Time has flown by since the beginning on the new Millennium! Its hard to imagine that the now iconic structures of the London Eye and the Millennium Dome were brand new, and that they were supposed to be only temporary. At that time the internet was becoming more and more mainstream but it certainly wasn’t the everyday business, communication, entertainment and information media that it has become today.
Yet way back in the year 2000, at Adventure Centre Ltd, we started work on CheapTents. At that time there were several well-known discounting websites such as Cheap Flights. From this the idea of the CheapTents brand was born. It made perfect sense since we were selling top quality outdoor gear at discounted prices, but of course, Not Just Tents!
By March 2001 our website was complete and CheapTents went online. By our reckoning that makes us over 10 years old! And we make no apologies for bragging, but we were one of the very first independent online camping shops and proud of it!
A lot has changed in the outdoor market since 2001. Brands like The North Face and Berghaus are continuing to innovate design. We’ve seen some excellent advances in materials and product features such as Goretex XCR Summit II fabric and the Berghaus Bioflex rucksack back system. Even hydration packs were quite new back in the day.
Website design has changed a lot too, since 2001. Our initial design enabled customers to progress from the homepage logically through the website. First selecting a main category such as tents, then a sub-category such 2 man tents, our customers would reach a comparison table for products in the sub-category. Finally there was a product page containing detailed information about each tent, or other product, and the “add to cart” button of course!
With the development of search engines it became possible to land not just on the homepage but directly on the product page. Our customers wanted to be able to get to product information more quickly, so additional navigation menus were added to the side of each page and each product now has its own page. Of course, it is still possible to navigate through the website categories as per our original design and compare products in our comparison tables. We have also kept our (in)famous light yellow background and green buttons!
Now in 2011 it has never been a better time to buy outdoor clothing and equipment. True to our original concept, at CheapTents we continue to offer high quality tents, camping and walking gear at discounted prices!
CheapTents Outdoor Gear Blog 