Hey, Camp Folks!

Earlier this month, I introduced our readers to our year-round assistance in our Graphics Department, Mellina. Today, it’s my pleasure to tell you about our other helping hand whom we’re happy to have in our Graphics Department at the Everything Summer Camp print shop, Deb! Deb came onboard our team three summers ago and has continued each year to prove her helpfulness in our printing production!

Always in good spirits with a smile on her face, Deb’s not afraid to roll up her sleeves and help out with our production of personalized products such as Iron-On Clothing Name Labels or Clothing Stamps, her main area of expertise is in clothing itself! We stock an abundance of blank clothing which Deb transforms into camp clothing according to the orders we receive.

Deb’s days typically begin with pulling the blank clothes she’ll need to complete the day’s orders and then she executes the actual production, applying prints to clothing by all sorts of different methods. Much of her work can be accomplished on a heat press, but her second home is in the embroidery room where she operates and oversees the production of our machines.

Along with pillowcase and laundry bag printing—not to mention her assistance in our graphics production—Deb enjoys the variety of work that life in the print shop provides her. “I’m never strictly standing at the heat press for eight hours.” She smiled. Before working at Everything Summer Camp, she was employed at the fitness center chain, Curves. And before that, she stayed at home, raising her beautiful family of three children with her husband, Don.

While her kids, Rebecca, Sara, and Jared, have not had the experience of summer camp, Deb and Don go on family camping trips about once a year which the whole family enjoys throughout the years. They’re planning a trip to Montana to visit Don’s niece as they’re a rather adventurous couple. They get out to make fun trips as much as they can; in fact, Deb and her husband met while planting trees in Bemidji, Minnesota.

In her childhood years, Deb attended Bible school which always ended with a retreat. She loved it so much, she went eight years in a row! Deb touts an indomitably good attitude and brings it to work everyday. I can say with all sincerity that I’ve never seen her in a poor mood. “Everything makes me happy,” she told me, “Except for when I get mad.”

Enjoy the camp clothing and other personalized graphics products that may have very well come from Deb’s caring hands and, as always, thanks for reading!

- John

Hey, Camp Folks!

Say hello to Mellina—our year-round help and organizational guru in our Graphic Department production. We make all of our personalized products right here in our own, local facility factory. Mellina runs production on a daily basis which involves designing and printing our Clothing Name Labels, Clothing Stamps, Stick-On Labels, Lid Skinz, Autograph Pillowcases, Embroidered Laundry Bags, Camp Clothing, and pretty much every other personalized product we offer.

Needless to say, her job keeps her busy, busy, busy—especially so in the summertime.

Before the busy days of adulthood, Mellina would frequently go on family hiking trips through the woodsy wilderness of northwestern Wisconsin. Her folks would often take her and her siblings on camping trips too. “I attended summer camp through the YMCA at Manitou one year and loved it,” she said. “We’ve taken the kids camping a few times and plan to more often since they’re getting older now!”

Nowadays, she’s an early bird—up with her two young kids, she typically chooses to start her workday earlier than anyone else at Everything Summer Camp. And after an often-times exhausting shift, Mellina goes home to her lovely family. She and her husband Jeremy cherish every moment with their adorable children Henry, 7, and Nora, 5.

With these two little ones of her own, Mellina takes great pride in her work, knowing how much young campers will appreciate a job well done. “My favorite part is making the personalized items for kids, especially the embroidery,” she told me. “Having an unusual name, as a kid I could never find trinkets with my name on them. Finally my parents had a barrette made for me and it really made me feel special. I hope these kids feel special when they see the items we make with their names on them.”

We hope you treasure all the fun personalized products we create for you in our Graphics Department and, as always, thanks for reading.

- John

Hey, Camp Fans!

Here at Everything Summer Camp, we love being the provider of all your summer camp needs, but we’re so much more than that. Much more than a business, we’re a family and we like to show the faces of our family so you can learn something about the people who work here.

Let me virtually introduce you to the Foreman’s Assistant of our Production crew, Teresa—she’s pretty much next-in-line after our Production Supervisor, Shirley (who you can read about right here). Having occupied every station in our production department, Teresa is well-versed with the factory and what goes into a well-constructed camp trunk. She’s had a hand in making them for 11 years now!

Having come from Mason Shoes in Chippewa—a company of more than 600 employees, Teresa loved the change of pace at Everything Summer Camp where we never have more than forty people under our employment. While she still loves how small we are, Teresa’s favorite part about her job is the ten-hour days she has which makes every weekend three days long!

