question in the email, answer it on the forum, and then email the customer a link to the for forum post. The benefits you get from this are huge: 1) your prospective customer gets introduced to the forum, 2) you create content in the forum that other customers can benefit from 3) next time you get the question, you already have it answered in the forum, and you can just refer to the link, and 4) you show customers how responsive you are.
All of these are small easy tips that require zero to minimal amounts of money (hosting a forum literally costs $10/month). It just blows my mind that more OEMs don't do this, especially when it makes the difference between success and failure.
I agree with you completely about the importance of fast and responsive customer service. As a tech guy in Silicon Valley, one of the most important rules for startups is to be close to the customer-- to listen maniacally to feedback and iterate quickly based on they feedback. And in fact if there is one thing that consistently separates the hugely successful startups from those that fail in Silicon Valley, it's this characteristic.
In the expo world I too see manufacturers they are obsessed with building a quality product, but that do so at the expense of being responsive to current and prospective customers. With social media tools a) giving customers such a strong channel and b) making it so easy for manufacturers to have an intimate channel of communication with their user base, there is no reason a manufacturer can't be leading class in this area. Literally the only thing it takes is a dedication of time-- as little as 30 minutes 2x a day, although ideally twice that. But it's the best investment of time a manufacturer can make.
I'm writing a bit of a thread hijack manifesto on this because it resonates so much with me and pains me so greatly to see high quality products like Adrenalin fail to gain traction in the market. The most important first step is definitely to make a high quality product. But that's not the *only* step.
So to all you OEMs out there:
- have an active Twitter presence. Respond to @mentions within hours, not days.
- have an active FB page. Respond to comments in hours, not days.
- take videos of what is going on in your shop every single day. Explain your product. Explain how you welded a corner a certain way, and why. Explain why you sourced a specific material. Etc. You might think this details don't matter-- but they are exactly what matter. You might think your video has to be slick and well produced. I'd much rather see a raw, unedited real video with real content in it. The stuff that is so mundane to you is incredibly compelling to others.
- when a customer comes to pick up your product, video tape the visit. Your customer will value having a video of how to use the product that is customized for them, and s/he will likely allow you to post that video out to social channels. Nothing sells a product like an excited customer picking it up.
- Jon is absolutely right: never, ever delete a bad comment, no matter how much it upsets you. A bad comment is simply feedback that people care enough to say something. Use it to make your products even better. Engage the person in conversation and try to turn the frown upside down. Don't be defensive. Feedback is a gift. Your only real problem is when people don't care enough to give it to you.
- bonus: when you get questions on social media channels, answer them with a personalized video and post it publicly to the channel. Prospective customers will be blown away that you took 5 minutes to respond to their question.
- bonus #2: start your own forum to let your current and prospective customers talk about your products together-- and be very, very active there. Post all the content you post to social channels there too. Train your customers to get excited about coming to your forum to learn more about what you're making.
If you do make your own forum: when a customer asks you a question over email (like "how much does it weigh?") instead of answering the question in the email, answer it on the forum, and then email the customer a link to the for forum post. The benefits you get from this are huge: 1) your prospective customer gets introduced to the forum, 2) you create content in the forum that other customers can benefit from 3) next time you get the question, you already have it answered in the forum, and you can just refer to the link, and 4) you show customers how responsive you are.
All of these are small easy tips that require zero to minimal amounts of money (hosting a forum literally costs $10/month). It just blows my mind that more OEMs don't do this, especially when it makes the difference between success and failure.
Romer
Adventurer
Jon- You camper is very similar to my Kimberley. Maybe those struts would fit. I bought spares from Kimberley just to have them and haven't used them yet and I know they still sell them. My Kimberley is 13years old, no leaks or tears and still very happy with mine. You can import the newer Kimberley model as some have, just not very cheap
Instead of starting my own thread I'll post here as this seems to be the best place for info on the trailers. I have the newer Blast version and can back up Jon's comments / impressions as accurate and very fair. The trailers are built like tanks and are a very cleaver design. No doubt. Product wise I think they are 95% there with 4 % minor annoyances and 1% WTH were they thinking.
My main product issue was water intrusion which we discovered was a result of very heavy duty struts only on one side which did not allow a even tight enough seal. Both struts were put on one side to accommodate the swing out spare tire which also doubles as a table – very neat idea in theory. The other issue with the struts and swing out was that they allowed for gaps in the tent seen below which obviously would not be fun when camping in the woods with creepy critters.
Gap with weather stripping removed (other side was completely tight)
Tent Gap
Our fail safe solution was to ditch the swing out and put equal sized struts on both sides which allowed for an even mating. After upgrading the cheaper weather stripping I now have a very watertight seal. Snap button fasteners were also added to eliminate the canvas gap.
I still need to find a good trailer jack because the one used was pretty cheap and the handle broke with very minimal use.
Sadly the issue of customer service / support could not be so easily fixed. Mine arrived without a simple screw stop installed on one of the inner tent poles which resulting in much internal damage as the tent closed unevenly. I contacted Ric and was actually berated that it was not possible – despite sending him pictures.
After some back and forth and only after contacting my credit card company to reverse the cost of the entire camper did Ric send new poles, wood and brackets to fix the damage. During this episode I also finally talked with somebody who it appeared to me actually built the campers as a sub-contractor for Adrenalin. I say this because there were certain simple details that Ric did not know and he finally passed the phone on to somebody who had in-depth knowledge of its construction and who also confirmed that screw stops should have been installed on both sides. Initially I thought that forgetting a screw stop was, while annoying, not that big of a deal as things happen. It's the way it was handled which left a very bad taste in my mouth.
