Costing a Camp and Setting a Fair Price

Working out what to charge for a camp is a fiddly job. You add up the campsite fee, the food, the activities and the minibus, decide how much to subsidise the adults and any siblings coming along, then try to land on a price per young person that covers it all with a little left over — without overcharging anyone. The Camp budget calculator does that arithmetic for you. Enter your costs and who's coming, choose who pays what, and it gives you a fair price per young person and the surplus you'll be left with — all updating live as you type.

It's a planning tool. Nothing here charges anyone or takes any money — it's there to help you set a price with confidence before you ask families to pay.

Where to find it#

In the left sidebar, click Tools, then open the Camp budget calculator card. It's available to leaders and group admins.

The hub has two tabs: Budgets lists the camps you're costing, and Templates holds any you've saved to reuse. To begin, use the Add budget card on the Budgets tab.

Starting a budget#

You have three starting points:

When you start from an event, Scoutworks reads the RSVPs to fill in your numbers — young people from member RSVPs and adults from the leaders and parent helpers who've accepted — so you begin with a realistic headcount instead of a guess.

Setting up the camp#

The Setup panel holds the basics the price is worked out from:

Pulling in the food cost#

If you've planned the catering in the Camp menu planner, choose that menu under Linked camp menu and click Pull food cost. The menu's estimated shopping total drops in as a cost line, and you can refresh it any time the menu changes.

Adding your costs#

The Costs panel is where you list everything the camp will spend. Each line has a basis so the maths is explicit rather than hidden in a formula:

Each line shows its own total, and the Total outgoings updates as you go. Use the dashed Add cost line row beneath the list to add another, and the bin icon to remove one. A blank budget starts you off with the usual suspects — campsite fee, food, activities, equipment, transport — ready to fill in or delete.

Choosing who pays#

This is the heart of the tool. Young people are always the starting point: they pay the price that covers whatever's left after the adults and young leaders have paid their share. You decide how much of their fair share the adults and young leaders chip in.

Pick a ready-made split, or set your own:

The Adults free, YLs & youth pay full split is selected by default — the most common arrangement, where the cost of the adults is spread across the young people. Pick Custom to type in your own percentages for adults and young leaders.

Comparing the options and reading the result#

The Results summary shows, for the split you've chosen: the price each type of attendee pays, the total you'd take in, and your predicted surplus against the costs and contingency.

Below that, the policy comparison lays every preset out side by side, so you can see at a glance what charging the adults — or letting the young leaders go free — does to the price per young person and the surplus. It's the quickest way to find a price that feels fair and still adds up.

Saving, exporting, and reusing#

The Actions menu at the top of a budget lets you:

• Save as template — keep the costs and pricing (without this camp's headcounts) to reuse next year with Create from template.
• Duplicate — copy the whole budget, headcounts and all.
• Export CSV — open the costing and price breakdown in a spreadsheet.
• Print / PDF — a clean costing summary to share with your team or trustees.

What's next#

• Planning Camp Menus and Shopping Lists — plan the catering, then pull its cost straight into your budget.
• Creating Events — set up the camp you want to link your budget to.
• Kit Lists for Camps and Activities — the "what to bring" side of camp prep.