Summer Camp Advertising. Have You Started?

Yes, it’s only January. 

Yes, Summer Camp Season is a whole 6 months away. 

Nonetheless, with the transition into the new year, many parents are already thinking about what to get their kids involved in during the summer. Many use camps as a means to determine if their kids really are crazy about horses  (heck, it’s how I first got into horses over 30 years ago) and it can be a great feeder into filling spots in your regular lesson program. 

There is no time like the present to start marketing for your Summer Camp. I guarantee the owners of other summer camps and activities will start advertising their camps this month. You don’t want to be left with empty spots because you waited too long and kids were already signed up for other activities. Let’s hash out the 5 Ps of marketing to ensure you’re prepared and maximizing on the opportunity this time of year.

Your Product

When you advertise you will need to provide a few key pieces of information. It’s important to get these tacked down first. 

What type of a summer camp program can your business handle? 

Take some time to think about the following:

Will you be hosting summer camp yourself or will you be bringing in support? 

If you are hosting camp yourself, this will impact the number of kids you can bring in each session (I found my program couldn’t handle more than 6 kids in a session when I taught it by myself). If you’re bringing in support, you will need to consider how much you will be paying them and the associated labor laws regarding doing so. You will also want to carve out some time to find that support before summer gets here.

Do you have a full lesson schedule that you will either need to work around or shift to accommodate camps? 

Fortunately, schedules change a lot for summer. While you won’t need to make scheduling changes yet, as you get closer to the break, plan to reach out to regular lesson students to adjust sessions around things like camp and heat (if your program is impacted as such). At Little Bird Farm I planned my general summer schedule like this, as the heat of the day here is 3-4pm and we are outside: 

Monday - Friday:

7:30 - 8:30am: Lesson time

9am - 12:00pm: Summer Camp

12:30 - 1:30pm: Lesson time

5:00 - 6:00pm: Lesson time

7:00 - 8:00pm: Lesson time

Do you have enough horses in your program to accommodate summer camp and lessons without burning them out?

When managing 6 kids I used 3 horses for camp and tried to reduce their lesson load during those weeks so that they weren’t going all day. Think about your horses and what they can realistically accommodate through the season. This can impact the structure of your camp program. Are you able to manage a heavy riding program? Do you need to consider bringing additional horses in just for the camp season? Do you need a structure with less riding? If these factors are going to impact how you design your program, it’s important to be up front in your advertising so that expectations are met. 

Will your summer camp be a riding camp or an unmounted horsemanship camp?

Dovetailing off of our previous question, your horses may impact this decision or you may simply have a preference. Consider this and be sure to make it clear in your early advertising to manage expectations.

Are you wanting to teach camp every week or less frequently?

Consider your own workload. Summer camp takes a lot out of us as professionals. It makes for longer and more chaotic days, requires more precise balancing of our commitments, increases the physical demand on our days, and often we do not have as much time for ourselves. Consider yourself and what you can realistically manage in your schedule. Also consider the demand on your horses. I taught summer camps every other week through the summer to give myself and my horses a break in between, just running my regularly scheduled lessons in the off weeks. You can also always add more dates for camp but it’s hard to pull back dates that have already been put out there. My first year running summer camps I wasn’t sure what to expect. I scheduled for one camp week per month (spaced so I could add more under the every other week concept, just in case) and those filled up in 3 days, so I went back and added two more sessions in between. 

What spaces on your farm are ideal for a group the size of your camp sessions? 

Based on the above, do you have the appropriate space to host a camp of the size and teaching style you want? Could things like unexpected rain impact that? Here in the Pacific Northwest we don’t need to worry about rain in the summer much, but I do need to ensure I have a comfortable space for my 6 camp kids that is still shaded, as it can get hot. On the flip side, I didn’t teach camps over the holidays, like many of my counterparts, as I don’t have a covered space to ride in and weather is too unpredictable in Oregon. I would hate for a kid’s first real experience with horses to be cold, rainy, muddy, and miserable. Not a great way to develop lifelong equestrians. Think about this as you’re structuring your program.

Your Price

Many elements will go into your price and it’s an important thing to get right from the start, as customers appreciate your being up front about it.

Consider your expenses associated with Summer Camp: added horse or tack costs (for example, during camp season I ramp up the frequency of my horses’ bodywork-type sessions to keep them in tip top shape throughout the season) and my first year I bought extra riding helmets so that I was able to accommodate multiple beginner riders at once, insurance (yes, it’s separate from basic riding lesson insurance and typically costs a couple hundred dollars ($500-600 for the summer in my region in 2024), employee costs (insurance, taxes, paychecks), activity costs (craft supplies, game resources), and any food costs (snack or lunch breaks, if you are providing them. This is a great detail to include in your advertising copy if you are).

Also take into account any loss of regular income as a result of hosting camp. For example, if you can’t teach as many lessons or train horses you normally would during this time, then the camp needs to offset your lost lesson or training revenue. Take this total number and divide by the number of campers you are expecting for the summer to get your expense per camper (if you live in an area where you are concerned that your summer camp may not fill, be conservative. Again, you can always add sessions but it’s tough to remove them once people have signed up).

