Staff Training Sprint Cohort → Live and already has a bunch of people in. You and your team next? 4 days building out a staff training. More on this at the end. But just skip the wait and sign up now.
Camp Career Accelerator → Looking to get into summer camp full-time? This is **4-month immersive, paid fellowship for future camp leaders. Travel. Learn from the best. Build your path into full-time camp leadership. (also more about this at the bottom)
Also: Was at Tri-State this week. It was awesome. None of what you are about to read below is possible without the people I’ve met at camp conferences.
In fact, it’s pretty much only because of who I met at camp conferences. More on a great week in the next couple of weeks!
Anyway, on to buying a camp.
Signed the papers a few weeks ago.
Multiple stacks, multiple entities. Signing as John Schott the person (that’s me! MY NAME IS JOHN!?), as owner of holding companies, as operator of the camp.
Your brain eventually just shuts off to get through it. At some point it’s white noise. You’re reading, nodding, signing.
Then you’re done. And you own a camp (!). More late on how to own a camp without tons of your own money, you won't be surprised to hear I don't have lots of my own.
What I mean is... if you have a dream to own a camp, it's possible.
How I Got Here
I met with Scott Brody last fall. He was looking to transition out after decades of running Kenwood & Evergreen, and I was looking for the right opportunity to step back into running a camp.
We talked through what that could look like, and I spent last summer working at K&E to truly get a handle on what was happening. The ops, the culture, the families, the staff, the rhythms.
By the end of summer (really well before that), it was clear this was the right fit. Scott had built something special, and I wanted to be the one to carry it forward.
Were you at Camp Idol at Tri-State? That happened in big part because Campminder stepped up to sponsor it.
They are awesome, and they also help run the camp I run. Forms, data, parent comms, all of it. Campminder keeps camp running and they help get more kids to camp.
What Buying This Camp Actually Means
This camp has existed for 95 years. Hundreds of people call it home. All of the alumni, the current families, and staff who return summer after summer.
K&E isn’t mine in the sense of “Yo! I own this and can do whatever I want.” I own camp in the sense of “I’m now responsible for stewarding it into the future.”
The new guy stepping into something much bigger and older than me, and that comes with hella weight. Can you say hella and own a camp!?
Financial responsibility, yes no doubt (a total understatement fwiw). But also emotional responsibility and legacy responsibility.
Scott built something incredible here. Families have been coming for generations. The culture is strong and the traditions really matter.
The challenge is that every camp has to change to survive. But how much change is too much? What are the right changes? Everyone has a different opinion about what matters most.
Some people care deeply about certain things, others don’t. It has to work as a sustainable business and it has to honor what makes this place special.
That’s the very real tension. That’s very really what I signed up for.
The Clarifying Part
Ownership does something unexpected though. It’s a forcing function on focus.
When I ran my old camp, I woke up every day thinking about how to make camp a little better.
How to get one more kid to camp?
How to make the program stronger?
How to find better staff?
Everything pointed back to that.
After I left, there was a time of transition for me over the last couple of years. It looked like staff trainings, speaking at conferences, corporate consulting. All good work, all valuable, but not running a camp.
Now with K&E, everything comes back to one question: how do I make this camp more awesome than it already is?
I need to define awesome, that’s the work ahead. But there’s clarity in knowing that’s the work.
There’s pressure no doubt. But there’s also relief in knowing that for the next couple of decades, I know what I’m focused on.
Getting kids to camp. Building great staff culture. Communicating with families. Making this place sustainable.
That’s it. That’s the whole job.
The Long Game
I don’t have all the answers yet. Still figuring out what K&E needs most, still learning how every single part of this place works.
There is some time to figure it out. No infinity time, but it doesn’t have to all come at once.
That’s the gift of ownership. It’s building something to last.
Scott did that for decades before me. Now it’s my turn.
Running K&E is the focus. That’s where the day-to-day work happens, where kids show up, where staff build culture, where families trust us with their summers.
But camp is the mission. Not just my camp, all camps.
That’s why I write this newsletter every week. Writing on Substack too. That’s why I keep talking about frameworks like Time to Fun and Hidden Curriculum and all the rest of it. Getting more kids to summer camp everywhere matters.
K&E is my responsibility. Camp as a whole is what drives me.
So if you’re reading this and wondering what’s changing at K&E, I don’t know all of it yet. But I know the work.
Get kids to camp. Build something sustainable. Honor what makes this place special. And keep writing about what works so other camps can do the same.
That’s what the next couple decades look like. I’m grateful for the chance.