GEMS KINDERGARTEN Play School: Business Plan for Early Education

This business plan details the establishment of Gems Kindergarten, a play school in London, UK, offering specialized programs for early childhood education. The plan outlines the company's mission, objectives, and new product concepts, including Nuvo, playgroup, and nursery/kindergarten programs designed to cater to different age groups. It analyzes the competitive landscape, market environment, and target segments, emphasizing the school's sustainable competitive advantage through its unique educational approach and the use of innovative tools like the Gems Kindergarten tablet. The plan also covers marketing strategies, growth plans, operational details, risk management, and financial projections, including sales forecasts, salary structures, income statements, cash flow statements, and break-even analysis. The document emphasizes the importance of providing a safe, creative, and engaging environment for children to enhance their skills and abilities before entering primary education. The plan also includes an analysis of the UK education sector using Porter's Five Forces, highlighting the competitive dynamics and the potential for success in the market.

GEMS KINDERGARTEN Play
School
(BUSINESS PLAN)

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Executive summary..............................................................................................................................
Company Description...........................................................................................................................
New Product Concept...........................................................................................................................
Sustainable competitive advantage.......................................................................................................
Market environment competitor analysis.............................................................................................
Industry Attractiveness.........................................................................................................................
Porter’s Five Forces.....................................................................................................................4
Overall Market and Target Segment(S)...............................................................................................
Size of the current market............................................................................................................5
Target market segment.................................................................................................................6
Competitive positioning.......................................................................................................................
Customer decision making process..............................................................................................7
Marketing Mix.............................................................................................................................8
Growth strategy............................................................................................................................9
Research & Development...................................................................................................................
Operations...........................................................................................................................................
Management Structure........................................................................................................................
Risk Recognition and Risk Reduction Strategies...............................................................................
Financial details..................................................................................................................................
Sensitivity Analysis............................................................................................................................
Financial Analysis..............................................................................................................................
References..........................................................................................................................................
Appendix............................................................................................................................................

Sales forecast.............................................................................................................................17
Salary structure..........................................................................................................................17
Income statement.......................................................................................................................17
Cash flow statement...................................................................................................................18
Break Even Analysis..................................................................................................................19

LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 1: Number of nursery schools in the United Kingdom (UK) from 2000/2001 to
2014/2015*......................................................................................................................................5
Figure 2: Bayswater Road near Kensington Palace, London, UK..................................................9
Figure 3: Management Structure...................................................................................................11

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Gems Kindergarten play school is highly specialized play group school which focuses on
providing three types of programs for the child development grooming i.e. Nuvo, play group and
nursery & kindergarten. Furthermore, the initial investment of business will be 100000 which
will generate positive returns after the one year functioning. On the basis of breakeven analysis,
95 students should help in achieving no profit no loss situation for the firm.
COMPANY DESCRIPTION
Gems Kindergarten is play school group which aims at providing Early Childhood Care
& Education (ECCE) and will follow the standard of Child Development & Education (CDE).
Looking at the competitive environment, every parents wants their child to be skilful and capable
in order to compete in the market. In this regard, childhood development plays significant role to
make them strong and skilful. The main purpose of entrepreneur is to provide early education
facility so that it helps child to groom at early stage and start educational career with a grace and
confidence. Furthermore, owner is planning to offer different programs to varied ages of children
such as:
Programs Age group Duration
Nuvo 1.5-2.5 years 2 Hours/day
Play group 2-3 years 3 Hours/day
Nursery & Kindergarten 3-4.5 years 4 Hours/day
With such attractive service, entrepreneur is planning to attract large number of parents
so that they can be encouraged to make their children join Gems Kindergarten. Furthermore,
cited play school will be located at Bayswater Road near Kensington Palace, London, UK. At the
initial stage, owners are planning to target domestic market around London and on the basis of
demand and responses from clients or customers, management will focus on distribution of
services on national level. The business will be privately owned and consist of two principal
shareholders for executing the business activities.
