How to Start a Childcare business

Starting a business is no small endeavor. There is much planning that needs to be completed before you can even begin doing the work you love. Sometimes, this necessary effort scares people away from the process. However, if you are willing to push through the hard work it takes to start a daycare business, the results may bring you more joy than you have ever experienced before. Not only will you be working in a field you love – childcare – but you will be working for yourself. For many people, this is the dream! The following article provides a step-by-step process to follow to make this dream possible.

How to Start a Daycare/Childcare Business

1. Research Your Community
2. Make Your Business Special
3. Craft a Business Plan
4. Satisfy Legal Requirements
5. Fund Your Endeavor
6. Surround Yourself with Positive People
7. Prove Yourself
8. Actively Market in the Community

Perhaps these eight steps seem easy to you, but they may appear monumental to others. Our recommendation is to focus only on the next one step you need to complete. This will keep you from being distracted from all that there is to be done and will keep you moving forward toward building your future.

Step 1: Research Your Community

This may seem like a strange concept if you are new to it. How does one research a community?

It may be especially odd if you have resided in your community for a long time. You may even feel like you know your community well enough that you do not need to research anything additional.

To this we would say: “give it a chance.”

Try to dig just a bit deeper.

Researching your community means asking questions and listening closely to the people who live, work, and surround the physical area you hope to start your daycare business in. By asking difficult questions before you even get started, you will have a much clearer idea of how to go about starting your business.

Is there Interest?

One of the first questions you need to answer is whether or not your community is interested in having a local childcare business. Just because you enjoy working with children does not necessarily mean there is a need for you to do so there.

The most important part about asking this question is that you are open to any and all answers that come back to you. You absolutely cannot go into the conversation expecting or even trying to extract a “yes” answer. There are unlimited answer possibilities, such as:

• No
• Maybe, but not certainly
• Not right now
• Yes, but not where you were thinking
• Yes, but only for specific ages
• Yes, but not the way you were hoping

The more unbiased you can be in your asking and listening, the better reflection you will receive of your community’s true interest in having a childcare business.

Are They Interested Enough to Pay?

Be sure that you push the question about interest far enough that you understand clearly whether or not your community is willing to pay for this business. There is a large difference between someone wanting a local childcare business and someone willing to patronize that business.

What Type of Daycare is Needed?

As you are surveying the need for a daycare, be sure to pry enough to fully understand what type of daycare is most desired from your community.

In-Home vs. Daycare Facility

Specifically, there is a great difference between starting a childcare business in your own home and purchasing and opening a daycare facility.

This is an important detail to iron out as you could spend a large amount of time and money establishing a daycare center only to find out that it is not the type of childcare business your community was looking for.

A childcare business that you run in your home may provide a more intimate family feel that some parents will find attractive. Other parents may prefer that their kids are exposed to more people through a larger childcare facility.

Each of these options come with their own pros and cons in terms of expenses you need to consider and benefits they offer. We will get into this in more detail later.

Who Emerges as Customer?

As you are asking these questions of your community, look for those who are most interested in your childcare business. When you start to see trends of age, gender, education, and/or employment status, you may have just found your target customer.

It is important to keep quality notes on details that describe this person:

• Approximately, what is their age?
• What jobs do they work?
• What is their financial status?
• What types of things do they do?
• What does their family look like?

You might want to ask this trending target customer more questions than your typical interview might have. This information will become helpful for you when you are analyzing the needs of your community and deciding how to specialize.

Local Competition

While you want to have a clear understanding of the needs of your community and target customers, you also need to be aware of any other local childcare businesses.

If you are less familiar with the area, you may need to ask some of these questions during your interviews or complete a few quick Google searches before you can dive in deeper.

• What other childcare businesses exist in this community?
• How are these daycares doing financially?
• What has made them more successful or less successful?
• Is there anything special about your competition?

Once you have discovered enough information about the other local childcare businesses, it may be worth asking around about non-childcare businesses as well. Getting a sense for what other industry is around and most active will help you determine if there is any possibility of collaborating with them in the future.

Can You Make Enough?

Before you find yourself too deep into establishing your daycare business, it is good to figure out if you will make enough money doing what you love.

Ideally, if you made it this far, you have already established there is interest in your business and people are willing to pay for it.

So what is, “enough?”

This may mean something different to everyone.

For some, making “enough” will mean covering their bills. For others, “enough” means making them wealthy enough to do other things they love.

There may also be a difference in how quickly you need to make “enough” from your childcare business.

