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By
Catherine M. Pruissen
Catering
to busy families by offering such services as dry
cleaning deliveries, take-home dinners and on-site
extracurricular activities such as dance classes and
karate, has become a way for an ever-growing number
of daycare centres to boost their bottom line.
Little
Leprechaun Academy in Mason and West Chester, Cincinnati
has hired a professional chef to cook up dinner delicacies
that families can order and have ready to take home
with them when they pick up their child. Kids R Kids
Quality Learning Centers, located in 13 states and
Puerto Rico, offers late-night hours, dance and foreign
language classes, and professional photography sessions.
Some
centres have even incorporated daycare video viewing
systems, like the ones provided by Watchkids.com,
so that parents can watch their child's music lessons
and dance recitals while they work. Still others are
bringing in hairstylist on a monthly basis, offering
an automatic payment services through companies like
ReliaFund
Inc.so parents don't have to write cheques, or
offering to drive kids to their outside activities
so parents don't have to.
If
you are looking for ways to add-on profit to your
business this year,
- Talk
to your parents. Find out what services they would
be interested having you provide, like a dry-cleaning
drop-off, extended hours, an early morning Starbucks
or Timmy's coffee service, etc.
- Check
with instructors of various children's activities
and see what they'd charge to bring their program
to your centre. Know a hairstylist who could use
some extra cash? Set up a haircutting day for parents
and the kids.
- Walk
around your business to see what other business
are are out there and think of how you can combine
forces to make life easier on parents and to enhance
both your profits. Better still, it may enhance
your enrollment figures or add new names to your
waiting list. You can't beat that.
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