Today we’d like to introduce you to Ashley And Victor Bredemus
Hi Ashley and Victor Bredemus , we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
If you’ve seen the movie The Parent Trap then you can envision what we do – we own a summer camp! My husband, Victor, and I have owned Birchwood Wilderness Camp since 2020 (a tough first year to go into business). Prior to Birchwood, Victor was attending the University of Minnesota – Duluth pursuing a degree in outdoor education while I was working as an engineer in Florida. Our paths converged in 2018 when we met at the camp. Victor was the Tripping Director at the time and I was visiting my dad, Dan – his parents, my grandparents, founded Birchwood in 1968 and it has remained in the family ever since. That summer, my dad was working as a groundskeeper for my cousins who were directing the program. After visiting him for a portion of the summer, I decided to quit my job and spend the winter at camp with my dad, fully planning to find another engineering job in the spring somewhere in Duluth or Minneapolis.
Victor and I hit it off that fall, which made moving back to Minnesota (Grand Rapids is where I grew up) even sweeter. That winter, my uncle (who owned Birchwood at the time) said he would be selling the camp. My dad and I decided to sell the house he had built/I had grown up back in Grand Rapids so we could purchase the camp and keep it in the family!
I never returned to engineering and Victor finished up his degree so he could join us as a director. It has been over seven years since we met at camp and now we live there together full-time, are married, and had our first son, Kit, last fall.
I don’t think either of us had aspirations to own a small business and yet we’ve found ourselves living our dream life together in the Northwoods running our small wilderness camp.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
In many ways, owning a summer camp is such a playful/fun job to have yet it also carries a tremendous responsibility not only to keep everyone safe first and foremost but to also provide an uplifting experience that sends kids home as the best version of themselves. We take that responsibility to heart and welcome those challenges every day!
When a camper is homesick or nervous about a trip or butting heads with a cabin mate, it’s our job to work with our team of camp counselors to help that camper face those micro-adversities and come out on the other side stronger. Not every day at camp is s’mores and Kumbaya (although it’s mostly that)…underneath the rosy exterior, you find that each kiddo is developing through the little discomforts of being in a new setting surrounded by new people and experiences. Our camper’s challenges are our challenges!
Those are the challenges we look forward to solving. The obstacles we don’t look forward to are the somewhat universal challenges of owning a business – letting go of an employee who isn’t working out, fixing a broken something or other when it gives out, closing shop when a pandemic hits. These things come with the territory. In the past when big obstacles smack us in the face, like the pandemic, we always turn to each other and say, “Well…do you still want to do this?” So far the answer has always been a confident “yes, absolutely,” from both of us. We’re in it together and that makes all the difference!
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
Birchwood Wilderness Camp is a small (by design) wilderness camp for boys, ages 7 to 17, at the edge of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area out of Grand Marais. Since my grandparents founded the camp in 1968, we’ve kept enrollment small so we can focus on the things that matter most to us – connection, self-discovery, and a sense of shared purpose. I like to think our camp is synonymous with words like artisan, boutique, and mom-and-pop. We’re the opposite of a large “corporate” camp.
At any given time, we have a maximum of 46 campers and 25 staff making our dining hall jam-packed with boisterous young men with adventure on their minds! Each week, we send all of our campers on camping trips ranging from 3 to 5 days in length. Most trips paddle into the Boundary Waters but there’s always one or two that go backpacking on the Superior Hiking Trail or rock climbing on the north shore of Lake Superior. During the weekends, everyone returns to camp for traditional in-camp activities like archery, arts and crafts, swimming, fishing, etc.
It’s an energy-intensive 10 weeks for us and our staff. Thankfully, it’s balanced by the calm of winter when we have time to prepare for the next season, maintain/upgrade camp buildings/grounds, and chip away at the other one million things that go into preparing for a successful camp season! A lot of care goes into this family business and being a fourth-generation camp owner is something I take a lot of pride in.
Let’s talk about our city – what do you love? What do you not love?
The wonderful thing about working together is that Victor likes to do most of the things I dislike doing and vice versa! For example, Victor doesn’t like answering the phones and pulling together the daily task lists. I thrive off doing those things! Meanwhile, I don’t like conducting performance reviews or fixing things that break but he’s really good at those and feels fulfilled when taking the lead in those areas.
That being said, the number one thing we love most about owning our own business is the flexibility in the off-season and the intensity in the camp season. It’s such a nice balance and leaves us feeling fulfilled.
Pricing:
- 4 Week Session = $6,500
- 2 Week Session = $4,250
Contact Info:
- Website: https://birchwoodwildernesscamp.com/
- Instagram: @birchwoodwildernesscamp
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/gwc.bwb
- Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/@birchwoodwildernesscamp7734
