Zoobean's wife and husband team, Jordan Lloyd Bookey (l) and Felix Lloyd (r). Photo courtesy of Zoobean

For many parents, figuring out what their kids want to read is a daunting prospect. In order to take the guesswork out of the equation, Jordan Lloyd Bookey, a mother of two and a former classroom teacher, created Beanstack, a free, new reader’s advisory app for young children, with the help of her husband, Felix Lloyd. The duo are behind the children's books and app services company Zoobean. Beanstack works by curating and recommending books for children, from ages 0–8, that are available at a local library, based on user-added keywords and categories. Beanstack, which anyone can use to get customized recommendations from their library network, got its start shortly after the Lloyd-Bookey team launched Zoobean, a personalized “book-of-the-month” paid subscription service (sharing the name of its parent company) in May 2013. Zoobean subscribers receive a monthly book in the mail that they can keep. “When we became parents, we found it challenging to discover books and apps that were good matches for our two children,” says Bookey. “Then, a friend sent us the book All the World, which happens to picture a multi-racial family like ours, and we absolutely loved it. So we set out to create [Zoobean]…whereby each child receives a book hand-picked just for them based on their particular age, background, interests, and reading level.”

The Zoobean husband-wife duo make their pitch before a panel of investors on "Shark Tank." Photo courtesy of ABC/Shark Tank

Zoobean found its start-up funding in a nontraditional way: through a nationally broadcast pitch on ABC’s popular reality series “Shark Tank,” where entrepreneurs pitch their start-ups to investors for funding. As Bookey tells it, a producer from “Shark Tank” had contacted the husband-wife team after Zoobean launched and asked them to appear on the show. “Felix loves the show and had always imagined one day being on it," Bookey says. After Zoobean got its funding from "Shark Tank" guest, investor Mark Cuban, Bookey says, the idea for pairing the recommendations app with a library service emerged from the feedback from families who loved having highly recommended books and apps selected for them, but who preferred to get the books for free from their local library.

Amy Calhoun, virtual branch coordinator at Sacramento Public Library Photo courtesy of SPL

Hence, the Beanstack app was born, and it has been recently adapted by the Sacramento Public Library (SPL), the first institution to integrate the app with existing library catalog. Patrons (and non-patrons) will be able to create a Beanstack profile, selecting preferences such as "animal characters" or "outer space." Books that fall into those categories, according to the child's reading level and ability, will be sent to their inbox on a weekly basis. (Each recommendation links back to the participating library’s catalog.) Users can also track their child’s favorite reads. “People now are accustomed to things like Netflix, where they can go online and browse, set up their personal tastes,” says Amy Calhoun, virtual branch coordinator at SPL. “So I think having a library model of great reads for kids… is the perfect fit.” According to Bookey, the service is available to Sacramento residents regardless of whether they have a library card or not. However, "Some extra features of the online profile are only available with a library card,” she explains. “In this way, the service engages families who may not regularly use the library and provides them with content and services to encourage library use." Creating a Beanstack profile is a straightforward, “fun and whimsical” process, says Calhoun, and can be done over the Internet in two to three minutes while answering questions about the child’s age, reading abilities, and preferences. The Beanstack website is also mobile and tablet-responsive. “Many low-income families do not have internet access at home but do have smart phones through which they regularly access the Web,” explains Bookey. Beanstack's mobile-friendly design was a major factor in SPL's decision to integrate its service. The app also serves as a marketing agent for the particpating library. According to Calhoun, users who do not yet have a library card are then prompted by Beanstack to sign up for a library card, and the app walks the user through the sign up process.

---

Terry Chao has previously written for DVICE, Dramafever, and Blackbook, and regularly waxes poetic about vegan food on her blog, Vegan Chao. She is perpetually on the hunt for the perfect vegan gummy bear, so feel free to shoot her a line on Twitter @veganchao.