Open the storage closet and there it is: the three-person tent you bought for a festival years ago, two sleeping bags, a gas stove, a self-inflating mat and an LED lantern. All of it works perfectly. All of it gets used, at best, once a year — and some years, not even that.
That pile is easily €300–600 worth of equipment with a real utilization rate of around 2%. Meanwhile, every summer, thousands of people are looking for exactly those items for a weekend in the mountains, three nights at a festival, or a first family trip under canvas. They don't want to buy them. They want them for five days.
Peer-to-peer rental closes that loop. This guide covers what camping gear actually earns, how to build bundles that book themselves, when demand peaks, and how to protect your equipment from rough returns.
Why camping gear is one of the best categories to rent out
Not every item performs equally on a rental marketplace. Camping has four traits that make it unusually profitable:
- Deeply seasonal, infrequent use. Most people camp zero to two times a year. Buying a full setup for two nights makes no financial sense — and that's exactly the reasoning that drives people to rent.
- High purchase barrier. A decent two-person setup (tent, sleeping bags, mats, stove) runs €350–500. Renting the same thing for a weekend costs €40–60. For anyone who isn't a regular camper, the math is obvious.
- It rents as a bundle, not as a single item. This is the real lever. Nobody rents just a tent. Someone looking for a tent also needs sleeping bags, and probably a lantern. Every booking becomes multi-item, and your average order value climbs.
- Long bookings. A drill rents for half a day. A tent rents for four, five, seven nights. Fewer handovers to manage, more billed days per trip to the door.
How much you can earn: the numbers
Here are realistic peer-to-peer reference rates for gear in good condition. All figures are daily and net of the Lendmates fee:
| Item | Retail value | Per day | Weekend (3 days) | Week (7 days) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2-person tent | €90–180 | €8–12 | €22–32 | €45–65 |
| 4-person family tent | €180–400 | €14–20 | €38–54 | €78–110 |
| Sleeping bag (each) | €40–120 | €3–5 | €8–13 | €17–28 |
| Self-inflating sleeping mat | €35–90 | €2–4 | €6–11 | €12–22 |
| Camp stove + cookset | €40–100 | €4–6 | €11–16 | €22–33 |
| Cooler / cool box | €50–150 | €5–8 | €13–21 | €28–44 |
| Complete 2-person kit | €350–500 | €22–30 | €60–80 | €120–165 |
The last row is the one that matters. A lender who lists each piece separately averages €10–14 per booking. A lender who offers the same gear as a coordinated kit reaches €60–80 on a single weekend booking — with exactly the same number of handovers to manage.
Seasonality: two peaks and a long tail
Main peak: June to September
This is where the bulk of demand sits, clustering around public holidays and long weekends. During these months you can price at the top of the range without hurting your booking rate: someone searching for a tent in early August has already decided to go.
Secondary peak: April–May and early October
Shoulder seasons belong to hikers and multi-day trekkers. Fewer requests, but longer average bookings and more experienced borrowers — which means less risk of damage and sloppy returns.
The winter tail: festivals and events
Even off-season there's residual, very specific demand: trade fairs, gatherings, sporting events, film shoots. Small in volume, but almost all of it converts at full price, because buying makes even less sense in November.
💡 Calendar rule of thumb: open your summer availability by April. Most July and August bookings land three to six weeks in advance, but the most organized borrowers — the ones who return everything in perfect order — book far earlier. A closed calendar in May costs you exactly those customers.
The bundle strategy: kits that book themselves
The most effective way to raise your average booking value isn't raising prices — it's reducing the number of decisions the borrower has to make. Someone planning their first camping trip has no idea which sleeping bag rating they need in August. They want a ready-made answer.
The "Weekend for Two" kit
A 2–3 person tent, two sleeping bags, two mats, one lantern. The single most requested package and the easiest to hand over: it fits into two duffels and travels in any car.
The "Family" kit
A 4-person tent with a porch, four sleeping bags, mats, a folding table and two chairs. Higher price point and longer bookings (5–7 nights), because families leave for the whole week rather than the weekend.
The "Camp Kitchen" kit
Gas stove, cookset, cutlery, cool box. This works best as an add-on to a main booking: when it's clearly offered alongside a tent, most borrowers take it.
Always state the number of people the tent sleeps and the comfort rating of the sleeping bags in your listing — these are the two details borrowers look for and rarely find. If you want to go deeper on listing copy, see our guide on how to price your rental items.
💚 Practical tip: slip a laminated card into the tent bag with pitching instructions and a photo of the tent set up. It costs nothing, it kills the 9pm "how do I put this up?" messages, and it makes an outsized difference to your reviews — first-time campers remember how supported they felt more than anything else.
Hygiene and condition: the part that separates good lenders from great ones
Camping is the one category where the borrower sleeps inside your item. That changes the rules: perceived cleanliness matters as much as gear quality.
- Wash and fully dry sleeping bags between rentals, or supply a washable sleeping-bag liner — cheaper and more hygienic. Say so in the listing: it's a genuinely strong selling point.
- Never store a tent damp. It's the number one cause of mildew and permanently ruined fabric. If it comes back wet, open it up and dry it completely before packing it away.
- Count the pegs on return. It sounds trivial, but missing pegs are by far the most common form of damage. Put the exact count in the description and check it at handover.
- Include a small repair kit: gaffer tape, a couple of spare pegs, a fabric patch. Borrowers fix small mishaps on site instead of handing you back a problem.
On Lendmates, every exchange is confirmed with a QR code and the deposit is held at booking and released once the item comes back undamaged. Document condition with photos at handover and on return, and you'll have an objective basis if anything is ever disputed.
"I'd used that tent twice in six years. This summer it went out seven weekends out of nine — it has already paid for itself, the sleeping bags and the stove. The strange part is it kept coming back cleaner than I ever kept it."
Mistakes to avoid
- Renting out the fifteen-year-old tent because "it still works." Broken zips and worn-out waterproofing generate reviews that cost you more than the bookings earn. If a piece is at end of life, leave it out of the kit.
- Pricing per day as if it were a power drill. Camping rents in blocks: offer a long-booking discount (say −15% from five days) and you'll fill the calendar far faster.
- Not stating packed size and weight. Borrowers arriving by train or scooter need to know. Listing it prevents last-minute cancellations.
- Handing over without a demo. Five minutes showing how the tent pitches eliminates almost all misuse damage.
🎯 Bottom line: a well-photographed two-person camping kit, available from June through September, realistically earns €250–450 net per season across 5–8 bookings. Add a second family kit and clearing €700 becomes straightforward — for a few hours of effort per month.
Build the full summer bundle
Camping gear performs best as part of a small summer ecosystem. Someone renting a tent in August is planning an entire trip: they often also need suitcases and travel bags, a roof box to fit everything in the car, or hiking gear for day trips. Listing related items creates cross-requests and turns one borrower into two or three separate bookings in the same week.
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