Teresa comes from a warm family upbringing in which they braved the cold together for the sake of fun. The oldest of her two brothers and two sisters, Teresa and her parents and siblings would do what they called ‘makeshift camping’ which was essentially in their backyard—they would go year-round.

Winters didn’t stop them. They would cut firewood, cook dinners, and go for sleigh rides in their family’s legitimate sleigh (pulled by the snow blower). And when they were done playing in the snow, they would hang their mittens over the fire and huddle close to the flames to get warm. It wasn’t exactly summer camp, but it certainly gave her lasting memories!

Thanks to her mother and her grandmother, Teresa is a unique artist of two different media. Since she was 10, her mother coached her on how to decorate a cake. Her grandmother shared a great project with her classroom students first and then her family: colorful snow creatures!  I hope you’ve enjoyed learning a little about Teresa at Everything Summer Camp and, as always, thanks for reading!

- John

Hey, Fans of Everything Summer Camp!

Meet our Printing Technician at Everything Summer Camp, Ed Jr. (or EJ). An excellent part of our team, EJ is in charge of the printing part of our Designer Trunk production. He keeps tabs on orders so he knows how many printouts of which designs to make! He also networks and finds artists to supply us with more of our awesome designs for our Designer Trunks.

If you don’t know what our Designer Trunks are, they’re our traditional C&N footlockers, only turned on its ear. These trunks are dressed up in a design that covers them completely (aside from the bottom). To get a better sense of what EJ does, take a look at our Designer Trunks right here.

To achieve such a cool look, EJ employs an interesting printing technique that embeds our high-definition designs directly into the metal exterior of our trunks. “I’ve learned a lot since I’ve been here,” he says.

When EJ isn’t at work, he’s home with his beautiful family—his wife Justine, their daughter Arya, and baby #2 on the way! He and Justine are very excited to bring another little baby into the world. In the meantime, they’re just enjoying the summer. “I love to go camping,” he told me. “And Justine’s family is really into that too—it’s an every weekend kind of thing for them,” he clarified.

“Camping is a big part of our family life.” EJ anticipates the camping trips he’ll be making this summer and the new member of his family that will be here by the end of summer! We can’t wait to meet her! EJ asks that all our customers enjoy your Designer Trunks or get one if you don’t already have one—they’re the coolest! And of course, as always, thanks for reading!

- John

Hey, Camp Preppers!

As we end the month of May and embark on what’s obviously our busiest season here at Everything Summer Camp, it’s imperative that we keep our Call Center packed with competent and helpful representatives who we like to think of as our gear counselors. With the proper management, our Call Center operates like a well-oiled machine: taking calls, placing orders, answering questions, and handling the occasional ‘problem order’.

This department requires a knowledgeable, dedicated head that can keep things running smoothly on a day-to-day basis and that’s where our Call Center Supervisor Anita comes in. Hired on for our seasonal help last year in the Call Center, Anita showed exceptional skills in customer service and it wasn’t long until we could see her in the supervisor position for our Call Center.

With technology taking over, the Call Center has seen a considerable decrease of in-bound calls. While they still receive a decent amount throughout the day, Anita estimates that 75% of customers contact us by either email or LiveChat as opposed to talking to us on the phone. But no matter what mode of communication our customers choose, “Nobody treats their customers as well as we do here,” comments Anita.

A mother herself as well as her own in-home daycare previous to her employment at Everything Summer Camp, it’s nothing short of fitting that she should have found a place for herself here at Everything Summer Camp where she continues to play a role of encouraging children as they grow up.

Bailing hay in the summers on the farm, Anita had no time for summer camp, but she and her husband of 24 years, John, have given their children a different upbringing, sending their younger daughter, Rachel to the Girl Scouts for a number of different summers in the Chippewa Valley and going for family camping trips with Rachel and their older son Robert.

Their children are older now, but back in the day Anita and John had a nice camper that the family and their yellow lab, Tubby Jo Semanko, would stay in during weekend camping trips where they would enjoy campfire pizzas and scrambled eggs in the morning with orange peel muffins.

Everything Summer Camp is more than happy to have such a diligent, warm employee as Anita. I love talking to Anita. Give us a call and maybe you can talk to her too! Enjoy your summer experience and, as always, thanks for reading!

- John