Holiday Helper: The One App Parents Need This Holiday Season

Los Angeles traffic is notoriously awful all around - but for parents, it's even worse. Something as simple as dropping off your children at school on your way to work can tack an hour or more onto your commute. That time driving is amplified when you add in sports practices, after-school activities, work meetings, grocery runs and other errands. Luckily, there is a new app in town here to change all of that. Enter: Kango.

Kango is an app-based ride and childcare service for busy families. Think of them like a "nanny on wheels" - a nanny who is background-checked, fingerprinted, Trustline certified and heavily vetted by the team of experts at the Kango headquarters in San Francisco. Parents can schedule and pay for rides to and from school, sports, activities and more right on the app, and can even tack on babysitting time after the ride or book a sitter for a standalone service. Sounds like a lifesaver, right?

With the holidays coming up and schedules becoming as hectic as ever, Kango is the perfect app to download as a helping hand this season. Whether you have an unexpected holiday party to attend and have to secure childcare quickly, or just need a dependable person to scoop the kids from practice and bring them home (finally! a time to wrap presents without prying eyes!), Kango can help.

Though it has only launched within the last year in Los Angeles, the service has proven itself to be trustworthy through its partnership with Chrysler, where the automaker offers eligible Kango drivers a low-cost lease on Pacifica Hybrid minivans. These vans, decked out with the app's kangaroo logo, are kid friendly, comfortable and (most importantly) top-of-class for safety. In addition to the Chrysler partnership, Kango has won the "best Uber for kids" award from San Francisco Magazine for the past two years, beating out competitors like Zūm and HopSkipDrive.

The last reason Kango is catching the eyes of parents in the Los Angeles area is that it was started by a fellow parent. The app's founder and CEO, Sara Schaer, is a mom to two boys and, according to a previous interview with Forbes, built the service to solve a problem she herself was experiencing: balancing a demanding career with a busy family schedule.

To learn more about Kango, you can visit them online, download the app from the App Store or Google Play, or follow them on Instagram, Twitter or Facebook.