1 → Camp runs on Campminder. It's how we run registration, run parent communication, run the media we send out everyday, run the health center, run everything. Check out Campminder!
2 → Write For Camp 3.0 is starting in October 12th . 2 weeks Filling Camp Slowly. More than a dozen camp pros are already in. Your team next? We are hosting a Write For Camp Q&A to answer any questions on Monday, October 5th. 3-3:30 PM EST. Sign up here to join.
All right, on to the show here.
My friend Erec Hillis (hey Erec!) owns and runs Camp Champions. This month he sent out a newsletter that opens like this:
3 minutes - 3 hours - 3 days - 3 weeks - 3 months - 3 years - 3 decades.
Those are the steps kids take on the way to independence. Three minutes is the first time a parent puts a kid in the crib by themselves and goes into the other room to get something.
Three hours is the first AM daycare drop-off. Three days is a long weekend at grandma's. Three months is the first semester at college. Three decades is when you get married.
And then there's the three weeks. Which gets skipped for so many kids along the way.
The Perfect Message?
That's what this is, honestly. It might be the best version of a camp sales letter I've ever heard, because you're just nodding your head along.
We broke Erec's whole letter down on the Substack. Go read the whole thing, but it’s basically this:
You agree with the three minutes. You agree with the three hours and the three days. Maybe you argue a little bit about the number ahead of one of them, but not much.
Three weeks?
The gap is just sitting there, and the reader finds it themselves. Which whenever we want readers nodding their heads along, is what we hope happens naturally.
A kid goes from a long weekend at grandma's almost straight into college with no longer time gap. Two or three weeks on your own for a little bit in between, and you're going to be way more ready for the three-month thing when it shows up.
Why It's True
The number of steps kids take away from their parents is shrinking every year. Parents are afraid to have their kids in the grocery store.
Even the playground is full of grown-ups now. My parents were like, go play on Seneca Parkway until the street lights come on. Don’t cross Dewey. Any Rochester people on here!?
We talk about building independence for kids. Well, independence is a skill. It's something you learn how to do.
You can learn it by getting thrown into the lake before you can swim, but that's the panic zone. Learning happens in the growth zone, stretched a little, not that overwhelmed.
If the practice goes from three days to three months, there's no in-between. Camp is the bridge. It gives kids, at the appropriate time, the right kind of growth zone space.
The Calling Card
When a family asks, “Why camp?”, this can be the calling card. It should be. It’s one of the most compelling first-line cases for camp, speaking directly to a group of people who might not be considering camp at all. Which, honestly, is most parents.
Because that’s the big part of the pie graph. Not the people who are choosing between different summer camps. But the people who don’t have summer camp anywhere close to the radar.
The problem with many of our answers is that they never mapped to the other stuff in a family's life. This one is mapped to everything. Daycare, grandma's, college, adulthood, and life. So it makes it so clear.
I’d say go write a version of this for your camp. Erec is on board. His exact words: "I just want more kids to go to camp." Hear hear.
Start talking about camp in that 3-week zone with the rest of life stacked up around it.
You got this,
Jack
PS - We are talking about these exact kinds of messages in Write For Camp and how to use them to get more kids to camp.
Have a question? Join the Q&A on Monday, OR hit reply, or email doug@thesummercampsociety.com, and we'll answer everything.
