For the vast majority of you summer vacations will already be over, when this newsletter is published. The next highlight is the opening of the Caravan-Salon in Düsseldorf. We hope you had nice and relaxing days at LeadingCampings despite of changing entry and return rules and changing risk area classifications! We really spared no pains to offer you the best vacation under Corvid-19 protection conditions. Fortunately, none of the LeadingCampings have been affected by the various natural disasters of this summer - the forest fires in Tarragona were far away from Playa Montroig and the floods in BeNeLux and Germany steered clear of the LeadingCampings. Our compassion is with all those, who did not have this luck and have to mourn losses. From the losses of some to the gains of others: Our big summer raffle, which we ran together with partner Carthago and 900 Linda pharmacies, now has three lucky winners looking forward to a motorhome vacation. Congratulations! A Leading vacation is doubtless a profit also in late summer and autumn. At these times of year, too, we look forward to welcoming and pampering you at all 36 Leading locations in 11 European countries.

LeadingsClub

Welcome in the LeadingClub! Each month there is a lucky winner of a "feel good camping week" at a different campsite amongst the club members. The winner of the LeadingCamping week of July 2021 is Christian S. from the Mühlviertel in Upper Austria. He may look forward to having a treat at the Camping- und Freizeitpark Luxoase closeby Dresden. Have a look what this campsite has to offer at www.luxoase.de The LeadingCard is the entrée into the LeadingsClub. The most popular benefits at a glance:

1. Every month a raffle of a full week's stay at one of the LeadingCampings, restaurant meals, wellness, sports, and fun included.
2. Late check-out and pitch upgrade*
3. Preferential reception and/or reserved counter for LeadingsClub. *
4. Benefits and privileges on every LeadingCamping for club members, including overnight stays for bonus points (not on all LeadingCampings). *
5. Reserved space in leadingcampings.com website where you can control your point account, find current offers and much more interesting information.
   

* Examples of the various LeadingsClub. Offers can vary from campsite to campsite and are not available at every LeadingCamping.

ADAC inspection

Beloved and feared: In the camping world of Europe, the ADAC is still considered the consumer organisation with the most comprehensive database on campsites - a treasure for the ADAC-Camping GmbH in Berlin who comprehends the information in the ADAC Camping Guide every year with its PiNCAMP brand. In order to keep the database up to date and to distribute awards fairly and justifiably to the campsites, annual inspections of the campsites according to standardised criteria are essential. Covid-19 prevented a proper inspection in 2020. Therefore, it was even more important to resume the on-site assessments this year. Even though travelling was still arduous, the ADAC inspectors swarmed out and made up for the missed assessments over the summer. Our picture shows the ADAC PiNCAMP team inspecting the LuxOase near Dresden. More information: www.pincamp.de

Leading inspection

Not only the ADAC inspects campsites, but also the large Dutch camping guides from ANWB and ACSI will send again their teams of experienced and trained inspectors in 2021. So it was by chance, that Leading quality manager Hannes Kiessling caught the ANWB inspector red-handed in Tyrol, while Leading managing director Eicke Schüürmann met the ACSI managers on the Rhine during their trip through Germany. However, because the so-called ‘soft skills’, i.e. the emotional component of hospitality, are enormously important to us at LeadingCampings, we do not leave it at the results of the professional inspectors. Again and again, we want to talk to the member establishments ourselves and get first-hand information. In doing so, we always look beyond the Leading campsites to learn, what other very good campsites have to offer. This is called ‘benchmarking’. Kiessling and Schüürmann have just completed such a trip (four days, four campsites) together on both the French and Spanish sides of Catalonia. They found out, that even a beacon among the LeadingCampings like Le Brasilia still manages to become more beautiful, better, tidier in details. It is a boon to verify something like this at full capacity in the peak season. More information: www.brasilia.fr

LeadingCard bonus points

As you know, bonus points on the LeadingCard have a validity of three years. When the travel restrictions due to the pandemic became apparent in spring 2020, we suspended the expiry of the points. It was foreseeable that our guests would have no or only extremely limited opportunities to visit our campsites and redeem points due to Covid-19. Therefore, our guests got  the opportunity to use the points, which were threatened with expiry, for longer than usual during this period in which travel and redemption were not possible as usual.
Unfortunately, due to a system error, this did not work right away: With the resumption of the points expiry in the second half of 2021, it initially simply continued where it had stopped, i.e. points from 2017 and 2018 were forfeited. This was absolutely not in our interest and we apologise for this. Together with the system provider, we worked feverishly to reactivate the points that had now expired too early. On August 17^th, we received a positive reply that the problem is under control. All points, that have been booked up to December 31^st 2019, will now live for one and a half years longer. Points that have been added from 2020 onwards will follow the normal 3-year rhythm again.
We apologise for the inconvenience and also for the fact, that some LeadingCard accounts will now show some confusing lines with initially cancelled and then reactivated points ("cancel cancelled points"). Please check your account, when you have a chance and let us know of any discrepancies. We thank you for your patience.

Trendsport paddel tennis

Just in time for its 25^th anniversary, Camping Piani di Clodia in Lazise at Lake Garda has afforded itself a brand new court for the trendy sport paddle tennis. This field sport, being very popular for some time, is similar to tennis, but is played on smaller courts with short rackets without strings. Paddle tennis is played only in doubles, on a court 20 by 10 metres, which is enclosed in a U-shape by side boundaries that allow the ball to bounce. The sport, which is a mixture of tennis and squash, experienced its first boom at the Costa del Sol in the 1960s, and now it is coming back and spreading rapidly beyond Spain and the south of France. The fast backstroke game delights beginners as well as advanced players and is always an exciting fun for spectators. More information: www.pianidiclodia.it