3rd Annual Roaming Times Green RV Award
Roaming Times, a leading RV review and RV consumer report website has selected Earthbound RV travel trailers as the 2010 Green RV of the Year.
David B. Hoefer, Earthbound’s VP of sales and marketing said:
"We’re at the cutting edge. Instead of traditional RV-building methods, we’ve turned to experts in other fields, such as automotive and plastics…”
The V-2 Earthbound being produced has already eliminated all wood and wood by-products. “Earthbound has leaped ahead with the use of composites, thermoplastics, and lightweight hybrid structural materials. We’ve been partnering with major international composite suppliers for over 8 years.”
Earthbound trailers are eco-friendly and lightweight. “We have the potential to add 11 million new customers to the towable RV buying market. Our RVs are towable with vehicles that are already parked in many of today’s family driveways.”
Read the rest of the Roaming Time’s announcement: Roaming Times’ Green RV of the Year Award 2010 – The Earthbound travel trailer.
Other RV, Camping and Outdoors News:
- Smokies campsites reopen with stimulated improvements, WBIR, Knoxville, Tennessee (use of federal stimulus funds for park improvements.
- New Report Reveals Full Extent of Public Outrage at Forest Service Concessionaire Policies, Fly Rod & Reel Online
- FEMA trailers at discount prices, todaysthv.com, Channel 11, Little Rock – Buyer beware!
- Teardrop trailer makes her a happy camper – The Daytona Beach News-Journal
- Jeep introduces campers built by Livin’ Lite, RV Daily Report
- Cost of sleeping under stars gets astronomical…Fees for your site, reservation, firewood — even getting through the gate — are on the rise, The Vancouver Sun
- Vermont state parks expect upswing, WCAX.com
Image Gallery:
Around the Upper Loop, September 13, 2007
(click on image for larger version)
We were camped at West Yellowstone KOA several miles west of town for nearly a week in September 2007. Our camper was a Big Horn fifth wheel by Heartland. We were set up with satellite TV and satellite internet and had almost all of the conveniences of home.
For all of the conveniences, though, we found that we were not doing the kind of camping that we really preferred. We prefer national and state park and forest campgrounds, but found in some of those kind of campgrounds that maneuvering into sites that could accommodate the size of our 5th wheel was often difficult and, in some instances, there just were not any sites that we felt comfortable with trying to get into.
We now have a small motor home and are able to get into just about any campground that we want to with little or no difficulty. The only ones we can’t get into are those restricted to tent camping and those that we can’t get to with the camper. We’ve visited a couple of places where the curves were so tight that our 25 foot motor home was over the length limit. We’re also not quite yet prepared to go too many miles down an unpaved road.
In 2009, we camped in 4 national park* campgrounds, 4 nights in each one. We didn’t have satellite TV or internet and we were doing the kind of camping we really prefer.
See more of our
Image Galleries at Haw Creek.
* Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Shenandoah National Park, Rocky Mountain National Park, and Mesa Verde National Park
According to an Elkhart Truth article, Heartland paid $306,000 for the rights to the Fleetwood names.
Prowler, Mallard, Gearbox and all the brand names that once distinguished Fleetwood travel trailers and fifth wheels now belong to Heartland Recreational Vehicles LLC.
The towable manufacturer bought the Fleetwood trademarks from the bankrupt Fleetwood Enterprises for $306,000 in a transaction that was finalized this week. Heartland bought the rights to the names only as they pertain to travel trailers, explained Len McGill, in-house counsel for Fleetwood Enterprises, noting the RV maker would be limited in applying these monikers to products other than towables.
Company officials did not return a phone call Thursday, but in a press release Heartland stated it expects to begin manufacturing towables under the newly acquired brands within the next 12 months.
Read the rest of the Elkhart Truth article.
In January, fifth wheel RV manufacturer NuWa Industries announced that it would quit manufacturing RVs later in the month, with units in production to be completed. The company CEO, in a letter to dealers, said that he could not see any indications that market conditions would improve significantly enough to continue production. The company was not going bankrupt and planned to meet customer warranty claims and to keep the factory service center open until at least 2010.
On March 7, NuWa CEO Mike Mitchell announced on the NuWa Owners Forum, “NuWa is developing a new business model and will be back in production in June. There, you heard it from the ‘horse’s mouth’.”
He went on to try to enlist the forum members’ help in getting the word out about the company plans. He said that there are units on dealers’ lot at a great bargains with both the dealers and the manufacturer still discounting them as though NuWa was going out of business. He also implied that the discounts would no longer be available once when the 2010 models hit the lots. There are no plans to significantly change the 2010 models from what is available in the 2009s and the model MSRP will not increase. Mr. Mitchell also asked for patience as the business plan is being developed and said that he would announce and explain it more at a later time.
