Onsite Insight Podcast by RV Housing Group

The Balancing Act: Quality Service vs. Competitive Pricing in RV Housing

• RV Housing Group

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The temporary housing landscape is evolving as insurance agencies increasingly view RV housing as a viable solution for displaced families, creating both opportunities and challenges in maintaining exceptional service while managing costs.

• Education around on-site housing options is improving among insurance partners
• New competition entering the market doesn't necessarily translate to quality service
• Maintaining exceptional service requires proper staffing and infrastructure
• Volume can beat margin when building a sustainable business model
• Taking a Chick-fil-A approach of being potentially "over-employed" to ensure quality
• Balance between cost efficiency and exceptional service requires strategic thinking
• Flexibility in pricing sometimes necessary to help families with limited coverage
• Empathy is essential when working with people who have lost everything
• Hiring team members who genuinely care about people is critical
• No business is perfect, but attention to detail minimizes preventable mistakes

If you're an insurance partner looking for reliable temporary housing solutions for your policyholders, reach out to learn how we can provide both exceptional service and competitive pricing.


Speaker 1:

Brad, what's up? Hey, man, Another episode you ready. Another day, here we go. It's a busy season for us right now, man. It's good, we've got a lot rolling right now.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, we do. Yep, it's great, man, it's great we're staying busy, for sure.

Speaker 1:

On that note, I just kind of wanted to dive right in today because I think there is a move in this industry I hope there is at least where housing agency reps are starting to see RV housing as a much more viable option. Have you noticed that where people are getting more educated around it and are saying, oh, this is actually something where it is?

Speaker 2:

a good option for our insured. I think so. I think it's partly that. I think it's also that they're just you know, they're just listening to the policyholders a little bit more and saying, hey, all right, you know I hear that you want onsite and you know they're willing. But I think education is happening too. They're really having a much better grasp of on-site housing.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, which is the big why behind even this podcast is to hopefully to continue to educate a little bit more so people know, if it, if it's the right fit.

Speaker 1:

you know that here's, here's some options.

Speaker 1:

I think the downside of that is what I've been noticing is there's there's a lot more players coming into this space, which again, we don't.

Speaker 1:

We don't have a scarcity mindset around that.

Speaker 1:

Like we're friends with a lot of our quote-unquote competitors and you know right, you would talk with them and we swap ideas and best practices, all that kind of stuff.

Speaker 1:

But there is a sense where there's a sense of responsibility that we feel of just like a little bit of buyer beware, like hey, there's people jumping into the space that can make a big splash, but this isn't a space necessarily, if you don't have the right infrastructure, that you can do well, like it just takes a lot between inventory and systems and structures and relationships, and there's just a lot that goes into this space. And so I wanted just to talk a little bit about just that hybrid balance between, yeah, relationships matter, all those things matter. We try to really go out of our way to keep great relationships with our partners, but then also equally important is the value and the service and all that kind of stuff. And so I just wanted to get your thoughts, even if it was just for a few minutes on the landscape of this market and what you're seeing and how we want to continue to show up best for our partners.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, for sure. I think that we're certainly seeing some new competition coming into the industry, right, but that doesn't scare me, it's fine, it just is what it is. I think competition is not a bad thing at all. But competition or no competition, I am steadfast in what I believe to be important in how we run our business right and how we take care of people. It literally would not change man if no other company was doing what we were doing.

Speaker 1:

if we were the only one, okay, I would be just as passionate and, just you know, care just as much about taking care of people the way that we do well, history proves that too, because before there was many players in the space, you know you were one of the first ones, and that's always been true of the company, so yeah, that's not a new thing.

Speaker 2:

Yeah for sure, yeah for sure, um, but you know, I always tell I'm always talking to the team about. You know, um, look, anybody can and I believe this man, anybody in with some money, right, or some backing or investors or whatever can go out and buy a bunch of trailers, right, or a bunch of RVs, whatever, um, and look good, right, so like your business looks so legit. You know, you have all these units, blah, blah, blah, um, which, excuse me, which we have too, but not everybody has the ability to take really good care of people and offer great service. All you got to do, man, is go walk into almost any business in this country, right, and you can take a day and go to multiple different companies, right, and just get their experience. So many of them are not good, you know. So I'm like so many of them. I'm like I walk in, I'm like, does anybody even see me here? You know, now this is a little different because we're not face to face so much, right, but still, man, it just what I'm.

Speaker 2:

You know, I'm trying to make the point of that it's it's not common to have impeccable service. It's just not. It's really unfortunate, right, I mean, and you talk about look, I talked to other business owners about hiring people and, and you know, finding qualified employees. Man, that's freaking hard. You know, everybody wants to make a lot of money, but nobody actually wants to work for that money, you know. And so it's just where we have come to as a society.