For some, making “enough” will need to happen almost immediately. They will need to see profitability to support their family and cannot hold out through any sort of waiting period.

For others, making “enough” will need to happen in time, but not necessarily right away. They may have a more stable financial situation which allows them to ride out an additional few weeks, months, or years without making a profit.

The most important thing is that you are aware of what your “enough,” numbers are and can make decisions accordingly.

Step 2: Make Your Business Special

Now that you have heard all that there is to hear, it is time to specialize your childcare center. Specializing your business will help it stand out to your customers when they are considering where to send their children.

Pay Attention to the Need

Look through the notes you took of all of your community research interactions. What community needs do you see reflected in these conversations?

The best way to ensure success as a business is to focus your mission on a need.

Consider Your Passions

While you want to focus on filling a need with your specialization, you also want to keep in mind what you are particularly passionate about. Often times what we are passionate about is connected to a particular talent or natural ability.

On occasion, even if we do not have a particular talent in the area of our desires, we are passionate enough to be willing to work hard and fight to improve ourselves to become more effective. This may make your passion a good area to specialize in.

For example, if you are particularly focused on early childhood education, this may be a potential unique focus area for your daycare business. You could craft your entire business model around providing the best education for children outside of their school days.

While not every parent will be seeking an educational experience for their child, some parents who are eager to provide their child with some extra assistance may be particularly interested in this opportunity.

It is highly likely that if you are particularly focused on a niche of childcare, there are others who would find this focus valuable as well. They may even be willing to pay a higher fee than normal to provide their children with this specialized education.

As long as you are keeping the needs of your community in mind and balancing them with your passions, you will be heading down the right track. Either one of these without the other may not be a quality fit for you, but if you can discover where they overlap, you will be well on your way.

Specialization Ideas:

The idea of specializing a childcare business may seem somewhat foreign to you, but it is certainly possible. Below we have broken down what a few different options might look like.

As always, keep in mind that it is very important to balance these ideas with your community’s needs and your personal passions.

The Educational Childcare Center

While we already made a few comments about this daycare business model, you can really take this as far as you want to. You could offer test prep to older students and/or educational curriculum to younger children. You can ensure all of your entertainment has an element of learning to it and even provide some team-building activities during any exercise time.

The At-Home Childhood Center

While a large facility would offer you and your kids more freedom, you might find that it would be too much for you to manage. In this case, it might be wise for you to consider hosting your childcare business in your own home.

Having a childcare center in your own home comes with pros and cons:

• Pro: it is more convenient for you geographically
• Pro: you would have less kids that you could focus on more
• Pro: you would not have to worry about a facility lease or mortgage
• Con: it might disturb your current home arrangement
• Con: you will not have as much money coming in as you would if you could accept more children
• Con: your personal property may risk being damaged

Weigh these positives and negatives carefully as you make the best decision for your family.

The Daycare Focusing on Developmental/Sensory Needs

If there is a need for childcare which focuses on children who have developmental or sensory needs, this just might be the perfect niche for you to offer.

Do not tread into this specialization lightly though, as it will take extra skills and experience to serve this need well. You will want to make sure you and any staff are highly trained to handle this population of children before you advertise that it is your focus.

This specialization may also require extra purchases to make sure your center is physically able to accommodate all types of disabled youth. You will also want to be fully stocked on any equipment, tools, games, supplies, and curriculum to work with any children that register for care in your facility.

The Daycare with High-Level Communications

Another potential area you can focus on is providing the most frequent and involved communication to parents. While some parents would rather drop their kids off and not have to think about them until they bring them home at the end of the day, others would appreciate as many updates are you willing to give them.

Consider what makes the most sense for you and your staff.  While it may seem like a good fit for your daycare business niche, having a daycare with a high-level of communication to parents might also take a great deal of effort. Someone will need to be behind all of the photos and messages to parents. This person’s time and energy may be well-used in this way, but it will likely take their limited time and energy from other areas.

The Affiliated Daycare

Some daycare businesses find their niche by being affiliated with a particular school, religion, or community organization. When they connect with another institution in this way, it creates a sense of trust on both sides.

For parents who already have a relationship with the institution, this type of daycare business will be easier for them to trust their children with. Likewise, as more and more children register for the childcare center, there will be more people regularly exposed to the institution overall. This may even make them more likely to sign their child up for the religious body, school programming, or community organization’s events.

The Daycare that Provides Transportation

Last but not least, the ability to provide transportation is absolutely an effective way to make your business stand out above the rest.

