We built Kanoa for our own studio first.

Running the studio meant running a small business, and the part that mattered most was also the most frustrating: getting people booked into our classes. We tried the scheduling tools available to us and came away disappointed every time. They felt clunky and hard to use, and we spent more time working around their limitations than actually getting things done.

So I set out to build the booking system we actually wanted. Between running the studio and caring for our newborn, I carved out an hour or two each day. Over about half a year, Kanoa slowly came together.

We moved our own studio onto it first, to test it and make sure it worked. It did. Classes filled, the front desk got calmer, and we finally had scheduling that fit the way we worked. Before long, other studio owners were asking if they could use it too.

So we turned Kanoa into a platform. We still run our own studio on it every day, which means every studio that joins is using software built by people who do the same work they do. Made with care by a community art studio in Southern California, for businesses everywhere.