[ Industry advisory · Childcare & education ]

Strategic advisory for childcare and early learning centre operators.

Childcare economics are tight and tightly regulated. Occupancy, educator-to-child ratios, Child Care Subsidy timing and wage cost discipline are the levers — and small movements compound across a centre or a group. We help operators see those numbers clearly.

[ What we hear, again and again ]

The pressures inside childcare & early learning centres.

None of these are signs of a poorly-run business. They're signs that the financial relationship around the business hasn't kept up.

  • 01Occupancy gaps quietly eroding centre profitability week by week
  • 02Wage cost and ratio compliance creating a hard floor under labour spend
  • 03CCS funding timing and gap-fee recovery creating cashflow complexity
  • 04Lease cost and centre footprint locked in against variable demand
  • 05Multi-centre operators losing visibility on which centres actually contribute

[ How we work ]

What strategic support actually looks like.

  1. 01

    Centre-level profitability and occupancy tracked weekly and monthly

  2. 02

    Wage cost, ratios and rostering reviewed against real attendance

  3. 03

    CCS reconciliation, gap-fee recovery and family debt managed deliberately

  4. 04

    Lease, capex and capacity decisions framed against real payback

  5. 05

    Structure designed for multi-centre growth, acquisition or sale-readiness

[ The numbers that matter ]

What good operators in this industry actually watch.

Not a long list — the handful of numbers that, watched consistently, change how the business is run.

  • 01

    Centre occupancy %

    Utilised places vs licensed capacity, week by week

  • 02

    Wages as % of revenue

    Against the hard floor set by ratios and award

  • 03

    Revenue per place

    What each licensed place actually returns

  • 04

    Family debt and gap recovery

    Gap fees and family debtors collected on time

  • 05

    EBITDA per centre

    Centre-level contribution after all direct cost

[ Across the year ]

A real cadence — not a tax-time call.

See the full 12-month cadence →

[ The honest line ]

Childcare operators who see occupancy, ratios and centre-level contribution clearly make better decisions about staff, sites and growth. We help build that visibility into the rhythm.

[ The next conversation ]

Run the centre on real occupancy economics.

Bring the messy stuff. The numbers, the pressures, the decisions you've been putting off. The first conversation is structured, candid and obligation-free.

Book an introductory call →See the Command Centre