Camp4Real Entrepreneur Profile

Scott Williams owns, Camp4Real, a weeklong summer camp with rotating locations around Albemarle County, Chesterfield, and Virginia Beach. Camp4Real offers a fun-filled camp experience emphasizing healthy living through physical activity, social and emotional wellness, and proper nutrition. It fosters character building and creativity in a safe and nurturing environment. Nutrition is their passion at Camp4Real and they really practice what they preach by offering only the best foods for their campers! All campers are fed plant-based meals, free of artificial ingredients and minimally processed throughout the camp day. Camp4Real empowers their campers to “be leaders” at camp, school and home by sharing what they’ve learned.

As an elementary physical educator, Scott’s program was very popular with his students. When he offered after-school classes, he would have 40-50 kids sign up for each class. A co-worker of his walked through the gym one day after school, saw how many kids he had in the gym then remarked, “You need to start your own summer camp!” and the vision was born!  With the need for a unique aspect to the camp, and with Scott’s passion for nutrition and experiences he had making positive changes in his own food choices, the fit was perfect. He had always wanted to help make positive changes in the offerings for his students through the county school lunch program, but that was more challenging than he expected. So when he started his own business, Scott was able to choose what foods were offered to his campers!

Scott sees his business growing in both Virginia and nationally in the next five years.With connections to PE teachers all over the area, it is just a matter of time until Camp4Real grows in different markets. A non-profit that compliments Camp4Real is another goal for Scott . The current business model makes it difficult to offer the program in schools with higher populations of economically disadvantaged students. Establishing a non-profit would be the perfect solution to that challenge and Scott can’t wait to tackle that problem!

Having no business background at all, CIC opened Scott’s eyes to the complexity of the process of running a business! The course was set up perfectly to inform and educate, but not overwhelm. He felt the speakers that came in and presented to us were top notch! Topics such as break even analysis, marketing, and many others had a positive impact on Scott’s business. He walked away from the class with his business better equipped to succeed in the long run and connected in a way that he always feel supported and part of the CIC family.

Scott’s advice to other CIC entrepreneurs is to take advantage of everything CIC has to offer. Not only do they have great speakers during the weekly-scheduled class times, but they also have professionals offering their time during outside of class hours. The office hours each month are so valuable and Scott tries to take every opportunity he can to talk to anyone whether it’s what he deems a pressing need or not! These professionals are great expanders for what entrepreneurs are trying to do and others may get an amazing idea when they least expect it! Scott also advises people to reach out to the CIC family when they have a specific issue or just need to bounce ideas back and forth with somebody. CIC is truly a family that just keeps giving!