// GLAMPING & OFF-GRID SITE MONITORING
Every glamping pod’s power on one reception screen
A flat battery is a one-star review. Put every pod’s battery, solar and alerts on one screen your reception can read at a glance — built on Victron’s official VRM API, hosted and supported for you, anywhere in the world. Rated 4.9 on Google.
- ● Live demo on this site
- ● Built & hosted for you
- ● Worldwide
/01 — THE STRAIGHT ANSWER
Yes — every pod on one screen at reception
Yes. You can have a single screen at reception showing every glamping pod, shepherd hut or safari tent — each one’s battery percentage, solar input and a clear alert if it’s heading for trouble — and we build, host and support that screen for you as a done-for-you service, worldwide. Victron’s VRM platform already collects the data from each pod’s system beautifully; what it doesn’t give you out of the box is one branded, at-a-glance view of the whole site that a receptionist can read in two seconds without logging in.
That gap is exactly what we fill. We take the live data from every pod through Victron’s official VRM API and turn it into a dashboard designed for your front desk: big, colour-coded, sorted so the pod that needs attention floats to the top. It runs on the reception PC, a wall-mounted TV, or a phone in a manager’s pocket. Staff top up, swap a battery or send someone round long before the guest in Pod 6 notices the lights dimming. The rest of this page is the honest version — what VRM does well on its own, where it stops for a front desk, what we add, what we need from you, and what it costs.
/02 — THE GUEST EXPERIENCE
The guest never sees the battery — until it dies
Off-grid glamping sells a feeling: unplugged, but never uncomfortable. The moment a pod runs out of power that feeling breaks — phone won’t charge, no hot water, the mood lighting gone at 9pm on an anniversary. Guests rarely email you; they wait until checkout, say nothing, then leave three stars and ‘lovely spot, but the power kept failing’. One line like that costs you more future bookings than any single flat battery ever did.
The problem is almost never the kit. Modern Victron systems — an MPPT charge controller, a lithium bank, an inverter — are extremely capable. The problem is visibility: on a busy changeover day nobody realises Pod 4’s battery has been creeping down through three cloudy days until a guest complains. A reception dashboard changes the failure mode entirely. Instead of finding out from an unhappy guest, your team sees the number falling and acts in the quiet window before it matters — a quick top-up, a generator run, or simply moving that evening’s arrival to a pod that’s brim-full. The same screen tells housekeeping which huts are fine and which need a look. You are trading a reactive, guest-reported failure for a proactive, staff-managed one — and that is worth far more than the monitoring itself.
/03 — CREDIT WHERE IT’S DUE
What Victron VRM already does — genuinely well
Credit where it’s due: VRM is an excellent, free platform, and for a single site or a hands-on owner it may be all you need. Each pod needs a Victron GX device (a Cerbo GX, or a Cerbo-S / Ekrano depending on the system) with an internet connection; from there VRM logs battery state of charge, solar yield, loads and more, viewable on any browser or the VRM app.
Two features matter most for a site owner. First, alarm rules: you can set a rule per parameter — for example alert when battery voltage or state of charge drops below a threshold, with hysteresis so it doesn’t nag — and receive email, browser or app push notifications. Second, the installation overview: a sortable, filterable table of all your systems that flags any site with an active alarm using colour-coded tags, with optional 24-hour mini-graphs. For a technically-minded owner watching a handful of pods, that genuinely works, and we’ll always tell you so.
To be completely clear: we are an independent service and are listed in Victron Energy’s Recommended Software Integrator Program — though not a Victron dealer, distributor or reseller. Victron and VRM are their trademarks. We build on top of their platform using its official API — we don’t replace VRM, and we’d never pretend to be it.
/04 — WHERE VRM STOPS
Where the stock tools stop short for a front desk
The stock tools are built for an installer or engineer, not a reception desk, and a few hard limits show up the moment you try to use them that way:
- The main VRM dashboard layout is fixed — only the Advanced tab is composable, and its custom widgets are limited to roughly six parameters. You can’t lay out a clean, one-glance ‘every pod’ wall for non-technical staff.