You also want to ensure that you get paid for your time for camp. Consider the number of hours involved in administrative needs for camp, shopping for craft and food items, setup and cleanup of camps each day, and the camp itself. Given the pay rate you are wanting for yourself, take these hours and multiply by that and the number of sessions you are planning to host, then divide by the number of campers above. This should show you your profit margin needs. Add the expenses and this number together to get your per-camper fee. 

An important note: While you want to make sure your needs are met, if you are new to doing camps and teaching (and using this program as a feeder for your lesson program) you may want to reduce your expected take-home per-hour rate with the expectation that it will come back around via additional lesson students in the Fall (not more than you reasonably can afford to, though, please. We want you to stay in business and be able to pay your bills!). Once you’ve hashed out these variables, if it’s a bit more expensive than other activities in your area, don’t fret. Most parents expect it, given the high overhead cost of horses and horseback riding. They’re using it as a means to introduce their kid to the sport, after all. 

Another key element to consider is how much you will charge customers and when. I like to ensure customers have some skin in the game and are truly committed to attending camp, so I charge 50% up front, like a downpayment, to hold their spot. I am clear in my communications (written please, so they can’t come back and say they didn’t know) that this deposit is nonrefundable unless I am able to fill their spot with another student (the expenses you have going in need to be covered). When you advertise, this can get a bit wonky because people will reach out asking about sessions but the nature of the communication, unless you have an automated billing and booking system, is such that they likely won’t pay the downpayment right off the bat; you have to share how with them and they have to manually pay. What I typically do is tell people who reach out that I will hold the spot for 24 hours pending downpayment, otherwise the spot will open back up to others I have interested. If it’s one of my last spots in a session, I let others know that I have someone who has inquired and the spot is pending their downpayment, but I have other spots available (and list the sessions) or will let them know if this spot comes available ASAP. This will bide you some time to negotiate individual communications and to manage the logistics of holding spots in sessions.

Your Place 

This refers to where you will market your product (summer camp). Given that the predominant demographic for Summer Camp is kids aged 5-12 who likely don’t have a lot of experience with horses yet, consider where their parents are going to get information on a regular basis. Is there a community Facebook group, or two, where you live? How about within a 15-30 minute radius? A parent group? Perhaps advertising at the front counter of the local coffee shop or via a school bulletin board is an ideal option in your community, as parents of school-aged children congregate in these areas. Take a few minutes to think about where your ideal Summer Camp customer is. The regional horse community Facebook group, for example, probably isn’t the best forum for advertising your Summer Camp since most of the audience already has horses and isn’t looking for this type of service. 

Your Promotion

Now that you’ve thought about where you will advertise your camp, let’s talk about how you will advertise it. Canva is a great tool for creating flyers with your key information. They have lots of easily editable templates to choose from. Some important information to include:

• Dates and times of camps

• Availability within each session (as your camps begin to fill this will help generate demand to act, for fear of losing out)

• Cost of camp (including if there is a downpayment component and whether it’s refundable or not)

• Structure of camp and/or key activities that will be covered

Keep this short and sweet. Parents are busy and they want to be able to quickly deduce if your program is a good fit for them. 

Here is the visual I used one year for my camps, which I kept updated throughout the promotional season. This accompanied a post sharing the structure of my camp, key activities associated with camp and my contact information for sign-ups. 

Your People

We’ve talked previously in this post about the target audience for summer camp. Along with interested parents of school-aged kids, your existing students may want to attend. As a show of loyalty to my current customers, I open up camp sign-ups to them via email outreach (using the flyer and details mentioned under promotion) one week ahead of opening it up to the general public. I let them know in that email that it was an early invite for them to sign up before I open it up to a broader audience on X date. When I open it up to the general public I also send an email to my prospective customers list, those individuals who had reached out about lessons previously but didn’t officially sign up. This action created an opportunity for any parents who were struggling with committing to lessons because they weren't sure if their kid was seriously interested in the sport. This is also a great example of why keeping a simple email list of customers and prospective customers is so important.

In Conclusion

Using this model, I was able to fill my first three summer camp sessions within 3 days of opening them up to the general community. Upon opening two more sessions, due to demand, those filled in 1.5 days. I got 1-2 new long-term students from each camp session when Fall rolled around, which put me at capacity with a waitlist for my riding program in my first year. 

So, with the new year getting underway, take a few minutes today to walk through the above process and get rolling on advertising your Summer Camps. You have plenty of time between now and June to work out the details and logistics (and don’t worry, I will be writing more on this topic between now and then to help ensure you’re prepared, too). If you want some help, or have a unique situation with your camp that you want to work through, reach out to me. I’m here for you.

Hugs and Happy Riding!

Kristin

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Learn more about author Kristin Bowers.

Blog posts from Equestripreneur are not meant to replace individual professional advice, which will best inform personal circumstances.