Mission:
Mission statement of Xyz play group is to develop synergy of skills, knowledge and
values in the children to provide them inner voice for the 21st Century.
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Objectives:
To open a new venture it is important for the entrepreneurs to develop realistic and
achievable objectives for future development. Following are the objectives for Gems
Kindergarten:
 Provide safe and satisfying play school in which parents are also encouraged to
participate for better development of their child.
 To offer attractive educational services that makes children learn without books.
 To attract high amount of families for fulfilling 70% of classes capacity by the end of
first year operations.
NEW PRODUCT CONCEPT
Looking at the current market environment, parents are highly concerned about the
education and learnings of their children. In this regard, the concept of Gems Kindergarten is to
provide attractive, creative and safe environment where child can groom, learn new things, and
enhance his/her attributes before starting their education career. Therefore, to cover all these
aspects, different play school services have been designed by the owners to establish business
within the target market of London. Following are the four different kinds of categories that
Gems Kindergarten will offer to children:
 Nuvo: This category is especially crafted for children of age group 1-2.5 by keeping in
mind about the holistic development of children at this age. The main purpose of this
program is to develop and strengthen the relationship between child and care giver.
However, the program consist of structural learning developmental experience of kids by
rhymes, free play, sensory activities, art and crafts, scrap books activities, sand and water
activities and outdoor and indoor play.
 Play group: This is the category of age group consisting 1.5 to 2.5, where children start to
explore the world around them. Therefore, this program helps them explore world in
more attractive and creative manner with safe environment. This program will focus on
developing skills related to social, aesthetic and motor in young child. Activities included
in this section is water and sand play, creative time, field trips, puppet shows and skits,
celebration of festivals and special days.
 Nursery & Kindergarten: In this section, child will be engaged school readiness activities
such as reading, counting, alphabet and number recognition, problem solving in fun etc.
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Herein, individual will be encouraged to learn through dramatics, science and art.
Furthermore, letter and number will be visualized through projector, building blocks
activities will be used to enhance problems solving skills, realistic articles will be used
for memorizing the child about basic understanding.
SUSTAINABLE COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE
Planning to enter into such a competitive environment it is important for the senior
authority of Gems Kindergarten to provide quality of services and environment to the child so
that parents can be attracted. To establish business and attain competitive edge within the target
market it is essential to create brand image. On the basis of above product concept of Gems
Kindergarten, they are predominantly reliant on their core competencies that is environment and
education. The main aim of company’s entering into education sector is to provide quality of
learning environment for different age group where child enhance their various and abilities
before initiating their education career.
Gems Kindergarten tablet:
Gems Kindergarten tablet will assist in providing the child an all-round exposure to
ensure multiple skill development. However, this tablet will consist of reading, musical,
mathematical, analytical and technological skills to give the child smart edge. By the means of
this, owners are focusing on attaining sustainable competitive advantage as their competitors are
not offering such type of services for the betterment of child’s grooming and early stage learning.
MARKET ENVIRONMENT COMPETITOR ANALYSIS
Analyzing market is one of the major aspect of business plan, however, it helps in
evaluating and identifying all the competitors available in the market that are also offering
similar kinds of services to the same target market. In this regard, following are competitors of
Gems Kindergarten:
 Castle Kindergarten (Wimbledon): It is one of the outstanding nursery school for the
children aged from 2-5 years which offers superior quality of education services to
prepare children for prep schools. Firm have high staff ratio and rich curriculum, perfect
and gentle introduction to nursery school so that basic skills and abilities of child can be
developed.
 Chelsea Pre-Prep and Nursery: In the area of Chelsea it is considered as one of the best
play school in offering early education for children aged 2.5 to 6. However, owner of this
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school focuses on providing list of fun activities such as sports lesion, music and drama,
French and animal care so that children can learn varied basic things.
