If you run a kids' camp, class, studio, or after-school program, you've probably looked at ActivityHero at some point. It's one of the most established names in the space. Lots of providers list there. Lots of parents have used it.

But "established" and "right for your business in 2026" aren't the same thing. A growing number of providers are looking for an alternative — and a growing number of parents are looking for a directory they can actually trust to be complete and current.

Here's the honest comparison.

Short answer

ActivityHero is a pay-to-be-seen marketplace built in the SEO era. Providers who pay get visibility. Providers who don't, or who don't convert enough registrations, fade out of the directory.

Enrichment.kids is a complete, always-fresh directory of every provider in an area, with simple flat pricing for providers who want to stand out. Parents can trust the directory because it isn't filtered by who's paying — and providers get embedded in something parents actually return to year-round.

If you want predictable pricing, a directory that doesn't suppress non-paying providers, and a platform built for how families find activities now (including through AI assistants), Enrichment.kids is the better fit.

What ActivityHero is good at

Credit where it's due. ActivityHero has been in this space for years and has built real assets:

• A large parent email list and brand recognition with families who've used it before
• Registration software with the standard features (forms, payments, rosters, check-in, waitlists, parent communication)
• A marketing-driven acquisition model where providers pay per registration they get through the platform
• Custom solutions for multi-location operators, franchises, and enterprise/district contracts

If you're a 500-location franchise or a school district looking for an after-school registration system, ActivityHero has a real offering for you.

Why providers look for alternatives

Talk to independent camps, studios, and small program operators and the same themes come up:

The pricing is hard to predict. You pay when ActivityHero brings you a registration. That can be fine — or it can mean your costs swing with their marketing performance, not yours. Multi-tier plans, per-acquisition fees, and custom enterprise pricing make it hard to know what you'll actually pay in a given year.

The directory is filtered by who's paying. Parents searching for camps see the providers ActivityHero has a commercial relationship with. Providers who haven't signed up — or who paused — effectively disappear. That's fine if you're paying; it's a problem if you're a parent who wants to see what's actually available in your area.

Listings go stale. When a directory only shows paying providers, the listings that remain are only as fresh as those providers' updates. A parent visiting in February to plan summer often sees last year's information.

The discovery model is from a different era. ActivityHero was built when SEO and paid search were the dominant ways parents found activities. Email blasts to subscribers, social ads, paid Google placements. That stack still works — less well every year. Parents increasingly ask ChatGPT, Claude, or Perplexity "what summer camps near me would my 8-year-old like?" and expect a real answer.

How Enrichment.kids is different

1. We list everybody. Not just providers who pay us.

This is the biggest structural difference, and it changes everything downstream.

Enrichment.kids maintains a complete directory of providers in an area — paying customers, non-paying providers, brand-new programs, established institutions. We proactively keep listings fresh year-round, even for providers who've never heard of us. We do this because a directory parents can trust to be complete is fundamentally more valuable than a directory filtered by ad spend.

For providers, that means three things:

• Parents actually use the directory year-round, because it's reliably accurate. They're not bouncing off stale listings and going to Google instead.
• Your competition isn't hidden from parents — but neither is your business hidden from parents looking for it. Everyone shows up on equal footing by default.
• If you want to stand out, our Pro Plan and Featured Ad placements lift you to the top of the relevant lists with a photo. You're competing on attention, not on whether you exist in the directory at all.

ActivityHero's model is the opposite. Pay to be visible, or be invisible. That's an ad network with directory styling.

2. Simple, predictable pricing.

Here's the entire pricing page:

That's it. One plan. One take rate. Ads if you want them, at a flat rate that doesn't change based on how many parents see them.

You can budget for Enrichment.kids the way you'd budget for a software subscription. You can budget for ActivityHero the way you'd budget for paid advertising — because that's effectively what their core model is.

3. Built for how parents actually find activities now.

ActivityHero's marketing engine is from the SEO era. Email blasts, social campaigns, paid search, brand partnerships. It worked. It still works, somewhat. But the way parents discover activities is shifting fast.

