Wondering what to do with your child’s art projects? New app Keepy offers a simple solution to save and share

An ‘explosion’ of child-produced artwork

Palo Alto dad Offir Gutelzon faced a familiar challenge when his son started kindergarten- suddenly his house was exploding with artwork, projects and papers. Offir wanted to save all these gems of childhood, but storing them all in a small house was impractical.  And he needed a way to not only save these mini masterpieces, but also share them with grandparents who lived far away and were eager to see what their grandchildren were doing in school.

Keepy: tapping technology to create an simple solution

Keepy founder and CEO Offir Gutelzon

His solution: create an app called Keepy that allows parents to save and share their children’s artwork using just a smart phone or tablet. With a tagline of “for now. for later. for ever,” Keepy provides parents with

Keepy lets parents create a timeline of images and photos

an easy solution for archiving art, photos and projects by date, creating a timeline of memories (called “keepies” in the app’s lingo) that can chronicle a child’s development over the years. And what’s unique about Keepy is that along with the image, parents can also record short video or audio clips of their child talking about what the drawing means (especially helpful for those preschool scribbles that are impossible to decipher).

Sharing with family members and fostering interaction 

Grandparents and other family members become a child’s “fans” on Keepy so they can get updates when new photos and artwork are uploaded. Intentionally, there are no ‘like’ buttons on Keepy, but rather ‘fans’ can record short video

Keepy app makes it easy to share and store art and photos

replies or text comments next to the child’s projects. “We didn’t want parents or kids to focus on collecting ‘likes'” founder Offir explained. “Instead we provide the video or text comment feature so grandparents and children can share thoughts with each other.” For grandparents who may not have a smart phone or know how to use an app, Keepy can send updates about new artwork via email instead of by phone. All interactions in the Keepy app are private and controlled by parents.

600,000 users and growing

Over 600,000 people have downloaded the Keepy app to share art and projects privately, and some have joined the Keepy community, posting everything from stick figure preschool drawings to prom pictures. Keepy also allows users to save and share videos too.

The Keepy app is free to download but users only get 15 ‘keepies’ a month under the free service. For $5.99 a month, users can upgrade to a version of the Keepy app that provides unlimited number of ‘keepies’ each month. See call out text below for a special offer for Palo Alto Pulse readers.

Based in Palo Alto

Offir and his family moved to Palo Alto from New York about a year ago after selling his first company (PicScout) to Getty Images.  He has a son at Walter Hays and a younger brother in preschool at the Oshman Family JCC. “It’s amazing to be in Palo Alto,” Offir says. “It’s such a diverse and international community and people are so accepting. I love being in a suburb but still walking distance to a coffee shop.”

Keepy’s office is located on Middlefield Road just south of Palo Alto and Offir has big plans for the app to grow as more users come on board, including a partnership with Zazzle that will let Keepy users print their children’s art and photos onto tshirts, mouse pads, etc.

Prepare for the end of school with a special offer for Palo Alto Pulse readers