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Gordon White | Monday, 14 May, 2007
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Bob Mehrer, the President of Interior RV, and his team
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Is Bob Mehrer just an
urban legend? The stories start with Bob driving
hundreds of miles just to fix a customer's camper.
Other stories say that his baseball hat never comes
off. Surely this is madness. Yet he was very real
when we spoke with him. And in the photograph we
requested, he is indeed wearing a baseball hat. So
the stories are true. He is a legend, or at least a
good story teller. Here's the real story behind the
legendary Bob Mehrer.
TCM:
How did you
get into the RV business?
Bob:
When I
graduated grade eight, my father decided that was
enough education. I got a job building Scamper
travel trailers in Alberta. I worked there for
three years and then heard that they were opening a
factory for mobile homes in Penticton, British
Columbia. I wanted to live there, so I moved and
worked for General Coach for five years. Then I was
asked to go to Oliver to build Citation. I worked
there for ten years, most of the time as a
supervisor in charge of research and development of
new models. Then there was an opportunity to go to
Okanagan in Penticton to start building a Class C
motor home. I was in charge of anything with wheels
and made sure new products were CSA and DOT
approved. I worked there for 15 years. Then
Okanagan was bought by Thor Industries, the parent
company of Airstream. I got to prototype the first
Airstream van and work with Thompson Wade, the
owner of Thor. Then Thor sold Okanagan and a lot of
us were unemployed.
TCM:
Is that
when you started Interior RV?
Bob:
Yes. In
1991, I started Interior RV to build highline 5th
Wheels and hired people from Okanagan. After three
or four years, we decided to build truck campers
when we weren’t building 5th wheels. We created a
basement, which gave us five feet of floor space,
and put the tanks in the basement and heated them.
And people thought we were crazy when we built a
slide-out into a camper. Now we’re very busy
building truck campers with side-outs. We no longer
build 5th wheels. I don’t think I could work for
anyone else now. I’ve been spoiled.
TCM:
Who’s
responsible for new model design at Interior RV?
Bob:
At this
point in time, anyone in the company can suggest an
idea and it’s never rejected. No matter how crazy
it sounds, we’ll take a look at it. Someone starts
an idea, but it’s normally a combination of many
people who make it work after that. It wasn’t just
me who came up with the slide-out. It was the hard
work of five or six employees. We share everything
and have an open door policy for ideas and
complaints. It works really well. And when you
build good quality products, it’s very easy to
warranty. We are fair to our customers on or off
warranty. Our customers have faith in us and we
can’t let them down. If we ever come to the point
where the customer can’t be satisfied, then we’ve
failed. The best sales team is the people who own
our campers, if we look after them. Wade Thompson
of Airsteam told me that if you build a good
product and service the heck out of it, you can’t
go wrong. That was the best advice.
TCM:
How do
weight and payload factor into your designs?
Bob:
We look at
weight all the time. Any time we can take out ten
pounds, that’s ten pounds of parts that we don’t
have to buy. But there is a relationship between
how much comes out and when you start to loose
structural strength. The only place where you can
save weight is in the structure of the camper.
Every manufacturer uses the same refrigerators,
stoves, fiberglass, and air conditioners. People
want that stuff. If you take the refrigerator out,
you’ll have an unhappy customer.
TCM:
What’s the
difference between Snowriver and Snowbird?
Bob:
Snowbird
and Snowriver are the same campers with different
names. We use the Snowbird name in Canada because
Nu-Wa manufactures a 5th wheel in the US called
Snowbird. We sell Snowriver in the US and Nu-Wa
sells their 5th wheel
under the name Snowvilla in
Canada.
TCM:
How would
you describe your job?
Bob:
I have the
easiest job in the world. I really do. My employees
look after me. They’re excellent people and I don’t
do a lot anymore. My job is basically customer
relations. Since that’s my only job, I do it as
good as I can. When people come to visit, they stay
in my back yard. I’ve met so many interesting
people. People think I’m very giving, but I’m
really taking. I have a customer who worked for NBC
and knew Jay Lenno and Johnny Carson and has great
stories to tell me. That’s an interesting part of
my life. I get so much from people. Too many
manufacturers sell a camper and never want to see
the person again until they’re ready to buy. My job
as customer relations is to enjoy people. Every
time we sell a camper, I have a potential new
friend. I’m not afraid to meet our customers
because we build campers of high quality.