Whether your business offers transportation to school, from school, to or from afterschool activities, or some combination, you are providing a valuable service to families. Some parents work odd hours and are unable to transport their children the way they would like to.

Providing transportation will come with extra paperwork, insurance costs, and liability, but this extra effort may just be worth the extra interest that it stirs up.

Step Three: Craft a Business Plan

The next step in your journey to start a childcare business is to write down your business plan. This is an important step for any new business owner.

A business plan is a written document that compiles all of the research you conducted within your community as well as your plan to build a business in response to your findings.

This is helpful for many different people in multiple ways.

First, it can help you! It provides a map to follow as you move forward in your business ventures. This way you will be less likely to get distracted with new ideas along the way.

It can also be helpful for you in the way it provides you with a confidence boost. When all of your research and plans are together in one place, it will be easier to see the ways you are serious about this dream you are pursuing. This burst of energy may just help carry you through the next step or two of your business development journey.

This document is also helpful for financial institutions. If you decide you need or want to apply for a loan to get your childcare center off the ground, you would likely need to provide this document to any potential lenders.

The reason you need to submit your plan to lenders before they will give you money is that they want to ensure you will be able to pay their money back to them. Often, they will even ask for interest on this money. For this reason, they will want to be sure you will be securely profitable in your endeavor.

Daycare Center Business Plan

• Business Information
• Business Mission Statement
• Preliminary Research
• Financial Analysis
• Policies and Procedures
• Marketing Plan

We will focus on many of these topics in additional detail later on. Until then, here are a few summaries to hold you over:

Business Information

As you might expect, this is often the first section of your business plan. This is where you tell your reader the basic information about your company. This information might include your name, contact information, business structure, as well as the legal set up of your company.

This section is a helpful one to provide to readers right away. Doing so gives readers a clearer picture of who you are and prevents them any confusion or extra effort later in your business plan.

Business Mission Statement

This is your opportunity to showcase your specialization and share your company mission. Developing a mission you can live into each day is the best way to conduct your business. This gives you and your staff something you can strive to live out with intention.

Preliminary Research

This is where you can highlight the most essential information you compiled during your market research. With all of the interviews you conducted, you will have much more data than you can or should list. Lift up any information that convinces readers of the need for a childcare center in your area.

Policies and Procedures

It may seem odd to consider your policies and procedures before you even begin operations, but one of the best things you can do to set yourself up for success is to have these in place as early as possible.

Spelling out exactly how your daycare business will charge customers, train staff, handle children, clean its space, and keep everyone safe will give you a leg up when it comes to sharing this plan with your staff and parents.

Marketing Plan

We will discuss marketing in much further detail at the end of the article. For now, plan to devote an entire section of your business plan to this topic.

Can I Share My Daycare Business Plan with Others?

While you may be eager to share all of your hard work and exciting plans, you should be cautious about sharing it with just anyone.

As the title of the document says, your business plan is the plan for all of your business happenings. This might not mean much to some, but in the hands of your competitor, it could be seriously detrimental to your business.

Do whatever you can to keep the sharing of your business plan to a “need-to-know” basis. This may include some, but not all, employees of your company, as well as your lawyer and accountant.

Finally, you might want to consider what it looks like to share parts or all of the plan with your family. This will keep them informed of your business intent. It also gives them a peak into all of your hard work and might even give them encouragement to support your big dreams.

Step Four: Satisfy Legal Requirements

For most people starting a business, satisfying the legal requirements is one of the least enjoyable steps to work through. Lawyers and legalese can be intimidating and the anxiety about taking a wrong step can be enough for someone to call the whole thing off.

We hope that you will not be one of those people! While it may seem overwhelming to tackle the legal side of starting a business, keep an eye toward your dreams and plans. All you need to do is complete the next best step. You will get there.

First Things First: Business Structure

As with any business, you need to decide on a business structure for your childcare business early on in your endeavor. This decision will affect the general operation of your company as well as how you pay taxes.

If you are not sure which business structure is best for you and your company-to-be, the best thing to do would be to consult a lawyer, business mentor, or an accountant.

Here are some business structure options worth considering:

Sole Proprietorship

This is the easiest business structure (because it is the default), but it is also the least protective. When you start a childcare business of any size, you will be automatically taxed as a sole proprietor. This is often a helpful structure for businesses in the beginning of their journey.

Limited Partnership

This business structure has multiple owners and a simple structure. One of the partners has unlimited liability and all others have limits on their liability and control of the business.

