Camp Social: Inside the Branded Weekend Getaway for Adults

Liv Schreiber, 28, was a current school graduate working in New York Metropolis, constructing companies and a social media following, when she observed that a variety of content material in her orbit centered on “maintaining with the Joneses” and summers spent with “slick-back buns” within the Hamptons. “I used to be like, , I actually simply want I may bounce within the lake and put on no make-up and return to sleepaway camp,” Schreiber tells Entrepreneur.

^{Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Camp Social. Liv Schreiber.}

Schreiber was well-positioned to carry her concept to life. In 2019, she launched Model Caffeine, a digital advertising company, and in 2022, she based Sizzling and Social, a social group that hosts meet-up occasions the place folks of their 20s and 30s could make new mates.

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The 2-time founder already knew easy methods to harness the facility of branding and social media to forge in-real-life connections, and in Might 2023, she was decided to use that experience to Camp Social. Schreiber’s first camp befell just some months later, in August, with 150 ladies in attendance.

^{Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Camp Social}

Since then, Camp Social has solely grown in recognition. The upcoming camp, which value $880 per ticket and will probably be held August 22-24, bought out in 24 hours. Camp Social has additionally expanded to supply two camps per 12 months as a substitute of 1; the primary fall weekend will probably be September 26-28.

“ I’m agency in my perception that that is what everybody’s going to be doing in a couple of years.”

Schreiber has only one rule for Camp Social’s campers: Everybody comes solo and leaves as mates. “It is a lunch desk the place everyone seems to be welcome to sit down,” she says.

Camp Social hosts ladies ages 21 and older (the oldest camper up to now was 65) and bunks them by age. Nevertheless, inter-generational friendships are additionally widespread, as campers meet new mates based mostly on the actions they select all through the weekend, Schreiber says.

^{Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Camp Social}

The price of a ticket to Camp Social covers the weekend’s bills, from the bus trip from New York Metropolis to the Pocononos — an “iconic” begin throughout which individuals are “singing, dancing and assembly one another,” Schreiber says — to the intensive record of instructor-led actions, from boating to archery, yoga, candle-making and extra, and branded goodie baggage, which embody quite a lot of merchandise.

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“I  prefer to deal with it like an influencer model journey for the patron,” Schreiber says. “ I’m agency in my perception that that is what everybody’s going to be doing in a couple of years. I have been shouting right into a black gap, attempting to [get] manufacturers to grasp that influencers aren’t shopping for their merchandise — customers are.”

Schreiber stresses that Camp Social solely options merchandise that she actually believes in and has turned down those who aren’t the appropriate match. A few of Camp Social’s sponsors embody Dunkin’, fast-casual restaurant chain Dig Inn and nonalcoholic wine model Fre.

^{Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Camp Social}

Schreiber is at all times looking out for brand new choices in service of what she calls “an important” a part of Camp Social: Facilitating group and new friendships. “We are able to provide every little thing and any model on this planet, however on the finish of the day, it is concerning the relationships,” Schreiber says.

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“Individuals have to know [that] connection is so necessary. Offline.”

“Neighborhood” is the brand new buzzword for a lot of manufacturers constructing a presence on-line — and Schreiber has blended emotions about it. “It makes me each completely happy and unhappy as a result of typically folks go into it with the flawed intentions or the intention of making one thing simply to promote,” she says.

Lately, it is authenticity and storytelling that make folks and types stand out, in response to Schreiber.

On her personal social media accounts, Schreiber notices that the movies that carry out the most effective are these through which she delves into the “why” behind her beginning Camp Social — and the real-life connections fashioned. A number of mates she met at Camp Social attended her current wedding ceremony. One in all them gave a speech; one other signed the ketubah.

^{Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Camp Social}

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In an period when many Individuals wrestle to domesticate significant relationships greater than ever earlier than — 21% of U.S. adults really feel lonely, and 73% attribute it to know-how, in response to a current report from Harvard Graduate College of Training — in-person connection stays Schreiber’s main objective.

“There’s an enormous model story that we are able to inform right here,” Schreiber says, “however the principle factor that folks have to know is that connection is so necessary. Offline. We have to make the most of social media as a instrument to be social and sort out the loneliness epidemic.”

This text is a part of our ongoing Ladies Entrepreneur® collection highlighting the tales, challenges and triumphs of working a enterprise as a girl.

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