The real cost of a cheap tent: three seasons in numbers

When a tent breaks in the wind, the first thought is often to buy the cheapest one that will do for the rest of the season. Sometimes that is the right call. But the price on the label is not what a tent costs you. What it costs is the price divided by the number of trips it actually gives you, plus whatever goes wrong on the trip when it fails.

The sum

Cost per trip = what you paid ÷ the number of trips the tent lasted.

An 800 AED tent used twice costs 400 AED a trip. The same tent used ten times costs 80 AED a trip. Used thirty times, it costs about 27. The price does not change; the number of trips does. If your trips are usually two nights, halve the figure to get the cost per night.

The numbers below are round and only illustrate the sum. They are not our prices, not statistics, and not a promise of how long any tent will last. A cheap tent can last for years; a better one can be damaged on its first windy night. Put in your own numbers at the end.

Three seasons, two illustrative scenarios

Say you go out eight times a season, so 24 trips over three seasons. You compare a 300 AED tent with a 900 AED tent.

Scenario one: the cheap tent is replaced twice

• Season 1: the 300 AED tent lasts six trips, then a pole cracks on a windy night. You buy another 300 AED tent for the last two trips.
• Season 2: the second tent tears at a seam after six more trips. A third 300 AED tent finishes the season.
• Season 3: the third tent lasts the whole season.
• Total: 900 AED for 24 trips, about 38 AED a trip, plus two spoiled trips.

Scenario two: the better tent lasts three seasons

• The 900 AED tent is used for all 24 trips.
• Total: 900 AED for 24 trips, about 38 AED a trip, and no spoiled trips.
• If it goes on to a fourth season of eight trips, the cost falls to about 28 AED a trip.

In this example the money is the same. What differs is the two trips that ended at 2 a.m. with a broken tent. The result can also go the other way: if the better tent is lost or damaged after 12 trips, it costs 75 AED a trip, twice as much as the cheap ones. And if the cheap tent never fails, it wins outright. That is why the sum needs your own numbers, not ours.

The costs that are not on the receipt

• The trip itself: fuel for a long drive, food bought, a day off work. If the tent fails, all of that buys you a broken night.
• Driving home in the dark through soft sand. The risk is clearly higher than by day: you are tired and you see less.
• Damage to other gear: a collapsed tent full of blowing sand gets sand into bags, zips and electronics.
• Spares: stakes and guylines replaced because the originals bent or frayed.
• Time: setting up a tent that fights you in the wind, every trip.

What makes a tent last more trips

You cannot know in the shop how long a tent will last, but you can read what it is made of. For desert use, look at the pole material, how much of the tent the rainfly covers, and whether there are guylines. The Grand Mesa 2P has lightweight aluminium poles and Quick Corners for a fast setup. The Tanglewood 3P has a full-coverage rainfly and attached guylines that help stabilise it in wind. A footprint such as the Grand Mesa 2P Footprint protects the floor from rough ground, and the floor takes a lot of wear.

More on how wind breaks tents is in why tents collapse in desert wind.

More trips from the tent you already have

The cheapest trip is the one taken with a tent you already own. Many failures in the desert start with the anchoring: a stake slides out of soft sand, the fly flaps, and the flapping overloads the pole. Good anchors cost little next to a tent. The NoBendium II stakes are high-strength aluminium for tough ground; in loose sand, a Sand Bag Stake filled with about 9 kg of sand holds a corner where a normal stake does not.

Care between trips adds trips too: shake out sand, dry in the shade, store away from heat. See caring for gear between trips.

Your own numbers

• How many trips did you take last season?
• How many seasons do you expect to keep camping like this?
• Multiply: that is the number of trips a tent has to cover.
• Divide each tent’s price by the trips you honestly think it will last in your conditions.
• Add the cost of one spoiled trip for each failure you expect.
• Compare the two results, not the two prices.