camp wizard app
I designed a product to solve a common problem: finding childcare in the summer.
about
Problem
Solution
American parents who work full or part-time know that planning for day camps in the summertime, when school is out, can be complicated and expensive.
Each year, parents must spend lots of time doing the research, ideally finding options that are affordable yet fun. Also: It’s bit ironic we refer to these as “day camps” when really it’s more like “childcare”.
Camp Wizard is a resource for summer childcare options in your area. While it can’t solve the problem of high costs, it offers a easier way of searching for what's available, so you can make better decisions.
It takes the stress out of planning by organizing the information for you, and might offer some options you didn’t realize were available.
industry research
The American Camp industry is quite massive, for better or for worse. So it's surprising that there aren't many apps or web apps that gather information about camps, based on location.
According to the the American Camp Association:
-
It's a $3 billion industry

-
There are over 26 million campers every summer, or 30% of U.S. population of school-aged kids
-
The ACA has a camp search, but the results are quite limited.​
There aren't any apps that synthesize information about camps based on location.
process
I was designing this app from scratch and I used the following steps to get to a full prototype.
The most important thing was to simply get it in front of people so as to obtain useful, early-stage feedback.
sketches
Below are some of the original sketches I made while on a plane. It was at this stage that I identified 6 key criteria needed to make this work for users. I'll get to those in a bit ...
words
In contemplating how this app should “feel” the first thing that came to mind is the irony that the word “camp” is used as a substitute for what is essentially "care".
As a designer, I try to be thoughtful about word choice and how words are used in products.
Even if it’s as simple a word on a button, nav, or a single sentence, words can serve as important a role, as the design itself. Words can determine whether things are clear to the user and how they feel. Words have power.
I took a little time to contemplate the meaning of of the word camp.
Noun
Verb
Transitive Verb
a place usually in the country for recreation
​
a program offering access to recreational or educational facilities for a limited period of time
​
a place usually away from urban areas where tents or simple buildings (such as cabins) are erected for shelter or for temporary residence (as for laborers, prisoners, or vacationers)
to live temporarily in a camp or outdoors
something so outrageously artificial, affected, inappropriate, or out-of-date as to be considered amusing
​
a style or mode of personal or creative expression that is absurdly exaggerated and often fuses elements of high and popular culture
source: Merriam-Webster
mood board
The words "summer camp" should elicit a feeling of fun. Lightness, ease, warm summer days, maybe some humor. Those were all guiding adjectives for me in this process. What also came to mind were primary colors, which are sort of childlike but bold, bright, and fun.
In summary: Planning for camp or “care” can feel frustrating, stressful, or even confusing … and I wanted the camp app to feel the opposite: Clear, bright, and easy to use
I wanted the camp app to feel clear, bright, and easy to use.
ui kit
I put together a simple UI kit (a full design system was not needed yet). It was just enough to give the design focus and provide some basic guidelines (helpful if this were handed off to a developer).
user flow
The user flow is often one of my favorite parts of design. This flow was pretty straightforward with the exception of planning for multiple kids, in which case there would be multiple paths. I thought a lot about how that could be simplified on the front end so that the back end wouldn’t be a hot mess to build.
​
I also made an assumption that there are 6 key criteria
that I'd need from users, to make this work properly:
the number of kids, location, times, weeks, preferences, add-ons
I was pleased to see that the ACA’s website search had nearly identical criteria, so I felt like I was on the right track.
​
I couldn't help thinking of what free vs paid version might look like, too.
I thought about how it could be simplified on the front end,
so that the back end wouldn’t be mess to build.
wireframes
I decided a progress bar at the top of the app would be not only critical but helpful to users, to allow them to intuitively figure out where they are in the process; they reflect those 6 key criteria I mentioned earlier.
This is a lot of information to ask people, and I again felt it was important to give a sense of clarity: It should be easy to read, easy to navigate, easy to make choices. I simply added some bold, fun colors and some icons And that’s it!
final design and prototype
user testing
The simple Rainbow Method of capturing user feedback would work well, since the team was, well, just me. It’s a lightweight method and easy to see where there might be overlap in feedback from a small group of users.
The "P" columns represent people who tested the prototype. This would help me focus on specific areas to improve.
next steps
The most important next step was to get a prototype in front of people so I could begin to measure the response and adjust as needed. But there were other questions and ideas swimming around in my head as well.
Other challenges:

-
How to scale it; scraping the web would lead to too many inaccuracies ...
-
... so is this human-led? From locals? If so, I'd need to map out how to engage.
-
It’s seasonal, not necessarily a problem, but worth pondering.
-
It will need some moderation & community-based reviews
-
Need to review App Store guidelines
Other ideas:
-
What could be some paid version benefits?
-
Perhaps members get certain camp discounts, guaranteed spots, or alerts to new camps first.
-
How could the app benefit camps, e.g. could it also serve as an employment portal? (Camps frequently need young, seasonal workers.)
The work is certainly cut out for me, but I'm enjoying chipping away at it.