- The installation overview is a table, and it isn’t brandable. It’s a fine engineer’s list, but it’s not a calm, colour-coded reception screen with your name on it — and some fleet features only switch on above ten sites.
- Everyone who looks needs a VRM login. Your seasonal weekend staff shouldn’t need accounts, training and the full engineering view just to answer ‘is Pod 6 okay?’
- VRM share links and iframe embeds are not real-time — they refresh at the logging interval (15 minutes by default) and are read-only, so a screen built that way always lags.
- The long-promised white-label ‘Dealer ID’ feature never shipped — Victron’s own staff have confirmed this on their community forum — so there’s no official way to fully re-skin VRM as your own.
None of that is a criticism of VRM; it’s simply not what VRM is for. It’s exactly the gap we fill with a purpose-built screen.
/05 — SEE IT LIVE
See a live custom dashboard running right now
You don’t have to take our word for any of this. Our own off-grid support vehicle — the 365 Crafter, running a Cerbo GX on Venus OS with MPPT solar and a lithium bank — streams its real, live data through Victron’s official VRM API onto our custom VRM dashboards page. It’s the same kind of feed a glamping pod produces, so it’s an honest stand-in for your site.
On that page you can see the same live system rendered in two completely different dashboard styles — proof that the layout is ours to design around your front desk, not a fixed template. There’s also a fleet-style demo that lays out multiple ‘sites’ the way your pods would appear on a reception wall; in that demo only the van is a real, live system and it’s clearly labelled as such — we won’t dress up fake data as proof. Picture each tile as one of your pods, colour-coded, the low one jumping to the top.
If you’d like a version mocked up with your own pods’ names on it, that’s the natural next step — a quick conversation and a look at your VRM access is all it takes to get there.
/06 — THE HONEST PREREQUISITE
The honest prerequisite: Victron kit in each pod
Here’s the part some vendors gloss over. A dashboard can only show data that exists, so each pod needs a Victron system with a GX device reporting to VRM. That’s the real prerequisite. If your pods already run Victron, you’re most of the way there. If they don’t, your installer fits the kit and we handle the monitoring — two clean jobs, no overlap. We’re happy to talk your electrician through what VRM needs, and if you’re still specifying systems our off-grid Victron and system-builder pages are a good start.
To build your reception screen we need three things: appropriate access to your VRM (a monitor-only, read-only invite to your installation is usually all it takes — you stay the owner and can revoke it any time), the list of pods and the friendly names you want on screen, and a quick word on the thresholds that matter to you — the battery percentage at which you want staff nudged, and how you’d like to be alerted. Anything beyond the Victron numbers — a water-tank level, a temperature sensor — can be shown too, but only where it feeds into the pod’s GX device first, because that’s the one route non-Victron data can take into VRM. We’ll always tell you honestly whether something is possible before you spend a penny.
/07 — WHAT IT COSTS
What it costs — and what moves the price
We price every dashboard on a quote, because a two-pod site and a forty-hut holiday park are not the same job, and we’d rather size it to you than quote a headline number that’s wrong for everyone. There are no prices on this page for that reason. What actually moves the price:
- How many pods, and whether you’re adding more each season — we build so new pods slot in without a rebuild.
- How many dashboard views you want — a single reception screen, or a TV in the office plus a manager’s phone plus a housekeeping view.
- Alerting — simple thresholds, or tiered rules, quiet hours and who gets pinged for what.
- Extra data beyond the core Victron figures — tank levels, temperatures, occupancy flags — each of which has to reach VRM through a GX device.
- History and reporting — per-pod trends you can use to spot an undersized battery or a tired panel before next season.