Speaker 2:

You know, we just have this expectation of I want, I want, I want, but I don't really want to give back. You know, and that's where we're different, man, we we want, for sure, but we equally want to give back and make sure that we are providing an exceptional value for what we want. You know what I mean, which is obviously money, right. We want. You know what I mean, which is obviously money right.

Speaker 2:

So that's always been my thing, man, is, you know, hey, it's not that difficult to break into this industry and say, hey, here we are, we have all of these units and they're beautiful and all those things, but it is difficult to, once that unit gets placed, to take care of those people and answer your phone and message them back and email them back and stay in contact with the reps and and follow up and follow through and make sure that these people are actually happy and that it not just is the did the tech show up, but they fixed it the right way. And you know there's just so much of that man, that time, that takes time and it takes dedication and it takes caring.

Speaker 2:

you know, and not everybody has those attributes anymore. You know, and I think, I think you know just the generational thing and it's, you know, I think, social media man, I got so many opinions on this if you can't tell, but but but I think, ultimately, man, you know, just to know that, no matter what happens, we are going to continue to stay focused and do business the way that we've always done business, right, man, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter to me that we become the number one company and we put everybody else out of business and everybody sends everything they have to RV Housing Group. Dude, I'm telling you right now that would not change the way that I approach doing business with our partners.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and I think it's really well said because you look at a lot of the companies, organizations I mean Chick-fil-A comes to my mind immediately, probably because my family invests so much money there, but they're one place where they do have a great product.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I'm an investor too.

Speaker 1:

Their hospitality, their service, the way they take care of people, the way they treat people um is what makes it a takes. A good company, makes it great. You know that's right and you notice how many people they have, right?

Speaker 2:

yeah, man, chick-fil-a is over employed in my opinion, right you know, what I'm saying.

Speaker 2:

They are over employed, right, and and you know what? Probably you know, maybe someone could say the same thing about my company, hey, hey, based on competition and all that thing, you're over-employed. But you know what? There's something to having people having enough people to take really good care of people, and Chick-fil-A is the same mentality. You know what? Chick-fil-a, while they're good, they're not great. It's not the best chicken I've ever had, but you know that you go there and you're going to get phenomenal service, that you go there and you're going to get phenomenal service.

Speaker 1:

And I think that's why they are so dang busy. Yep, yep and kindness and all the different things, all those things. Let's talk about that for a minute, because here we have this relationship based business, and the insurance industry in general is a very relational I mean, everyone kind of knows each other and talks to one another as a relational business.

Speaker 2:

Yep.

Speaker 1:

And then you also have like cost effectiveness and cost efficiency and value base, and so you've got these things. A lot of times people can see them as competitive towards one another. Well, which one are you going to offer? You're going to offer you're going to be cost efficient, or you're going to offer great service, great value? Because the truth is to offer great service costs money, right, which a lot of times drives up prices, and so you're kind of at war with one another. How do you reconcile those two things, and what does that look like for RV Housing Group so that we can continue to offer great service but also stay competitive and cost efficient in our pricing?

Speaker 2:

You know, what's funny is that, although I continue to hire more people, my prices have actually come down. You know, hey, inflation hasn't changed. You know, the cost of everything else continues to go up. But I want the business man, I want all of it, right, I mean, you know, but and I understand that's not, you know, may not happen with everyone, but I'm willing to do whatever it takes so I can see the forest through the trees. When it comes to, you know, volume, right, volume will beat margin. I'm, I'm, I'm totally cool with that. So, you know, that's something that I'm always looking at. Right Is our pricing and hey, are we losing deals potentially because of pricing? And you know it. It became a little bit evident to me that maybe we were, and so we changed that up. But I'll continue to hire people, right, but when I hire somebody else, I'm not saying, oh well, hey, now we've got to raise our pricing up a little bit.

Speaker 1:

No, because I want to have the absolute best value for the dollar in this industry. Yeah, yeah, value for the dollar in this industry, yep, yep. Well, what? What is a sustainable kind of win-win partnership look like? In today's environment, with the competitive landscape and you know all the different things going on, what, what would that look like for you?

Speaker 2:

Um, I think that number one just just understanding that one, just just understanding that we are, we are doing business with people, that that need what we, what we have to offer, number one, number two, that understand that what we bring to the table is extremely valuable to them. You know that, that when they're dealing with RV housing group, they can know that things are going to get taken care of, they can know that they don't have to worry about following up to make sure things are getting done. Um, you know, because we're going to communicate all that, all of that along the way, um, but I think you know, just as long as we continue to make sure that our communication is on point, that you know our service, that our product, right, the units themselves, you know, are in great condition. You know, I think that in our pricing is, you know, is is great, right, we may not be the cheapest company, but we're certainly not the most expensive, um, and we're always willing to be flexible, right, so, understanding that people have ale limits and and things like that, uh, and knowing that our partners can reach out to us and say, hey, we have a family here, that their limits aren't great, but they're, you know the damage to their home was pretty substantial. Is there anything you can do from a pricing standpoint to maybe come down a little bit so they can get enough time to be able to get their house finished?

