Nursery World - Business Development - School's out for summer

Parental demand for holiday care exceeds supply. But what are the
practicalities of running a holiday club - and does it make good
business sense for nurseries? Hannah Crown reports.

Nursery managers may feel they have enough to deal with simply juggling the demands of the early years, without also considering how to entertain those on the verge of secondary school. But, perhaps unsurprisingly, there is a huge potential holiday care market.

The vast majority - 87 per cent - of local authorities in England do not have enough holiday childcare to meet demand. It is a rise of 15 percentage points on last year, according to the Family and Childcare Trust's annual Holiday Childcare Survey.

The National Day Nurseries Association (NDNA) - a quarter of whose 5,300 members provide holiday childcare - notes that nurseries are well placed to offer these services. NDNA chief executive Purnima Tanuku recommends working with schools in order to provide the care, as 'nurseries must be sure they can offer a great experience for, say, an 11-year-old, as their needs are obviously very different from a four-year-old'.

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