Limited Liability Partnership

This structure is slightly more complex than a Limited Partnership. Limited liability is offered to every owner.

Limited Liability Company

This structure is known to be quite protective of business owners, pending all guidelines are followed. Members are not forced to pay corporate taxes, but self-employment tax is required.

Corporation

This structure is broken up into multiple options:

• C Corp
• S Corp
• B Corp
• Close Corporation
• Nonprofit Corporation

To learn more about the different types of corporation, the best thing to do would be to consult an accountant or lawyer. This type of business can raise funds through stock. This can be a quality option for higher risk businesses, but it is important to note that some corporations are taxed twice.

Cooperative

The profits generated by businesses of this structure are given to the user-owners. There are also often board of directors, officers, as well as members who hold voting responsibility.

Registration Matters

Next up, you need to make sure you register your childcare business in as many ways as necessary for your location. This may seem like a lot of work, but the forms should be simple for you now that you have completed your business plan. You have all of the answers; now it is time to fill them in.

State Registration

The first registration you will complete should be a simple one. You will need to register your daycare business with your state. For many states, this is a easy form and fee. Some states will require that you develop and submit what is called an Operating Agreement as well.

County Registration

Next, you will register with your township or your city. There may be permits, such as a zoning permits, that need to be completed before you can get started.

Federal Tax ID Registration

Depending on what you picked as your business structure, you may need to apply for an Employer ID number. This number will help you with your business finances. Go to the IRS’s website to register for this one.

Keep Your Money Separate

The next step in your business journey will be to set up a separate bank account for your business. You will not be able to do this without an EIN number, unless you are structured as a sole proprietor.

Keeping your personal finances separate from your business finances may actually help protect all of your assets. Depending on your structure, this may be crucial for your future security.

Step Five: Fund Your Endeavor

Now that you have determined how much money you will need to start your childcare business and give you enough profit to live a comfortable lifestyle, it is time to secure any and all necessary funding.

Not everyone will need money outside of what they personally put into their business, but some will find this necessary to even get started.

Consider Borrowing Money

Loans are a great way to secure funding if you are just getting started with a business that requires a large amount of startup money. You will need to pay back a loan, so remember that in your financial planning.

In fact, you may also need to pay interest on whatever money you borrow. Make sure you understand any and all stipulations when you are signing papers to borrow money of any kind.

Consider Asking for Investors

Whether you know the person personally or not, there may be someone out there who believes in your daycare business so much that they are actually willing to invest in it financially.

Investment stipulations can range widely. Some want a percent of equity in your company, others may treat their investment like a loan with interest charged on it.

Similar to any loan you accept, you want to be sure to understand any and all strings attached to the investment agreement before you sign your name.

Consider Applying for a Grant

Sometimes, depending on your type of daycare business, you can even qualify for free money. This may also be dependent on your local area and what grants are available near you or in your state.

Grants.gov may be a helpful site to check out to see if you qualify for any grants at the national level as well. Be sure you meet all of the criteria before applying so that you are not given grant money by mistake.

Consider Working for It

Another possibility might be funding yourself for your childcare center endeavor. This may mean working a separate position on your off hours so that you can contribute to the cost of the business.

This may also mean having a serious conversation with other family members about how they might support you and your business as it gets itself off of the ground.

Working while trying to start a business or being supported by others in your family may not be your most ideal path forward, but this may be an area you need to sacrifice some pride or energy in.

Businesses of any type require much time and effort. If you are going to see your dream become a reality, this might just be what you need to do.

What Are the Funds For?

Ideally, you will have already established this detail before you even start asking for money. However, it may be helpful to keep your mind on what your startup funds will actually go toward purchasing. Doing so often helps business owners put meaning behind the dollar amount they are trying to come up with.

Building Funds

Whether you are an in-home center or a larger daycare facility, you will likely have building/property costs.

As an in-home center, this may look like getting your home inspected for a business of this time or adding in some playground equipment. Alternatively, if you are purchasing or leasing a separate facility, you will have mortgage or leasing fees to deal with.

Supplies

No matter where your daycare business is located, you will need an abundance of supplies.

• Cleaning products
• First aid supplies
• Snacks and meals
• Tools for small repairs
• Educational curriculum
• Office supplies
• Games and toys
• Necessary technology

While it might be exhausting to try to come up with a very large amount of money for startup costs, this is a good time to try thinking of that dollar amount in terms of toys, playground equipment, and a safe space for your children instead.

