A group sits around a fire in the middle of the woods. Empty darkness looms at their backs, but, within the circle, spirits are merry as the members trade stories. Their words and the warmth of the flames are what bind this small community together.

It is this very scene that inspired the name for Jason Louro’s company — Campfire Technology — which he founded in 2018 as a sophomore in the Khoury College of Computer Sciences. The start-up helps writers plan and create their stories, and has earned over a million dollars in revenue since it launched two years ago.

“When I came up with the idea, the name came along with it,” Louro (BS ‘20, combined major in CS and philosophy) said.

The concept behind Campfire was born when Louro sat down to write his own screenplay. He’s been passionate about storytelling since he was a boy — before founding Campfire, he planned to move to Los Angeles post-graduation and try his hand in the film industry. Computer science was something of a safety net, in case Plan A didn’t work out. As Louro began to brainstorm the plot of his screenplay, he turned to the internet in search of a software that could help him map out his narrative. He came up empty-handed.

“I’m not someone who can just dive in and start writing. I’m more of a planner,” Louro said. “I was hoping there could be a software out there that could help me visualize characters and a plot.”

But there was nothing that would allow Louro to visualize his story as much as he wanted to. So, he decided to create the tool himself, taking advantage of Northeastern’s co-op program to do so. He developed Campfire Pro, the debut product in the Campfire line in late summer of 2018, launching the product in October of that year. During the fall 2019 semester, Louro turned Campfire into a co-op, taking six months off classes to develop the software further, which he acknowledges he couldn’t have done as easily at another school.

Software idea grows into a real business

Campfire Pro is a desktop software — purchase it once for $50, download it onto your computer, and you’re ready to go. Users can create character profiles, and visualize character arcs and relationships. The software also allows writers to keep track of multiple timelines and create story events that can be linked to characters and locations. There are worldbuilding features too, with which users can upload maps of their fictional universe and design species, governments, languages, economies, and more. It’s all in one place, and it’s all visualized.

“I personally much prefer that type of workflow, and I think that resonates with writers,” Louro said. “You’ll see writers make index cards with chapter summaries written on each, and they will move them around. So, I tried to bring that flexibility into the software.”

While there are other applications for writers, like Scrivener, Louro described Campfire as more visual and story-focused. Most other apps, he explained, “are essentially about getting words down into the computer, with some organizational features thrown in.” His products, however, are all about the story, and the features are designed from the ground up with that in mind. As an example, he points to the “Timeline,” a Campfire feature that combines aspects of a flowchart and outline to allow writers to visually map out the plot of a story.

While Louro never wrote the screenplay he set out to, he’s been hard at work on Campfire, and it has paid off. The growing company released its second product, Campfire Blaze, on November 1. Campfire Blaze is a web application, meaning users can host their work on the cloud and collaborate with others. A new feature has been added allowing writers to type their manuscript directly into the app, and the pricing plans are flexible depending on the features a user needs.

Flames continue to leap higher at Campfire

The company has sold about 17,000 copies of Campfire Pro since it launched in October 2018, and Campfire Blaze had a user base of 15,000 two weeks after it launched. (Only a portion of those are paying customers. That’s because Blaze is a “freemium” product, meaning the basic edition is free, but users must pay for additional features.) Louro hasn’t received any funding from Northeastern and describes the company as “completely bootstrapped,” which is a business term that refers to growing your business with little or no venture capital or outside investment.

The start-up currently has seven employees, who help in areas including marketing, customer experience, finance, creative assistance, and web development. One of these employees is a Northeastern-sourced co-op, Bryce DeWitt (BS ‘21, combined major in CS and finance with concentration in finance). Part of what DeWitt loves about working for Campfire is its start-up culture. Everyone in the company is around his age, he described, and they spend their days shooting messages over Slack about new ideas for the software. Plus, DeWitt’s gotten plenty of exposure to new technologies, since the team is so small.

“There are lots of integrations on our site that are similar to other sites, like Wikipedia or Google Docs,” DeWitt said. “It’s really cool to recreate those well-known functionalities for Campfire.”

Louro plans to continue tapping into the talent of the Northeastern community; he has hired four Northeastern co-ops for the spring 2021 semester. The team will work on improving the Campfire Blaze site and building a mobile app. Louro is still figuring out what’s in store for Campfire after that.

“There are a lot of different directions we could steer the company. I’ve thought about getting into publishing —  we have a community of writers who use our software, so we could definitely find talent,” Louro said. “Or we could keep building better and better software. Either way, we’re certainly going to keep helping people imagine, plan, and tell stories.”

Keep up with Campfire Technology here.