Babysitting is a growing home based business opportunity
Babysitting is in serious growth mode at present and I'm not talking about your average teenager who's come to mind the children while you and your spouse head off to a party for the evening. It's in far more demand than that and becoming more and more specialised as it panders to an increasingly sophisticated market.
The days when you could just leave your kids for the neighbour to babysit are long gone. Police clearances, referees and exacting personal habits are highly sought after and have become the benchmark for an industry that is on the up and up.
Why is it such a booming industry? As many parents are now required to have a double income just to secure and maintain a mortgage they're looking for childcare that will work in with their lifestyles. Before and after school care, babysitting during the evenings and weekends and even extended periods of care are becoming accepted, and demanded.
This industry has it all; growing customer needs, safety concerns for their children and helpful convenience are creating a demand where prices are at a premium and profits can easily be generated.
Delia Timms, the founder of Find a Babysitter, an online babysitting referral service commented at a recent TV interview
that her service broke even within the first six months and has produced ongoing profits since.
The online service matches parents with localised screened nannies and babysitters from around the country. Parents subscribe to the service for A$49.95 for 3 months and can then choose their prospective sitter from the site. Depending on which plan a parent subscribes to allows them different options of contacting the babysitters at increased prices.
So how do they ensure that babysitters and nannies are appropriate and what levels of screening do they perform. Delia states;
There are a few levels of vetting. Firstly, I review every profile of every babysitter that joins, and then the parents are expected to interview and select their own babysitter so they do all the vetting.
It seems that this business idea is too good to be true, and it is in some ways. Delia is pioneering this online business and is obviously at the forefront of this emerging industry. However, there is very little in the way of competition at the moment and I would expect to see a few other players enter soon.
For the time being, Delia with her husband Jeff, have been able to run this from home and an offsite office and still maintain their own relationship and a family.
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