 Miss Daisy: It is a group of three popular nursery schools in Chelsea, Knightsbridge and
Belgravia. Further, school offers the services of play group, nursery and kindergarten to
the children so that with their basic education, curriculum activities are also focused on
so that preparation for future schools can be carried out effectively.
INDUSTRY ATTRACTIVENESS
Porter’s Five Forces
In UK, there are several sectors that are showing tremendous growth and sustainability
for the future. Toy industry is one of those sectors that are in highly demand and people for the
sake of their children are spending huge amount in the toy products and services. Further,
through the help of Porter’s Five Forces model, researcher focuses on evaluating the UK
Education sector so as to understand the risks and uncertainties associated with it.
 Threat of new entrant: In UK, education sector is emerging as one of the brightest and
competitive sector. However, with wide range of universities, colleges, school etc. around
UK making this sector one of the competitive environment to operate in it. However,
education, grooming, skill development is basic need of children or individual (Lewin
and et.al, 2010). Thus, the demand for services in this sector will never come to an end.
In this regard, threat of new entrant in education sector of UK is relatively high.
Moreover, in play with reasonable initial investment attract large investors to enter into
this sector.
 Bargaining power of supplier: The degree of supplier concentration and supplier
importance in context to education sector is similar as considered in economic aspect.
There are several supplier exist in the market that its bargaining power is moderate.
Schools, colleges, universities are making their inventory of books and copies that indeed
to reduces the power of supplier as they have to operate as per the terms and conditions
of buyer (Dobbs, 2014).
 Bargaining power of customer: With ease of entrant into the education sector of UK,
customers gets wide range of options for their children in terms of getting best possible
education. Therefore, bargaining power of customers is high. It is because of the fact that,
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switching costs is relatively low due to present wide range of play schools in different
parts of UK (RENKO and et.al, 2011).
 Intensive rivalry: Education sector of UK is one of the highly competitive environment
for the entrepreneurs to survive in. However, with large number of play schools, primary
schools etc. present in the market, intensive rivalry for Gems Kindergarten is relatively
high. Therefore, it is important for the owner to make sure that they offer attractive and
innovative services to satisfy the needs and wants of customers (Foskett, 2010).
 Threat of substitute: Considering the nature of business that entrepreneurs are focusing on
will possess low threat of substitute. This is because, early stage education comprises of
similar services or concepts only thus, substitute of products is relatively difficult which
reduces its threat.
OVERALL MARKET AND TARGET SEGMENT(S)
Size of the current market
Figure 1: Number of nursery schools in the United Kingdom (UK) from 2000/2001 to
2014/2015*
(Source: Statistical Portal, 2015)
The above depicted graph assist in presenting the number of nursery schools in United
Kingdom from 2000/01 to 2014-15. However, the number of schools are declining at significant
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pace because all the schools are providing same services which indeed creates high competition
and restrict owners to generate better sales. By the means of the decreasing sales and customers
nursery schools are forcefully closed down (Kim and et.al, 2011). Furthermore, people
perception have changed now and they want best and creative possible early stage grooming and
education for their child so that he/she can enhance skills become competent to enter into
primary education system.
On the basis of this, stats market gap has been identified which is that there are numerous
play schools but unable to provide quality of creative environment and education services that
can groom a child. In this regard, owners of Gems Kindergarten have focused on offering
learning through practicality, electronically so that child can connect to the things and learn in
more effective way (Huang and et.al, 2012).
Target market segment
Looking at the current business segment of Gems Kindergarten, owners have segmented
the target market into three different categories: geographic, demographic and Income level.
 Geographic: Planning to open play school in Bayswater Road near Kensington Palace,
London, UK the target market will be segmented as per the communities and societies
associated with the location. However, people of surrounding areas will be targeted to
generate leads.
 Demographic: Owners of Xyz are focusing on targeting those parent who both are
employed and unable to provide adequate amount of time to their child for grooming
them or making them learn. Thus, this is the major target market for the cited venture
which will be focused mainly. Overall marketing plan will be designed as per the needs
and wants of such people so that they can influenced to send their child to play school
and make him/her learn new and effective things through fun and creative education
system.