Parents now routinely ask AI assistants:

• "What summer camps near me are good for a kid who loves art?"
• "Compare these three nature programs for my 7-year-old."
• "Find me a Spanish-immersion preschool with afternoon care."

When parents ask those questions, the AI needs structured, current data about real providers to give a real answer. Enrichment.kids exposes our directory directly to AI assistants through an open data protocol called MCP, which is becoming the standard way AI tools access real-world information. That means providers in our directory show up in AI-mediated parent searches without paying for placement.

This is the next-generation version of being found. ActivityHero is still optimizing for the channel parents are leaving. We're built for the channel they're moving to.

4. Independent and family-run.

Enrichment.kids is built and run by a small family team. We talk to providers directly. We answer support tickets ourselves. We make product decisions based on what providers tell us, not what investors need us to prioritize.

ActivityHero is a venture-backed company. That's not an attack — it's just a different structure with different incentives. VC-backed companies need to grow fast, expand into adjacent markets (enterprise, districts, franchises), and eventually return capital to investors. That growth pressure shapes which customers get attention and which features get built.

If you're an independent operator who wants a platform run by people whose incentives are aligned with yours over the long term, that matters.

Side-by-side comparison

Who each platform is better for

ActivityHero is a reasonable choice if:

• You're a multi-location franchise or enterprise operator who wants custom solutions
• You're a school district shopping for an after-school SIS
• You're comfortable with per-acquisition pricing and want their marketing engine doing the work
• You don't mind being in a directory where competitors who don't pay are filtered out

Enrichment.kids is a better choice if:

• You want pricing you can predict and explain to a bookkeeper
• You want to be in a directory parents actually trust because it's complete and current
• You want to show up in AI-assistant searches as parents move that direction
• You want a platform run by people you can actually talk to
• You're an independent operator and you want a partner who's built for you, not for districts

What to know if you're considering a switch

A few practical notes:

You can list on both. Plenty of providers do. The platforms aren't mutually exclusive, and trying Enrichment.kids doesn't require leaving ActivityHero.

Migration is straightforward. Roster data, program details, photos — we can help you get set up quickly. Most providers are listing live within a day.

Your existing parents aren't locked in to ActivityHero. They can register with you on whichever platform you direct them to. If your communication is good, the platform switch is invisible to families.

The 1.75% take rate applies to paid registrations. No tiers, no waivers, no exceptions. It's predictable on purpose.

FAQ

Is Enrichment.kids really free to list if you don't pay? Yes. Every provider in our covered areas is listed by default, kept fresh by us, and reachable by parents. The Pro Plan and Featured Ads are for providers who want to stand out, not gateways to existing in the directory.

What's the AI assistant discoverability actually doing for me? When a parent asks Claude, ChatGPT, or another AI assistant about activities for their kid, those assistants can pull live data from our directory and recommend real providers — including yours — based on what the parent is looking for. You don't pay extra. You just need to be listed (which you already are).

How is the 1.75% take rate different from ActivityHero's fees? ActivityHero's MarketingHero plan charges providers per registration acquired through their marketing. The fee varies based on plan and customer. Our 1.75% is a flat rate on paid registrations, applied the same way to every provider on the platform.

Do I have to choose between you and ActivityHero? No. Try both if you want. The structural differences are what they are — you'll figure out quickly which one fits your business.

What if I'm not in one of your most active areas? You can still list, still take registrations, and still get the platform's tools. Parents in your area can find you through our directory and through AI assistants. The platform works the same regardless of where you are.

Bottom line

ActivityHero is a marketplace built for the SEO era, monetized as an ad network, sold as a directory. It works for some providers — especially larger operators and enterprise customers — but the structural model is showing its age.

Enrichment.kids is a complete, always-fresh directory with one simple plan, one transparent take rate, and a platform built for how families will be finding activities for the next decade — not the last one.

If that fits how you want to run your business, book a call with Jessie and let's get started!