This may just keep you motivated enough to secure the funds you need and move onto the next step.

Step Six: Surround Yourself with Positive People

One of the most beneficial steps you can take to ensure the success of your childcare center is to surround yourself with positive people throughout the difficult journey ahead. These people can guide you and encourage you if you ever get stuck along the way.

Professionals

Professionals will be essential to your path forward. It is always wise to have people in your corner who have done what you hope to do before and this endeavor is no exception.

Attorney

A lawyer is an essential component of any business team. Lawyers will be invaluable in the startup phase when you are deciding on your structure and registering your entity.

Hiring a lawyer may be an expensive step, but with all the liability you will be taking on by watching other peoples’ children, you simply must do it.

Accountant

A tax professional will be another necessary component of your professional team. Your accountant will assist you with taxes, quarterly filings, and even general budgeting.

This is absolutely essential when starting a business because you legally need to keep track of your money properly. Try to find someone who can teach you along the way so that you can learn as your business develops.

Business Guides

Board of Directors

For some business structures, a Board of Directors is a requirement. For most, it is not, but is still worth considering. A group of people focused on making your company the best it can be will only increase your success as a business owner.

Mentors

Having established mentors in your back pocket can provide just as much value as a Board of Directors, without all of the formality. If you decide to ask a few people to act as your business mentors, be sure they have skills, experience, and perspective beyond what you currently possess.

Essential Players

While you might have assumed your need for all of the above members of your business team, we wanted to be sure to especially highlight a few unexpected essential players.

Staff

Yes, your daycare business staff should be considered part of your inner-circle. These are the people you will spend constant time with – day in and day out. They will walk with you through handling challenging children and through the best days your kids have.

Not to mention, your children will get to know and love your staff as they register for your business. Depending on how much management responsibility you are dealing with, your employees may even spend more time with your children than you do.

This is why it is crucial to hire only the best employees for your childcare business. Once they are hired on, they are essential players on your team.

Registered Families

Finally, your registered families will be essential players for your business as well. In fact, you would not even have a childcare center without them.

Stay close to a few of your parents so that you always have tabs on their thoughts and needs. While your childcare center is intended to help the children of your community, you need to be especially in tune with their parents to find success.

Step Seven: Prove Yourself

Once you have set up your business and developed your team, it is time to start serving your community. This means you need to start registering some children!

Registering Children

One of the most effective ways to start signing children up for your childcare center is to have multiple open house opportunities. This allows families to get a feel for you and your daycare without any pressure of signing up.

Be sure to make the space fun and non-threatening when children come to visit. If you can make them feel safe and cared for, they will beg their parents to bring them back.

In fact, it may be helpful to have all of the registration paperwork prepared and available for any open houses you host. This will make it easy for parents to sign up for your daycare while they are all there.

This is also helpful in case any sort of interview is necessary with either the parents or children. You will all save time by having these conversations while you are already together.

Know Your Target Roster Number

The unfortunate truth is that you will likely not be able to accept every single child that wants to attend your daycare. At some point, you will max out on space or what you are personally able to manage.

It may be helpful to consider early on what type of criteria you would use to decide who can attend your center if you ever became so full that you needed a wait-list. Some childcare centers will simply go with a “first come, first served” model, but you may have other needs based on your center specialization.

Proving Yourself to Parents

While you may max out your roster someday, that likely will not be a problem for a while. In fact, you may need to work very hard just to get to a place where you are breaking even.

As you start to register students, stay focused on consistently providing a valuable service for these families. You will need to work hard to prove yourself immediately upon beginning operations.

This means that your first few customers will need to be extremely satisfied patrons for you to stay in business. This is because everyone will be asking them about you before they consider signing their own students up for your center.

While people may grow to love and trust your business over time, they do not usually start out that way. In the beginning, people are wary of any and all businesses. However, one of the best ways that initial wall can be broken down is when a trusted friend or family member raves about a business.

Once you know that someone whose opinion you trust has had a positive experience with a business, you are much more likely to try it out for yourself. This is why you need to take extra care in the beginning to go above and beyond any customer expectations.

Negative word-of-mouth may have the power to end your endeavors, but positive word-of-mouth recommendations have the potential to make your business dreams grow beyond anything you have imagined.

Step Eight: Actively Market in Your Community

Last, but certainly not least, you need to maintain a constant practice of marketing to your local community. Even if your daycare business is already at max capacity, you never want your people to forget the quality service you provide for them.

