A Tale Of Two Tents
The first couple of times I went to Burning Man, the insides of my tents got absolutely covered in dust.
I had neglected rule number one of Burning Man accommodations:
Dust proof tent!
There are always multiple dust storms that pass through, and if you don’t have the right tent, the dust will more than gladly find its way into your sleeping bag and personal belongings.
The dust is completely harmless. It’s just a bit…messy.
After going through that a couple of times, it was time to upgrade.
There are two types of tents that are omni-present at Burning Man.
The first is called a Kodiak Tent.
Kodiaks are made out of thick canvas, dust proof, and incredibly spacious.
The problem?
They are bulky and really difficult to set up. The tent comes with an assortment of long metal poles, and it requires multiple people to get it up and running.
Once it’s up - it’s fantastic. But getting to that point is a huge headache, especially if you’re setting up your tent at 2am after an 8 hour line to get into Burning Man.
The second widely used tent is called a ShiftPod.
The ShiftPod is like the MacBook Pro of Burning Man tents.
The setup is so seamless that it basically pops up as soon as you take it out of the case. It has a reflective exterior designed to prevent overheating. And the inside is very spacious.
ShiftPods are so well designed, they are almost effortless.
The last two years, I camped with a Kodiak tent.
It was a much better experience than the first couple years (95% less dust!), but the setup drove me crazy.
I hated that I couldn’t set it up by myself and needed two other people to assemble it. And it required a bunch of disconnected metal parts, one of which could be easily lost.
This year I made a decision:
No more Kodiaks! I’ve had enough with the clunkiness. Harsh environments require simplicity and ease of setup - so easy that I could set it up by myself in a dust storm in the middle of the night.
ShiftPods are the gold standard at Burning Man. I’m ready to up my game.
The lesson:
Simple and agile solutions are superior to bulky and clunky options.
Great design makes life easy.
If something feels way too difficult, there’s probably a better solution out there.
Personally, I’m not a tent engineer. I don’t want to think about setup. I want it to just work.
Just like how I want my computer or car to just work. I don’t want to get invested in the technical details.
Life is better when we find ShiftPod-like solutions to our problems.
It’s really nice when something works perfectly and you don’t have to worry about it anymore.
And if you feel dragged down by current solutions?
Time for an upgrade.