Westy Sure Start Nursery in Warrington is due to shut at the end of March. The local authority says it can no longer afford to subsidise the setting.
Warrington Borough Council put the nursery out to tender for a second time in October last year but it failed to drum up interest.
The closure of the nursery will leave 76 families without childcare and 12 members of staff redundant.
Parents are urging the council to reconsider, with a meeting this week to discuss three possible solutions: halving the subsidy provided by the local authority to £113k; putting the nursery out to tender for a third time; or reducing the subsidy for a period of time and, once the nursery becomes profitable, putting it out to tender.
Jonathon Jones, one of the parents in the campaign, told Nursery World, 'The council went about tendering the nursery in the wrong way by only advertising it to large chains, when a lot of private providers would have been interested.'
Cath Shipton, owner of local group Wasps Link Club and Nurseries, said, 'As an established provider in the area we would welcome the opportunity to work alongside all interested parties to help ensure there is a continuing provision on the Westy Sure Start site.'
Tony Crane of Warrington Borough Council's children and young people's services said, 'It was a very difficult decision to close the nursery and one we hoped we would never have to make.
'When the nursery first opened in 2004 it ran on grants and funding from central government. In 2007 this money was withdrawn and since then we have heavily subsidised this community facility. Sadly we can no longer afford to do that.'
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