Because we build, host and support the dashboard, it’s an ongoing service, not a one-off you’re then left to maintain. We’re a family-run UK firm (Bournemouth) that’s been going since 1995, we deliver this remotely worldwide, and our support office hours are Monday to Friday, 9–5 UK time. Tell us your site and we’ll come back with a straight quote and an honest view of what’s worth doing. Get in touch or call +44 1202 775566.
FAMILY-RUN SINCE 1995 · ★ 4.9 ON GOOGLE · 200+ COMPUTERS UNDER OUR CARE · NO FIX, NO FEE · SAME-DAY REMOTE SUPPORT
// GOOD QUESTIONS
Frequently asked
Do my pods already need Victron kit?
Yes — a dashboard can only show data that already exists. Each pod needs a Victron system with a GX device (such as a Cerbo GX) reporting to VRM. If your pods run Victron already, you’re most of the way there; if not, your installer fits the kit and we handle the monitoring. We’ll happily tell your electrician exactly what VRM needs before anyone spends money.
How ‘live’ is the reception screen really?
Fresher than a VRM share link. Those read-only iframes refresh at the logging interval — 15 minutes by default — so we don’t build screens that way. Instead we pull each pod’s data through Victron’s official VRM API and refresh on a schedule we agree with you. How current it can be is ultimately bounded by how often each pod’s GX logs to VRM, and we’ll set that up sensibly.
Can I put it on a TV at the reception desk?
Yes. The dashboard runs in a browser, so it works on a wall-mounted TV, a reception PC, a tablet or a manager’s phone — all showing the same live data. A big colour-coded TV view for staff, plus a phone view for whoever’s on call, is a common set-up. See our VRM TV kiosk display page for that side of it.
Do my seasonal staff need VRM accounts?
No, and that’s rather the point. The stock VRM overview needs every viewer to log in and shows the full engineering view. The screen we build is read at a glance with no account and no training — ‘is Pod 6 okay?’ answered in two seconds. You keep full VRM control; your weekend team just reads the wall.
Can you set the low-battery alerts up for us?
Yes. VRM supports proper alarm rules — per-parameter thresholds with hysteresis so they don’t nag — plus email, browser and app push notifications. We configure sensible thresholds with you (the battery percentage at which staff get nudged) and surface the same warning right on the reception dashboard, so a fading pod is impossible to miss.
We also hire out units or run separate holiday lets — is that this page?
Partly. This page covers glamping pods, shepherd huts, safari tents and whole holiday parks on one site screen. If you hire out motorhomes or campervans, see motorhome hire fleet monitoring; for a portfolio of separate off-grid holiday lets, see off-grid holiday-let monitoring. Same engine, different framing — and we’ll point you to the right one.
How do we get started, and what will it cost?
Tell us how many pods you have and what you want on screen, and give us monitor-only (read-only) access to your VRM. We’ll come back with a straight, quote-based price — there are no fixed numbers because a two-pod site and a forty-hut park are different jobs. Start with the live demo, then get in touch or call +44 1202 775566.
Are you part of Victron, or is this official?
No. We’re an independent service and are listed in Victron Energy’s Recommended Software Integrator Program — though not a Victron dealer, distributor or reseller; Victron and VRM are their trademarks. We build on top of VRM using its official API — we don’t replace it and we don’t claim any Victron approval. VRM itself is excellent at what it does; our job is the branded, front-desk layer on top.
Can the dashboard live on our own park website?
Yes — a subdomain such as power.yourparkname.co.uk works well, so guests and reception staff never leave your own brand or web address. Your VRM token is kept in one file on your server, out of sight of anyone who opens the page, and we only ask for FTP access to that single subdomain folder — not the rest of your site. Later on, we can add extra pitches, a guest-facing page or new dashboards in the same spot as the park develops.
See every pod before your guests do
Watch a real off-grid system streaming live through the official VRM API, then let’s mock up your own pods on one reception screen — quote-based, no obligation.
01202 775566 · help@365techies.co.uk · MON–FRI 9AM–5PM