 Income level: This is the third category in which target market is segmented on the basis
of income level. According to the designed services, upper middle class and higher class
people will be targeted (Noss and et.al, 2012). This is because, owner is planning to sale
its service at reasonably high prices so that they can acquire the educational tools like
tablet and other essential services.
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COMPETITIVE POSITIONING
Entrepreneurs planning to enter into such a competitive corporate environment it is
essential for them to make sure that they evaluate each and every aspect appropriately so that
smart and reliable decisions can be made. Herein, management should focus on positioning their
offering within the mind of target audience suitably so that sales can be generated. In this regard,
investigator can present the competitive positioning of Gems Kindergarten through the means of
Porter’s Generic Strategies (Berthon and et.al, 2012).
Herein, owners are concentrating on cost and differentiation focus strategy to position
products and services. Through the means of cost focus strategy Gems Kindergarten can easily
offer value for money to its customers by focusing on higher ratio of quality to price. In addition
to this, differentiation strategy will help in differentiating the products from the competitor and
assist establishing business at initial stage so that suitable platform can be developed for future
competitive advantage in education sector. According to the business concept, cited play school
is targeting children from 1.5 to 6 year and provide them better environment and innovative ways
of learnings apart from the use of books (Ataman and et.al, 2010). Therefore, through the means
of both these generic positioning strategies company will be able to position its products and
services within the target market in effective and efficient manner.
Customer decision making process
In general, marketing is considered as the integral part of business activities and for
initiating a new venture it is the most likely prospect that will help the course of owners in create
awareness and generating better demand of services within the target market. In context to the
industry selected, marketing strategy for Gems Kindergarten will be categorized on geographic
and demographic aspects of customers (Dobbs, 2014).
In terms of geographic segmentation, primary customer for cited school will be people
living in the societies and communities that are nearby Kensington Palace, London. For this,
newspaper and pamphlets will be used so that each and every family can be targeted for
generating demand. Along with this, use of digital marketing such as TV, social media etc. will
help the course in sharing information towards the target market.
In terms of demographic segmentation, owners of Gems Kindergarten is targeting high
income level people and parent who are into job or profession. In this, middle and higher class
people are targeted because designed services are relatively expensive for instance providing
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educational tablet so that child can learn new things easily. In order to attract such people
marketer can make the use of video, attractive ads and setup temporary outlets in Malls and
popular places of London so that customers (Parents) can be easily attracted and encouraged to
make admission of their child in new venture (RENKO and et.al, 2011).
Marketing Mix
In general, marketing mix is the tool which helps in illustrating different prospects of the
business enterprise which consist of product, place, promotion and price. Following is the
marketing of Gems Kindergarten:
 Product: According to the concept of Gems Kindergarten, owners will offer three
different types of programs or products for the children so that they can enhance their
skills and abilities through superior quality of early stage learnings. The product range of
cited frim consist of three types: Nuvo, Play group, Nursery and Kindergarten. On the
basis of age group children will be admitted in the all the categories of educational
programs (Huang and et.al, 2012).
 Price: Entering into relatively competitive market it is important for the entrepreneur to
offer academic and play group services at affordable prices but offering wide range of
creative and innovative learning system which excludes books requires adequate amount.
Therefore, premium pricing strategy has been used and upper middle and higher class
people are targeted so that cream and high class people’s children can be served with
superior quality of educational services (Kim and et.al, 2011).
 Place: Gems Kindergarten will be located at Bayswater Road near Kensington Palace,
London, UK. However, on the basis of geographic segmentation at the initial stage
owners will target nearby communities and societies so that parents of children aging 1.5
to 6 can be attracted. Once the domestic market is captured in effective way,
entrepreneurs will expand business by opening franchise in other parts of UK.
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