Re-cycling, up-cycling, and pre-pitching: Camplight are here to make festivals easier for all

Festival season is almost upon us, and revellers everywhere are booking up their Liftshares to get to and from this summer’s best events as easily and cheaply as possible.

But now there’s another way to make your festival experience hassle-free and cut down on the time you spend sorting out your essentials. Enter Camplight – and here’s their founder, Kieran, to explain more.

Hi Kieran. Tell us, what do Camplight do?

We hire pre pitched tents to festival goers so that they can travel light to the events that they love.  All of our tents have been previously abandoned on event sites by punters who couldn’t face carrying all their stuff home.  We started salvaging these tents in 2009 and learned to clean and fix them.  Now, we’re a group of professional tent fixers and restorers.

Where did the idea come from?

We came out of a transition town organisation called Transition Resource, with the basic idea that plenty more things can be reused and up-cycled.  Rubbish is a human invention, so why can’t we reinvent the way we make it and reuse it? This concept is called the circular or resource based economy.

What are the benefits to a pre-pitched tent?

People no longer have to carry all their stuff to events; allowing them to car share or travel by public transport.  They don’t lose out on a sought-after location in the campsite, even if they can’t make it to the event as soon as the site opens. No more being stuck miles away from your mates! They also don’t need to faff about with tents and tent poles, so there’s more time seeing the bands and acts that they want to. It’s a winner all ways round.

What events can we find you at in 2016?

Absolutely loads!

• Masked Ball – 20th to 22nd May
• Glastonbury – 22nd to 26th June
• NASS – 8th to 10th July
• Nozstock – 22nd to 24th July
• Green Gathering – 4th to 7th August
• Board Masters – 10th to 14th August
• Boomtown Fair – 11th to 14th August
• Shambala – 25th to 28th August
• Bestival – 8th to 11th September

You can read the list of events and pre-book your tent at our website. Bigger festivals sell out fast, so be sure to arrange your accommodation as early as possible.

Can people volunteer to come and work with you? What does it entail?

Yes please, we need people power! Our volunteers pitch, clean, and take down tents for our customers, in return for free tickets to the festivals that we work at. The Camplight Crew always have a great time, and party together throughout the events. It’s a brilliant way to get to the festivals you want to without forking Big Church Day Out, car-share, car-sharing, carpool karaoke, cheap petrol, cheap travel, christian music, christian rock, church, commute, commuters, commutes, commuting, drive, Festival, lift-sharing, Liftshare, liftsharing, london, ridesharing, safe driving, sharing, sharing economy, slow roads, out a small fortune for a ticket – and you’re saving the world by helping recycle! You can learn more about volunteering opportunities on our website.

Do you liftshare to/from festivals?

We try to fit as many in as we legally can! The Camplight Crew liftshare wherever possible to our festivals and events. Bestival is the best for this – we always have a full van for the Isle of Wight ferry crossing, so we’re as green as we can be!

What’s next for Camplight?

More events, more shelters, a bigger communal fire space, maybe even a camp kitchen… maybe even a tent mechanics rap music video… we have a lot of ideas in the pipeline. Stay tuned!