In 2013 I volunteered to join the Arlington Beach Camp  – Family Planning Committee. I thought that I might be able to bring my graphic design skills to the table to help in a few areas. Little did I know what that first year of volunteering would evolve into.

In 2013 I was responsible for designing a brochure that would be mailed out to potential Family Camp attendees, with the goal of getting them excited about camp, months before it took place and having them register and signup to attend as a result.

The very first year I created a trifold brochure to fit into mailing envelopes with teaser information focusing on our theme, our speaker, entertainment, dates, costs and importantly a registration form to try and get potential camp families to fill it in and mail it back to the office with a deposit.

The results are below:

It was deemed a success based on increased registration numbers and lots of buzz around the camp. People appreciated the info, the planning, and were excited about what we had in store for them that summer.  Unfortunately I was unable to serve in the same way in 2014.

As a family-camper myself I had experienced (and heard from other camping families) the frustration of arriving to register and getting pile of loose papers (each one printed out by the volunteer heading up a particular area that year) about their program, their needs and the information that pertained to them. Then there were papers from the camp about rules and expectations. There was a letter from the Director about their vision for Family Camp that year. It was lots of printing, lots of waste and frankly very hard to organize and make use of throughout the week. I had a vision for something better.

I proposed a booklet to the committee. I gathered information on costs and together we examined the camp budget and decided to go ahead with a limited run of primarily black and white booklets. The idea was that all the information families needed would be brought together, organized and presented in an attractive fashion that was in a small form factor (people could carry it around with them throughout the week), durable enough to withstand the wear and tear of camping for a week and was applicable to all ages. The first design took me man hours working throughout the winter. I handled everything from gathering information, following up with stakeholders to the design, layout, editing, final drafts and communication with the printers and eventually transporting the printed booklets to the camp.

They were an immediate success! Families loved them. In fact they loved them a little too much and they were gone in a matter of a few hours – with no budget or means to print more. The excitement was palpable though. Garbage was down that year and printing costs were greatly reduced. The volunteers raved about the decrease in work for them, but mostly it was amazing to watch families making their way around the grounds from seminars to services, the volleyball court to the beach with their bright orange booklets! Campers knew all the information they needed for the week. I was incredibly pleased with the result and received a lot of positive feedback.

In addition to  the booklet, I also created a new master schedule on an excel spreadsheet. I created another brochure as well that year and I played a part in creating some last-minute slides throughout the week to flash on the screen before evening service to remind people about special events like Watermelon night or Pie in the Kinney Memorial Lodge after service.