Provide Value

There are two methods of marketing, but both methods should employ similar techniques. In general, you want to focus on providing exceptional value to your community with your marketing.

Marketing should not be contained to the flashy signs, big discounts, and annoying commercials we often think of. Instead, your marketing can look like the consistent effort of your business to serve the community it resides in.

You may be wondering what exactly this could look like. We decided to provide a few examples below to help get your mind thinking about the possibilities.

• Host parenting classes
• Host babysitting classes
• Host CPR/First-Aid trainings
• Host an open community event
• Raise funds for a local children’s charity
• Share educational content online
• Participate on your local school board
• Advocate for child wellness

The possibilities are endless. As long as you are giving of yourself, you will make a difference. Making a difference and showing that you care about children (as more than just a business to make money!) will help community members trust you even more. This is one of the best ways you can market yourself and attract future customers.

In-Person Marketing

When it comes to marketing, there are whole industries specifically targeting online marketing, but it is important to remember that traditional in-person marketing still holds much value.

Offline marketing can be accomplished in many different ways:

• Handing out flyers
• Posting flyers
• Managing a display table at local events or establishments
• Knocking on doors
• Sending mailings
• Making phone calls
• Speaking at local events

It is not quite as extravagant as the newer marketing techniques, but for some people, offline marketing is the most effective option.

One way to make sure you are making the most of your marketing efforts is to ask a few of your target customers what offline marketing they would be most open to. If you have established a demographic to target with your childcare business, a few of these people should be able to easily tell you the best way to reach more people like them.

Online Marketing

Much of what you can do offline can also be done online.

You can host classes, trainings, tours, and even provide your latest announcements and flyers all online.

The trouble for most business owners when it comes to internet marketing is that they do not know where to start. While the internet can be a helpful place to share your business, it can also be an overwhelming space to step into.

We recommend daycare business owners start with establishing a website. This will help them provide any and all interested parents with the answers they need to see before taking the next step to register their child.

Do not become paralyzed by all of the options you will encounter when it comes to setting up your business website. The most important thing is that your target customers can find all of the pertinent information clearly displayed on your site.

If you are not sure what information needs to be included on your website, here is a list to start you off:

• Building Location
• Hours of Operation
• Ages of Kids Served
• Amenities Provided
• Cost
• Contact Information
• How to Register

Once you are comfortable with your website, you can consider moving onto a social media platform. We would recommend starting with Facebook, as this is still one of the most popular platforms.

Create a Facebook page for your childcare business and try to maintain a regular practice of providing value to any followers you may have. This could be in photo form, video form, or even sharing various resources that may be helpful or interesting to your ideal target customer.

Let’s Go!

If you have made it this far, you are likely well on your way to starting a successful childcare business. However, now comes the most important part out of everything we have already said:

You need to take action!

Whether you do so in fear or with great confidence, the only way you are going to see your childcare dreams come true is if you start following these steps one at a time.

Now that you have all of the steps laid out in front of you, this will be a much easier journey than it has ever been in the past. Just focus on the next one thing you need to do and you will be there in no time.

Related Questions

• Who should I ask to be my childcare business mentor?

One of the best moves you can make in starting a successful business of any type is asking the right people to mentor you.

The best mentor for you will depend greatly on the skills and experience you already possess as it is best to ask people who are different than you in some way to serve in this role.

For example, if you already have experience in childcare but have never started a childcare business, you may want someone who knows the ins and outs of this process.

If you have a lot of experience with children, but usually do not interact with parents, it might be helpful to have someone who can show you the ropes of working with adults in this way.

If you already believe in your business and can motivate yourself, but have never marketed before in your life, it might be good if someone with marketing experience has your back along the way.

Keep your eyes open for the skills you do not have and seek out mentors who may be especially gifted in these areas.

• How much staff should have for my daycare business?

While there is no right answer to fit every daycare business, you do want to make sure that you have enough staff to cover the need in your community.

Whatever number of children your building and your budget can handle should be the amount that you strive to obtain. You need to make sure you have enough staff to take care of all of these students.

This might fluctuate depending on how many age groups you are caring for as younger kids may require more attention than older ones.

While you want to have enough staff to cover your needs, be careful that you do not have too many employees that there is not enough work for them. As a new business, you certainly do not want to be wasting your hard-earned startup dollars on unnecessary employees.

Stay on top of this as you get started and your daycare business will be running effectively in no time.

Please note: This blog post is for educational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Please consult a legal expert to address your specific needs.

You are now ready to get started, the next step is our startup course and documents.