Luxury Bowlus Road Chief RV road trips

When Geneva Long took a 3,000-mile North American road trip with her family, she discovered a love for RV travel adventures. Little did she know that years later, she would become the Founder & CEO of the ultra-luxury designed Bowlus Road Chief.

While Long was studying at the Wharton School, she conceptualized the return of the Hawley Bowlus creatively engineered Bowlus Road Chief travel trailer.

Bowlus was an aircraft builder by trade, and helped build the famed Spirit of St. Louis airplane. He also trained the first glider pilots including Charles and Anne Morrow Lindbergh.

Almost 90 years ago, Bowles designed a lightweight travel trailer to transport flight crews to remote takeoff locations. Then in the 1930s he used this prototype to create the first recreational travel trailer for families to explore America.

This innovative engineer had many admirers of his unique design, including Wally Ryan of Airstream travel trailers. Hollywood also loved the look of the luxury travel trailer that could be hitched to the back of a station wagon. A Bowlus Road Chief is featured in the 1935 movie Red Salute starring Cliff Edwards and Barbara Stanwyck. Other big name movie stars including Clark Gable and Carol Lombard ordered a Road Chief for leisure travel, as did cosmetic queen Merle Norman.Popular Mechanics and Sunset Magazine featured Bowlus Road Chief adventures.

Long became the first female founded RV company in 2011. She also was honored “Forbes Under 30” in December 2019. On the Bowlus Road Chief website, Long is quoted as saying “We are guided by simplicity and reductive design principles that better connect people to what they love. We are known for many technological firsts, including heated floors, charging stations for devices, flexible space options, and clever lithium power management systems that extend the Road Chief experience off-grid. However, most importantly, the foundation of the Bowlus Road Chief design rests on a vision of intuitive user experience and sustainability that creates amazing and memorable life-enhancing experiences for our owners for a lifetime of adventures.”

Now with the coronavirus pandemic, Bowles Road Chief has noticed RV purchases by people new to RV travel up 15%. Long is seeing inquiries up 4.5 times with luxury travelers. Travelers are flying less and instead are ordering ultra-premium RVs for vacation travel in place of hotels to visit family, friends and explore domestic destinations.

The Bowlus Road Chief was designed for all four seasons. Each trailer offers heated floors and lithium-powered for an entire week of travel without an external power source.

The Bowlus Road Chief “Endless Highway” trailer starts at $190,000, and the recently launched Bowlus Road Chief “Endless Highways” Performance Edition starts at $225,000 ($35,000 premium over entry model).