Kids & Company Entering The US Case Solution

1. Kid’s & Co is a Canada based child-care service provider. The company has partnered with large companies to offer childcare services to its employees. Apart from this, the business has spread across 92 locations in Canada and five US locations to cater to the growing number of childcare needs. Kids & Co. also provided with back up child-care services that were more flexible and customized, arranged after school care, organized summer camps, made arrangements for children birthday parties and provided for care services during special occasions like Christmas Eve and Valentines. Moreover, the business also managed other employee-related programs including in-home child care and elder care, by connecting its corporate clients to the relevant service care providers. Thus, it established itself as a one-stop solution by diversifying its product offering to cater to the broad range of needs of parents and employees and acquiring different locations to expand its market reach physically by locating itself in urban hub areas (Chen and Yu). The business strategy was distinct from that prevalent in the market as Kids & Co. focused on making customer service its competitive advantage, in an industry, which was not known for flexibility (Johnson and Sirikit). It did so by tailoring and customizing the packages as per the convenience of the parents and giving them flexibility in setting their days and times and discussing their child's performance daily, establishing itself as a high-end offering. Furthermore, it also set up its sub urban centers to provide low cost services to those employees who could not afford its high fee in urban areas. Therefore, through providing best customer service in terms of flexibility and quality, it was able to reach a large number of target market through word of mouth, which thus helped it build a competitive edge (Groeger and Buttle).

2. The company’s success is linked to the distinct competitive edge it has created of providing exceptional customer service. A higher degree of flexibility is another factor. Moreover, Kids & Co. took a sensible decision to attract funding from High Net worth Individuals to increase the number of centers and boost revenue directly, owing to the increased demand (Bugg-Levine, Kogut and Kulatilaka). Furthermore, the business opened other sources of income by expanding its portfolio of services to include other activities, which helped broaden its market segment. Apart from this, the industry in which Kids & Co. operates, together with its business strategy helped in driving its success. This is because the buyer power is low in the industry as the demand exceeds the supply of the child-care service providers. The supplier power is also low as the teachers that would be employed in the care centers are now required to have a higher degree of education, with little effect on the pay scales. The industry is fragmented with many competitors. However, Kids & Co. helped counter it by offering a greater degree of flexibility to its client giving it an edge over its competitors. The threat of substitutes is high, as people also prefer in-home care providers as well as temporary child-care centers, which do not require monthly or annual subscriptions. Kids & Co. dealt with the situation by offering a diverse range of services directly or managed indirectly to retain its clients. Lastly, the barriers to entry are high due to strict legal requirements because of kids being involved. These require the centers to meet with certain standards to be eligible for operations and could vary county to county. However, Kids & Co trained its center directors to proactively keep up with any regulatory changes. All these factors can be attributed to its success as it made the Kids & Co. position stronger in the market (E. Dobbs).