Our Story

As an international student studying in Canada, Polina kept hearing about amazing camping trips from her fellow Canadian students. To her, the idea of camping felt overwhelming. 

How is it done here? 
Where do I even start? 
Where do I go? 
What do I bring?

Years would go by, and she would visit stores that sold camping gear. Yet looking at the prices, she realized that it would be too expensive for a student. She was never able to justify such an expense for buying things she would use only once a year at best. She didn't even know if she would enjoy camping. Having to spend over $1,000 to just buy the basics for something she wasn't sure she would enjoy felt like a foolish idea.  

One miserable night that sparked an idea

Years later, Polina and her husband Yury got invited to go camping with some friends. Those friends offered their old camping gear to use for the camping trip. Hooray! They could finally experience the magic of camping they’d been hearing all this time.

The trip started well. Good company. Forest. Campfire. Simple food turned delicious by the simple act of cooking it over an open fire.

The good times didn't last long, though. It started to rain. The tent they were given was old and leaked badly. They spent an entire night soaking in the rain. They were cold, wet, and miserable. Never again.

 

The problem that was not addressed

Reflecting on this experience in 2022, Polina realized that the market had not addressed a problem.

The whole camping industry seemed to assume that you had grown up camping in Canada. You know everything about camping. You have everything to go camping. Not very beginner-friendly, to say the least.

As strange as it sounds, the barrier to entry for camping beginners is high.

People have to:

• Know where to go camping.

• Know how and when to book campsites.

• Know what to bring with them.

• Buy everything or borrow from someone.

• Know how to use this equipment.

• Have the space to store all this equipment (Have you seen Toronto condos recently?)

Polina knew she wasn't the only one who couldn't go camping in a country that prides itself on having so much nature to explore. How ironic! 

The business idea was born - a place where you can rent everything you need for a camping trip.

Camping in a country like Canada should not be this grandiose undertaking. It should be easy to enjoy the Canadian outdoors even if you are a complete beginner.

 

Camp Rentique was born

The camping rental idea won the 2022 Peterborough & the Kawarthas “Spark” Program competition. The prize provided enough funds to buy the initial camping gear. Polina was a product manager by day. She had enough skills to build a quick website that people could use to start placing orders.

Polina and Yury decided to deliver camping gear straight to people’s homes. They wanted to make things easier for the customer and minimize the start-up cost. Their first delivery took place in Toronto in July 2022.

 

There was a demand for this service. People from different walks of life wanted to rent camping gear:

• Families who want to take their kids camping, but don’t want to deal with the mental load of buying and packing everything they need.

• International students and new immigrants who never camped before.

• People who live in condos and don't have enough storage space.

• People who move a lot and don't want to drag the gear with them.

• International tourists.

• Outdoorsy couples who want to include camping as part of their wedding weekend.

• Companies that want to walk the talk about mental health and gift their employees quality time away to disconnect.

 

Where it’s going

Camp Rentique is still a small but mighty family-run and operated company. Polina and Yury are passionate about growing this company sustainably. Polina comes from the world of growth-at-all-costs, often poorly-built tech startups. She insists on building a solid foundation for Camp Rentique. “Slow is smooth. And smooth is fast.” 

Yury has years of experience building operational pipelines in the banking industry. This makes him the perfect fit for building strong operations within Camp Rentique. Polina will continue to use her Product Management experience to develop the vision and product line for Camp Rentique.

Making spending quality time in the Canadian outdoors as simple as possible is the main goal behind all the plans for Camp Rentique. “How can we make {insert an outdoor activity} easier for complete beginners?” is a question that continues to bring a lot of ideas for the future development of Camp Rentique. In the upcoming years, Polina and Yury want to make other outdoor activities more accessible to newbies, mainly the winter sports.

In the meantime, Polina and Yury never forget to enjoy the benefits of the outdoors. Yury is often the first to test out new camping packages before they are introduced to customers. Both of them are looking forward to teaching their daughter everything they’ve learned about enjoyable camping in Canada.