my understanding is its ok to spend the night in the wal-mart parking lots, if so do see the manager or just park.

I always ask first and if there is no ordinance in the town against parking they say OK. but park out as far away from the entrance as possible..

WELCOME, Mobile, to the SKP forum and family! If you do a search under the menu item FIND, near the top of every forum page, you'll find massive amounts of information on parking overnight at Walmart stores. The subject comes up several times a year, and we all just about beat it to death before letting it settle down, and then we wait til the next time it's mentioned so we can start all over again!

Snoop around the forum all you want, and be sure to post whenever and wherever you like. Don't be a stranger... this is the friendliest and most helpful bunch of RVers around!

Lee

We just crossed the US of A on a one week trip...we did use WW for stopping overnight also a Flying J...

It is good to ask...and not set up camp...just staying for the night, to sleep and leaving in the morning is usually OK...

They us usally don't care as long as there is no City Ordnaces...We spend money and they always like that...

Nick Russell has a book...check out his posts for more info...

We overnight at Wallys and alway ask at the customer service counter first, manners eh!
We are astounded, disgusted actually by the arrogance of some campers, not skps of course, slides out, tables set , party time. what a bunch, I was \mortified that one such group werre Canadians, Quebecers! what can you expect.
Be fair, be nice clean up after your pet and yyourself, it is a privilege , not a right.
hopefully one we can keep if we all act responsibly!

There is a very long discussion about this subject at this link.

http://escapees.infopop.cc/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/730605661/m/427106534

My concern is that might be a city ordinance the manager doesn't know about.

I wish there was some place on the internet that listed all city ordinances that afffect RV parking.

But this would be a gargantuan task to undertake.

If there IS a city ordinance, there WILL be signs in the parking lot! At least, I'd be very surprised if there weren't! WalMart's corporate policy is that they welcome RVers to stay on their lots UNLESS there's a local ordinance against it. For this reason, they're "usually" very careful about making sure it's posted--I would say "always", but then I'd be found to be wrong somewhere that an ordinance was just passed and signs weren't yet in place!! I'd also bet a dollar to a donut that IF there were an ordinance and no signs that the worst that would happen is being asked to move--maybe not the most convenient thing in the middle of the night, but certainly not the end of the world.

Being as how it's company policy to allow parking, in MY opinion there should be no need to speak to the Store MANAGER (it interrupts whatever he's doing and the interruption may not be appreciated)...I suppose inquiring at the Customer Service Desk is appropriate, but something *I* honestly don't feel is "required". The main thing is to park out of the flow of traffic, away from the entrances, don't leave any trash behind and don't give the appearance of "camping" as opposed to "parking".

Brenda

Always wondered why there is not a site that people could post pics of people "camping" with their rigs. Could show the license plate and a pic (or two) of how they are ruining it for the rest of it...maybe call it the Wal Mart wall of shame web site..

I have been fulltiming rving as well as fulltiming traveling in the rv for 5 years and stay at many Walmarts...I have yet to see any RVer "ruining" for the rest of us.

quote:

Originally posted by Bluebird Bob:
Always wondered why there is not a site that people could post pics of people "camping" with their rigs. Could show the license plate and a pic (or two) of how they are ruining it for the rest of it...maybe call it the Wal Mart wall of shame web site..

A couple of years ago in Lake City, Florida we saw a big 40 foot diesel pusher with a trailer behind it towing a trike motorcycle. He was parked in the middle of the parking lot taking up 7 spaces, not on the edge, had all of his slides out, jacks down, BBQ grill out and lawn chairs! At 2 in the afternoon!

I stopped and took several pictures of it, and the guy came out and asked why I was taking the photos. I pointed to the Gypsy Journal signs on my pickup and said "I'm going to put them in my RV newspaper, and when we can't park here overnight anymore, folks will know who to thank!"

I guess I guilted him into leaving, because by the time we were done shopping, he was gone. But I still put the picture in the paper, just bo be ornery!

Strange how some people look at things differently. I serious think that many walmart or the like , managers all have different views on their acceptance level. In Calif, no manager like overnighters. In the middle west, they welcome you and kinda, my opinion, expect slides, etc. In the deep south, it seems to be an intrusion in their "trust" if you do it, other than sleeping. East, forget about it! Midwest, they like you to be comfortable only. When I see discussion on this , I often wonder what the managers thought.

In 2004 and 2005 DW and I lived in New Orleans for a long term engineering assignment that I requested. Some crazy storm named Katrina chased us away. While we were there we met many wonderful folks and actually became very good friends with two couples. One of the guys was a career WM manager from Colorado who transfered to Slidell, Louisiana. I think he's a district manager somewhere in Georgia now. He had changed cities and states three times during his career. We became good fishing buddies.

He confided to me that almost every manager he knows absolutely hates the WM policy of allowing RVs to overnight in the lot. Of course they are trained to respect the customer at all costs and to provide the most pleasant shopping experience possible. He told me that when the managers get together for semi-annual seminars they will sometimes get onto the subject and moan and groan about the RVers. He says that many hours are spent talking to "silver haired" RVers who think that the clock has stopped and that the manager's time is free. They want to tell him about their uncle in Hoboken, their grand children, their little dog that is the smartest dog in the world, their rig that is unlike anyone else's in the entire world, and how there is family out there crowding into their own private camping lot with their lawn chairs out eating a watermellon, and the list goes on and on. Meanwhile the manager has shipping concerns, personnel concerns, scheduling concerns, A/C systems down, people stealing everything in the store, and I guess his list goes on and on, too.

Anyway since he became my friend I have looked at overnighting at WM in a totally different light. I ask permission in a very short but friendly way. I say a simple thank you regardless what the answer is. If permitted I stay no more than 10 hours.

I guess the world looks different from different angles.

quote:

In Calif, no manager like overnighters.

If so this has changed as the two winters that we were where we shopped at the Salinas, CA Wal-Mart we found that they had more than a dozen RVs most nights. They also had three that were there all winter both years and who would just leave to dump and fill water tanks. I even talked with the manager about it at one time, since the old RV that was living there annoyed me, but she did not consider it to be a problem!

Kirk, tell me of any walmart in socal from LA to the border that allows overnighting? Maybe in Salinas where no illegal owns an rv that will run off the lot, or that is not parked in the lettuce fields. I can name you 35 that do not allow it, but its ok if you want to think different.