The Dyrt · 2020–2021·Senior Product Designer

Domain
Consumer experiences, Booking and reservations, Reviews and community, Maps and search
Surface
Native, Web
Tool stack
Sketch

The Dyrt, #1 Camping App

The Dyrt is the largest camping app in the US, with more than 44,000 campgrounds, over a million reviews, and about 30 million visits a year. Its commission-free booking model sets it apart from other booking platforms.

I joined in November 2020, the week the company closed its Series A-III round, to lead the design of the app's campground management tools. As time went on, my contributions crossed over into all aspects of the app.

Results and outcomes

  • #1

    Camping app in the US

  • 1st

    Camping app named App of the Day

  • 44K+

    Campgrounds listed

Five months after I joined, on March 12, 2021, Apple named The Dyrt its App of the Day. The Dyrt was the first camping app they chose. During that time, I was working on Manager Portal and on consumer experiences. The Dyrt was the number one camping app in the US while I was there, and it still is.

The App of the Day story art: two campers by a fire next to a tent, above The Dyrt's App Store listing.

What I designed

Host tools

  • Manager Portal for bookings, sites, amenities, and media
  • Review moderation and guest messages
  • Payouts and calendar sync with outside property tools

App and UI kit

  • Campground details, the review wizard, search, and onboarding
  • S'mores UI Kit, the shared component library

What I led

  • Sole ownership of Manager Portal, from the first audit through ongoing iteration
  • Organizing, deploying, and maintaining S'mores UI Kit with a small design team
  • Piloting the Ditto app for copy and GitHub for Sketch file version control

The opportunity

When I started, there was no spec. There were no documented requirements and no UI kit. There were a few unfinished tools for campground owners, and they didn’t match the rest of the app. Leadership had a long list of things an owner should be able to do, but no clear picture of how those features would work together for someone running a campground day to day.

At the same time, Manager Portal, the consumer app, and the screens in between were being built separately. The more each one grew, the more differently they looked and worked. Nothing connected them, and the differences were going to keep growing.

Design

Starting with an audit

I did a competitive audit of campground and property management tools, and looked at how other marketplaces handle tools for hosts. That showed me what a management portal needed to do. I combined it with leadership’s requests to decide Manager Portal’s features and flow.

Sitemap

Sitemap for Manager Portal, showing bookings, sites, amenities, media, reviews, messages, payouts, and settings.

Claim a campground

Flow diagram for an owner claiming a campground listing on The Dyrt.

Designing Manager Portal

I designed Manager Portal for desktop and phone. It covers the whole job of running a listing: bookings, sites, amenities, review moderation, guest messages, payouts, and calendar sync with outside property tools.

Manager Portal

  1. Campgrounds you manage.
  1. Campgrounds you manage.

Swipe to change screens

Campgrounds you manage 01/07

Building a shared UI kit

S’mores UI Kit became the component library for Manager Portal and the consumer app. I owned how the components were organized, deployed, and polished. Others contributed pieces, including the illustrator who drew much of The Dyrt’s iconography.

Search and booking on a phone

  1. Search on the map, screen 1 of 5

Swipe to change screens

Search on the map 01/05

S'mores UI Kit

  1. Library files: documentation and assets, atoms, molecules, and organisms.
  1. Library files: documentation and assets, atoms, molecules, and organisms.

Swipe to change screens

Library files 01/14

What the team said

  1. He led the charge in our transition to Figma, stood up our design system, and modernized the owner management portal.

    Jenn McHale Product Design Leader
    Full recommendation

    Eric is a standout design team member and leader. He's a creative problem solver who has mastered the ability to transform complex business and user problems into easy-to-use software. In the short time he was at The Dyrt, I was consistently impressed by the quality, speed and leadership that came with each project. He led the charge in our transition to Figma as well as standing up our design system and modernizing our owner management portal. He's also a great mentor and collaborator. I hope to work with Eric again!

    Jenn McHale, Product Design Leader

What the press said

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Awards

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