TCM:
Are you
concerned about the recent spike in fuel prices?
Bob:
We have a
local dealership in Penticton that sells $300,000
to $400,000 guzzlers that haven’t slowed down.
People will always want recreation. And one of the
most fuel efficient ways to enjoy the outdoors is
in a truck camper. A truck camper can add two to
three miles per gallon over pulling a 5th wheel.
TCM:
What do you
like to do with your TC?
Bob:
I visit
people who have my truck campers. This August, I'm
going to Vancouver Island with a customer who owns
a salmon charter. In October, I'll be moose hunting
with another customer. In the winter, I visit
customers in the desert. I really enjoy doing these
things and meeting the customers.
TCM:
What truck
camper and truck do you use?
Bob:
I carry a
9' 6". My wife likes the separate toilet and
shower. My truck is a single rear wheel short box
F350 straight from Ford. No airbags, but it did
come with Ranchos. It handles the camper well.
TCM:
Talk to us
about why Snowriver only has four models and four
dealerships. Other TC manufacturers often have many
times those numbers.
Bob:
Basically,
people drive a long way to buy our campers. It's
not like buying a sofa. I just sold one to a guy in
Anchorage who had never seen our campers. He bought
it based on our reputation for quality service.
After buying, customers often meander home visiting
aunts and uncles and starting their camping trip a
little earlier. We don't need a big dealer network.
TCM:
Interior RV
sometimes feels like a cult of personality, as if
it could be re-named Bob Mehrer Truck Campers. How
did this happen?
Bob:
When a
person buys any make of camper, they are a loyal
customer. It's easy to keep that loyalty if you
look after the customer. To loose that loyalty, a
customer has to be very frustrated with the
manufacturer. Every manufacturer starts with a
loyal customer and it's up to us to do small things
to keep them happy. We're small and we don't have
the buying power of the big guys. They buy 3000
water heaters. We only buy 150. One thing I can do
is service. I build 150 campers a year. If I have
trouble with 10%, I can look after 15 people very
well. Good service is our way of competing. And
good service builds a loyal following of customers.
I don't know of one unhappy Snowriver customer. If
somebody is unhappy, my home phone number is on our
web site. There's always something we can do to
keep the customer happy.
TCM:
What can we
expect to see from Snowriver in the future? A
triple slide?
Bob:
That's
never going to happen. We have a small market and
it's very easy for us to sell what we built. We're
not production driven, we're quality driven. We can
survive on so much less. We don't have big
overhead. Our office staff is only three people.
People who use our campers in British Columbia like
to go off road to their favorite moose hunting spot
at the end of the road. If you have too many holes
cut in the side of the box you loose structural
integrity. We've stuck with the dinette slide which
gives plenty of room. We find that people
who are
looking for a camper to go off road buy a Snowbird.
Truck campers should be able to go where no other
RV could go. We have to build our campers to be
stronger than other forms of RVs on the market.
TCM:
Why are you
building a Snowbird motor home?
Bob:
We have a
partnership with a local dealer for whom we've done
a lot of special projects. We even built him a 40'
motor home. He came to me to build ten small motor
homes with double slides for the European rental
market. Europeans don't like wide vehicles so we
made it narrow. It cut our production that year to
120, but we had fun doing it. Sometimes we just
want a challenge. We learned a lot about aluminum.
I used aluminum for the motor homes because they
were meant to stay on pavement and go from
campground to campground. And he offered too much
money to say no.
TCM:
Is there
anything that we haven't asked that you would like
to include in your interview?
Bob:
I'd like to
see the US dollar a little stronger. The US dollar
isn't hurting manufacturers as much as it could
because our US parts are cheaper. Everything
balances out. I enjoy selling to the US, traveling
the US, and have made a lot of friends in the US.
And we will do what it takes to be known as a
leader in the industry. We're not a company that
likes to follow. There are still a few things to
come from Snowriver.
For more information about Snowriver and Snowbird
campers, visit www.snowrivercamper.com
and
www.snowbirdcamper.com. |
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