Other annoyances include Ric offering a shipping estimate which turned out was 3X too low. The trailer also came with no side marker lights which are required in my State before being able to register it – something that anybody selling on road use campers sure as hell should know. All now added at my expense. I took it upon myself to also upgrade a few things which did not fail but thought were weak points such as the hinges on the bed platform. Some things I will leave as is: I had him use the bolt pattern and wheels to match my 4Runner so I could interchange spares between the two. However in a ****** moment he did not use metric wheel lug studs which means I need to carry around a set of SAE lugs. Also no information came with the trailer such as the model of air bags used in case something needs to be replaced or repaired. A parts list would be nice for sourcing replacements. Lastly, no real instructions came with as to know the best way to open and close it - not hard to figure out the main body but I have not even attempted to put on the side rooms.
While I remain very high on the camper as it is truly unique, innovated and mostly very well built I cannot same the same for my customer service experience.
As the kid grows older we are morphing to more beach travel instead of camping so I may end up putting the camper up for sale solely due to its lack of use. At least I will know that if I do sell it the buyer will have all issues resolved so they don't need to put up with the hassle we endured.
My main product issue was water intrusion which we discovered was a result of very heavy duty struts only on one side which did not allow a even tight enough seal. Both struts were put on one side to accommodate the swing out spare tire which also doubles as a table – very neat idea in theory. The other issue with the struts and swing out was that they allowed for gaps in the tent seen below which obviously would not be fun when camping in the woods with creepy critters.
Gap with weather stripping removed (other side was completely tight)
Tent Gap
Our fail safe solution was to ditch the swing out and put equal sized struts on both sides which allowed for an even mating. After upgrading the cheaper weather stripping I now have a very watertight seal. Snap button fasteners were also added to eliminate the canvas gap.
I still need to find a good trailer jack because the one used was pretty cheap and the handle broke with very minimal use.
Sadly the issue of customer service / support could not be so easily fixed. Mine arrived without a simple screw stop installed on one of the inner tent poles which resulting in much internal damage as the tent closed unevenly. I contacted Ric and was actually berated that it was not possible – despite sending him pictures.
After some back and forth and only after contacting my credit card company to reverse the cost of the entire camper did Ric send new poles, wood and brackets to fix the damage. During this episode I also finally talked with somebody who it appeared to me actually built the campers as a sub-contractor for Adrenalin. I say this because there were certain simple details that Ric did not know and he finally passed the phone on to somebody who had in-depth knowledge of its construction and who also confirmed that screw stops should have been installed on both sides. Initially I thought that forgetting a screw stop was, while annoying, not that big of a deal as things happen. It's the way it was handled which left a very bad taste in my mouth.
Other annoyances include Ric offering a shipping estimate which turned out was 3X too low. The trailer also came with no side marker lights which are required in my State before being able to register it – something that anybody selling on road use campers sure as hell should know. All now added at my expense. I took it upon myself to also upgrade a few things which did not fail but thought were weak points such as the hinges on the bed platform. Some things I will leave as is: I had him use the bolt pattern and wheels to match my 4Runner so I could interchange spares between the two. However in a ****** moment he did not use metric wheel lug studs which means I need to carry around a set of SAE lugs. Also no information came with the trailer such as the model of air bags used in case something needs to be replaced or repaired. A parts list would be nice for sourcing replacements. Lastly, no real instructions came with as to know the best way to open and close it - not hard to figure out the main body but I have not even attempted to put on the side rooms.
While I remain very high on the camper as it is truly unique, innovated and mostly very well built I cannot same the same for my customer service experience.
As the kid grows older we are morphing to more beach travel instead of camping so I may end up putting the camper up for sale solely due to its lack of use. At least I will know that if I do sell it the buyer will have all issues resolved so they don't need to put up with the hassle we endured.
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OCD Overland
Explorer
So I seem to remember that one of the U.S. trailer companies showed a very similar trailer at one of the past expos, but it never materialized apart from the one-off demo, which I think one of the members here now owns. I wondered if this was due to a lack of interest in the design, or perhaps if Adrenalin had a patent on the design in the U.S. which ultimately prevented them from going to market.
Does anyone else remember that trailer and who made it? Perhaps now that Adrenalin is exiting the U.S., there's a chance someone else could pick up the design.
Does anyone else remember that trailer and who made it? Perhaps now that Adrenalin is exiting the U.S., there's a chance someone else could pick up the design.
Honestly I've been hesitate to post my experience because I didn't want only negative impressions out there. The good news is that the trailers are really well built and awesome design and customer service is an easy problem to fix if the vendor has the desire.
Xrunner
Explorer
Yes, I think it was a custom prototype called the Oasis that Adventure Trailer made based off of a Kamparoo for a disabled explorer. It was at Overland ExPo 2009 towed by a FlipPac Jeep IIRC... there are a few photos of it from SingleSpeedin here.
(all images belong to SingleSpeedin)
I've dreamed of owning something like that for a long time... anyone know if there is more info about the trailer somewhere? :sombrero:
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OCD Overland
Explorer
That's it - found a brief video, too...
drodio
Entrepreneur & Lifehacker
I am BEYOND excited to announce that I'm buying an Adrenalin Blast trailer (I'll keep the seller anonymous unless he decides to speak up!). I'd love to know how the Blast compares to the Rush; can't really find any detail anywhere on that. Jon do you have any details?
I'm also looking for anyone who's headed out West from the East Coast in the next month and would be interested in trailering it out to CA. I'd be happy to pay your gas money, and to let you use the trailer on the trip. Please please please PM me if you're available!
I'm also looking for anyone who's headed out West from the East Coast in the next month and would be interested in trailering it out to CA. I'd be happy to pay your gas money, and to let you use the trailer on the trip. Please please please PM me if you're available!
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