Famly has today launched an online hub that holds a number of free guides, webinars, and software tools that will deliver the early years sector business advice.

The EY Business Playbook features experts like Louise Stoney, Ben Rolfe, and leading groups like Kindred Nurseries and Little Beehive – with a focus on what EY settings can do to tackle the economic crisis.

There are a number of business areas that are covered including finances, marketing and management.

The Playbook launches alongside a new iteration of Famly Free, Famly’s totally free software platform for smaller providers. To respond to the crisis, the platform contains basic financial features like invoicing, payments, and enquiry handling for the very first time.

The Playbook offers real, tactical solutions to help providers address the crises of rising costs and limited government support that they’re facing, many of whom are turning to increases in prices just to stay alive. Some of the figures that underline the crises include:

• 94% of early years providers had been impacted by increased food costs, with
  62% forced to use cheaper ingredients and half saying that they had been forced
  to pass on increased costs to parents
• The number of providers has fallen by 10% in just four years
• Rising costs will mean that total spending on the “free” childcare offers in real
  terms is significantly lower than last year.

Julia Rose, early education editor at Famly, said
“While we can’t immediately fix funding levels, staff recruitment, and all the other existential threats to our sector, we want to do something to tackle this current economic crisis head on. As a former Level 3 educator, like many of you, I worked my way up to leading a nursery, so I can empathise with our colleagues in the sector who find the business side of running an early years setting tough.

“That’s exactly why we’ve put together a collection of no-nonsense, actionable advice alongside inspiring ideas from some of the very best in the sector. My younger self would have loved this and we hope you do too.”

The Playbook itself features more than 20 articles and videos on topics like marketing, financial guidance, staffing and recruitment, and the Famly team will be adding more to the Playbook every single week. This includes an upcoming webinar on marketing your setting with Childcare Marketing’s Ben Rolfe, and soon, more interviews with experts, special templates to help you calculate your numbers, and videos showcasing easy ways to get on top of your business.

Anders Laustsen, chief executive at Famly, said “We all know firsthand the impact that a thriving early years sector has on society – and unfortunately the latest avalanche of challenges that’s fallen on the sector’s heads is not making that any easier. Using our Early Childhood Platform shouldn’t be the only option we can give to nurseries to help get their business under control. That’s why I’m so excited about The EY Business Playbook. I can’t wait to see where this is going to go, and just hope that we provide that golden nugget of advice to as many settings as possible so that they can afford that extra bump in salaries, new piece of play equipment, or improved training for their staff.”