Speaker 2:

And you know what Our answer to that is? Absolutely We'll look at that Right. It's not no like, oh no, this is our pricing and you know we have to get paid this or we're not doing it. Man we want, because this business is not just about money, it's about helping people. You know what I'm saying and that's the greatest part about our business is actually helping people. So you're talking about people that are really in need, that are dealing with something they've never, they didn't anticipate, you know they weren't ready for um, and now they're in an emotional, uh state of mind right and they're wondering, like, what are we going to do for our you know dad, man, I'm a dad, right, you know, husband, father, like how, what am I going to do?

Speaker 2:

like, I feel, I feel so helpless, you know. So, knowing that this is where we come in and we can help these people, and I think that, um, I think that as long as we, uh, as long as we do that, we're always going to be willing to, to be flexible and to help out where we can. I mean, listen, we have come down on pricing in certain situations. I don't really want to throw that out there, because that's more, you know, I want that to be, uh, the rule, so much as the exception to the rule, but, um, but it's happened, you know what I mean, and in full transparency.

Speaker 1:

It's happened because we just looked at this situation with this family and we're like you know what, man, it's not always about making as much money as you can well, and that just came up this this week in our team meeting, there was an issue we were resolving and one of our team members just said that Just like hey, I just want to remind you like hey, this person just lost everything. They lost pets, I mean, they're just totally dysregulated and it helps humanize the situation. You're like, okay, they're not just being difficult for difficult sake, like they're in trauma and we have to remember, like they're actually going through some tough stuff right now.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, absolutely. I mean got to empathize man. I mean sometimes it's hard to do, but I'll tell you, I think we do a phenomenal job of that is, you know, just really putting ourself, you know, as if. What if that was us? You know what I mean and how would we want to be treated in that situation. And I think when we do that, that really is what propels our, our level of service.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, well, last question to kind of round out this conversation I you know you've heard it said before that you know businesses, you can. You can usually be one of three things you can be the cheapest, you can be the only or you can be the best, and so those are kind of your three options. Well, we know we're not the only and we're not the cheapest, although we're not the highest, like you said. But part of your vision is we can be the best and we believe and not to be arrogant or not to lead with ego, but we really desire to be the best to serve our partners, our clients, and they're insured to where they have a great experience working with us Cast a little bit of vision as to as we kind of move forward, as we grow the company and it evolves on these things. Why is that important to you and why is that something that's going to continue to remain a value for RV housing group.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, look, man, we're not perfect, you know. We certainly make mistakes. We're very good at paying attention to details, though, so it's not real common, but it's going to happen. Right? I'll tell you what. When mistakes occur, that's when I lose sleep, because I want to be, obviously, I want to be the best, but I am such a perfectionist, you know, and I almost, almost think, like, man, that was preventable, you know, like that mistake was preventable, and I think a lot of mistakes are preventable, but it's just human nature that mistakes happen. But it makes me lose sleep, man, you know, it's like golly, you know, I don't want to ever, I don't want to ever be looked at in a way of oh, that wasn't great service, you know, because, man, that matters so much to me, right?

Speaker 2:

So I think, going forward, you know, it's just always trying to put ourselves in their shoes, to understand really what the policy holders are going through, and and to actually make sure and this is something that's important to me when I bring on, you know, new, new employees and new staff, it's like hey, do you have? Um, are you an empathetic person? You know what I mean. Do you, do you care about taking care of people? Because if you don't, this is not this, this culture is not going to work for you, it's not going to work for me either.

Speaker 2:

And so I just think, as we continue to grow and to learn and expand our footprint across the country with new clients, with new clients, you know, I just think it's important for them to know that we are always looking at everything that we do to try and make sure that the level of service that we are offering is the absolute best, that if there are holes, you know, if there are gaps, we're going to try to fill those, you know, so we can make sure that everything we're doing for our clients is just as if they were going to do it, because obviously they want to offer an impeccable level of service as well, or else they won't stay in business.

Speaker 2:

And so we the risk right, we understand, um, you know the um. You know just the fact that it's not so easy to pass off something right to to somebody else and just hope, you know it's like, oh gosh, I really hope that they're gonna, they're gonna get that done in the right way. You know what I mean. Like we get that and that's that's what, um, you know, and we care about that, and that's why we continue to talk about it on a regular basis, and that's why I continue to be extremely bummed out when something falls through the cracks.