Posh mothers spend 1000’s on fancy sleepawy camps and equipment.

For Elizabeth Weprin, the greater than six figures she shelled over the course of practically a decade for seven weeks of summer time camp for her two daughters at Raquette Lake Camp within the Adirondacks, was priceless.

Not only for the friendships her daughters would make on the program — the place tuition starts at $17,450 per pup — or a summer time freed from digital distractions, however the networking.

“The crown jewel of these sleepaway camps is the alumni parent network that you can tap into,” Weprin, 55, a Boca Raton-based content material creator married to an lawyer, informed The Post.

Relationships with elite captains of business by way of Raquette Lake have served as a wealthy useful resource to Weprin’s women Marlie, now 26 and Allie, now 23 — as they’ve transitioned from little campers to varsity graduates to breadwinners within the workforce. 

“I’ve always told my kids, ‘Your Rolodex is everything,’” she mentioned, referring to the enterprise contact keeper of yore. “Internships, job opportunities, experiences — it’s all about who you know.”

And she’s not the one dad or mum making an costly funding of their kids’s futures.

Rachael Braunschweiger Potash shells out $40,000-plus a yr to ship her two daughters to Camp Vega, a girls-only summer time oasis on Echo Lake in Fayette, Maine — the place her kids have made an influential circle of associates. 

And this yr, after already spending practically the equal of a yr of personal faculty charges on the camp expertise, she’s devoting an additional little bit of funds in the direction of an elite deal with for her daughters 13 and 15, and their friends.

After bidding farewell to the comforts of their lovely abode in Boca Raton, Florida, for the Big Apple this week, Potash will then escort her brood to Westchester, the place they’ll be part of associates aboard a non-public airplane headed to camp in Maine.

It’s a first-class deal with that Potash, together with a small group of camp mother and father, determined to present their women this yr. 

And whereas the extravagant tour isn’t constructed into the roughly $20,000 per little one camp tuition charge, it is among the many posh perks afforded to the fortunate little ones whose people can afford to ship them to swanky sleepaways — together with some with annual dues exceeding $150,000. 

“My kids absolutely love going to camp every year,” Potash, a way of life influencer, solely informed The Post.

“Money comes and goes,” mentioned the mother, “but if you’re going to spend your money, summer camp is one of the things you spend it on.”

But whereas a whopping 24.6 million tots, tweens and youths throughout the US need their children to expertise what the Potash and Weprin kids do every summer time, per a May 2026 study, only a few can truly afford entry to it. 

38% of these households cite excessive prices as a significant deterrent, in accordance with the report.

You can’t blame them, as some camps price as a lot as $4,500 every week, just like the AI-powered summer day camp within the Hamptons that teaches “life building skills” and has wild choices resembling omakase lessons and a Trojan-horse workshop — and sure a super-elite rolodex of campers’ mother and father.

Because of these absurdly high costs, only 13% of low- and middle-income children are actually able to attend camp, compared to 45% of those in high–income homes, according to the study.

But for a first-rate, rustic adventure miles away from home — and a lifelong influential network — parents like Potash don’t mind spending big. 

“I didn’t grow up going to camp but their father, my late husband, did. He always wanted his girls to go,” Potash explained.

“The kids are actually spending their summer doing things that kids should be doing — waterskiing, kayaking, swimming, gymnastics, dance, art, making s’mores,” she raved. “Plus, they’re learning how to be empowered, independent young women before going off to college.”

Although Camp Vega enforces a firm uniform policy — meaning attendees are expected to wear camp-stamped clothing during their stays — there’s still a status symbol attached to bringing the “right” camping gear and swag with.

Potash’s girls were adamant about loading their camping trunks with chichi toiletries by Method physique wash, and cutesy pajamas from Brandy Melville, Eberjey and Roller Rabbit. 

After buying the most popular manufacturers, and reworking her formal eating room into “camp headquarters,” the place they label and pack all their camp gear, Potash pays handsomely for a concierge delivery service to move the trunks and duffels to the women’ camp bunks up north. 

“But even after the trunks get picked up and they’re gone, we’re still ordering stuff,” she laughed to The Post. “I still have a list of stuff to buy because there’s just never enough time.”

Under main time crunches, newcomers to the upscale sleepaway swing rush to haute tenting items retailer, Denny’s & Lester’s, which sees mother and father, from New York to Florida, scrambling to safe a one-on-one appointment with in-store specialists adept in sleepaway swag. 

“Parents begin reserving their summer time camp appointments in January, and we see people dashing to get last-minute wants proper up till their kids go away,“ Spencer Klein, a series proprietor, informed The Post. 

“We try to buddy each kid up with best person that would fit the camper’s criteria,” mentioned Klein. “We offer everything from bedding, pillows and bunk needs to clothing and gear, accessories. We label every item and embroider their trunks with their names.”

“It’s our busiest time of the year.”

And seemingly one of the crucial profitable instances, too. 

Dani Cohen, a married mother of three sons en path to co-ed sleepaway Camp Walt Whitman in New Hampshire’s White Mountains, yearly spends between $1,500 to $3,000 on the retailer, guaranteeing her boys — ages 11, 9 and seven — are good to go as soon as they’re gone for the season. 

The dear buying spree is merely the cherry on high of the greater than $15,000, per little one, camp tuition that the 40-something and husband Jason pay for her kiddos to frolic within the greenery for seven weeks.

“I start booking my camp appointments at Denny’s in November,” Cohen, a particular training advocate from New Canaan, Connecticut, defined. “They take care of everything and all I have to do is pay for it.”

“It’s minimal sweat until I look at that bill,” she chuckled. “It’s like sticker shock. They put everything into that box, then ring it up and you’re like, ‘How did this happen?’”

And the spending doesn’t finish as soon as her boys hop on the bus to camp. 

Almost instantly after their departure, Cohen books flights and accommodations, or rents an RV, for her and Jason’s mid-season keep throughout Visiting Day, a extremely anticipated time when households reunite with their campers, showering them with luxe baubles and treats. 

“We definitely bring food, goodies and trinkets with us. One kid usually asks for pickles, my niece gets sushi,” mentioned Cohen. “They get everything from pickles to hacky sacks to the latest new games.” 

For Weprin, each penny she spent on her women’ summers was price it. Yes, for the boons of hobnobbing with the higher crust, but in addition for the lifelong friendships her daughters have established. 

“These girls have such a strong love for each other. They may not have gone to the same schools or grown up in the same neighborhoods, but they are there for one another no matter what — birthdays, graduations, the loss of a parent, whatever,” mentioned Weprin.

“And that’s the biggest benefit. That love,” the homemaker continued, shrugging off no matter loopy sums of money she’s ponied up through the years. “They still can’t get enough of each other.”