From custom camper vans to mobile medical clinics shipped across the country, Vanna is quietly growing into one of West Fargo’s most fascinating manufacturers.
As a company building custom adventure vans for people who want freedom, flexibility, and life on the road, Vanna sounds like the kind of company you’d expect to find in the mountains of Colorado or along the Pacific Coast.
Instead, it’s here in West Fargo. And inside its facility, the work goes far beyond camper vans.
Vanna has grown from a custom van builder into a manufacturer with two brands under one roof. One being Vanna Adventure Vans and the other being Vanna Mobile Medical. One helps people chase the open road. The other helps healthcare providers bring care directly to communities that need it.
That second side of the business has become one of the company’s biggest developments in recent years. “We manufacture all those vehicles in one facility,” said Ben Gleason, who co-founded the company with Jason Gilbraith
“We were building camper vans, we still build camper vans, and then we got approached by a clinic to do a mobile clinic.”
That first mobile clinic project opened a much bigger door.
Vanna built an initial mobile wellness van, then connected with healthcare partners looking for similar units. As the team researched the space, they realized the mobile clinic market was growing rapidly and that there were relatively few builders in the country focused on doing it well, especially in van form.
What they saw was an opportunity.
A mobile clinic, Gleason explained, is not an ambulance and not a transport vehicle. It’s closer to a doctor’s office on wheels. It’s a compact, functional medical space where staff can meet with patients, take vitals, draw blood, store supplies, and provide care in places where access is limited or inconsistent. That need is especially real in rural communities, and Vanna saw room to build something better.
“We realized we could build mobile clinics that were way better quality because we’re using the best quality systems and components on the market,” Gleason said. “And secondly, we could build ones that look a lot nicer for the same price or less.”
That insight eventually led to a separate sister brand, Vanna Mobile Medical, which launched about a year ago with its own website, branding, and marketing presence.
Now, customers are finding the company from across the country.
Last year alone, Vanna shipped mobile clinics to states including Hawaii, Washington, California, New Mexico, Florida, and South Carolina. Gleason said most of those clients are not local. They’re discovering the company online and choosing to work with a team based in West Fargo.
That national reach is one of the most impressive parts of the story. So is the range of what Vanna is building.
On the adventure side, the company creates custom camper vans designed around how people want to travel. Some are built for couples. Some are designed for families. Others lean more rugged, with all-wheel drive, upgraded suspension, off-grid water and power systems, and layouts that maximize storage without sacrificing comfort.
On the medical side, Vanna builds everything from van-based mobile exam units to larger medical vehicles on heavier chassis. Inside one unit for the Medical University of South Carolina, for example, there’s a waiting area, a bathroom, workspace, refrigeration for pharmaceuticals, and an exam room.
Every vehicle is custom, but the company’s process has become increasingly disciplined. Gleason said one of the most important changes in Vanna’s evolution has been breaking production into a standardized eight-stage manufacturing sequence. No matter the vehicle, the order of operations stays largely the same: early chassis and mechanical prep, followed by insulation, flooring, walls, cabinetry, and final electrical and finish work.
That structure has helped Vanna scale.
It also reflects lessons the founders learned the hard way.
If Gleason could go back, he said, one of the biggest things he would change is how quickly the company tried to grow.
“If we did it again, we would be more intentional about pacing growth and focus on more standardization and streamlined processes earlier. Basically, would have stayed smaller longer.”
In the beginning, The research and design was very expensive and also offered radical customization without much standardization. The team was figuring out power systems, water systems, materials, layouts, and manufacturing methods. That kind of exploration is exciting, but it also gets expensive. Without enough standardization, every new sale adds complexity instead of efficiency.
Looking back, Gleason said the company would have benefited from spending more time standardizing products and streamlining processes before pushing harder on growth.
“At the same time, we’ve built an incredible team and invested heavily in research and design to create what we believe are some of the best camper vans and mobile clinics on the market. That foundation puts us in a very strong position.”
What has helped them get to this point is the team and culture.
“We couldn’t have done this without the incredible people on the Vanna team that have helped us build this.”
Inside Vanna, culture is not treated like a side issue or a buzzword. Gleason sees it as central to the business. When hiring, the company looks not only at skill, but at attitude and character. They want to know if someone is teachable, solution-oriented, and likely to contribute positively to the environment around them.
“Skill set, as long as they have a baseline, can be trained,” he said. “A teachable attitude is harder to find.”
Retention, he added, comes down to more than wages or perks. It comes from leadership, respect, and giving people something meaningful to buy into. Vanna’s team is trying to build high-quality products, yes, but also a workplace where people can actually thrive while doing the work.
Walk through Vanna’s facility and you’ll see a wood shop, cabinetry production, material prep, assembly areas, sub-assembly stations for power and water systems, and vehicles in different stages of completion. The space reflects a company that has matured dramatically from its early days in a much smaller Moorhead shop. However, you still see people smiling.
West Fargo has no shortage of businesses that serve the region well. What makes Vanna different is that its footprint extends far beyond the metro. From this facility, teams are building vehicles that end up in driveways, campgrounds, hospitals, universities, and rural communities across the country.
And if Gleason is right, it’s still early.
“Vanna as a whole is just getting started,” he said.
We can’t wait to see where they go.
