Kids Planet sells majority stake to Fremman Capital

The group, which has settings across the North West of England, has grown rapidly since the start of this year, from 53 nurseries to 82.

The new investment from Fremman is intended to support the rapid growth of Kids Planet’s national expansion, employing more senior personnel, and ongoing recruitment across its settings. 

It represents a 70 per cent stake in the business.

Started as a family-owned nursery group in 2008, Kids Planet’s founders - CEO Clare Roberts, her father John Hoban and sister Lucy Kaczmarska - will remain as 'significant minority stakeholders'.

Th other minority shareholder is BGF Capital, which has been an investor for five years and has helped to drive the company's expansion since coming on board in 2016 with £10 million. According to reports it has since invested more than £30m in the company.

The nursery group became the third largest in the UK in January 2020 - behind Busy Bees and Bright Horizons - after acquiring Kids Allowed, also based in the Manchester area. 

Since the start of this year, Kids Planet has been acquired a number of other groups.  They include 10 Poppy & Jack’s nurseries, and Learning Curve, five settings and out-of-school clubs based in Blackpool, in addition to building settings from scratch. It also won the contract to run Oxford University’s five workplace nurseries. 

Kid Planet also runs before-and after-school clubs and its own training academy.

Roberts (pictured) said, ‘In many ways Kids Planet is unrecognisable from where we were five years ago. With our BGF partnership, we’ve scaled significantly, launched our own training academy and acquired one of our key competitors – all of which has allowed us to take the business to the next level. 

‘We have continued with an unwavering commitment to providing an outstanding level of childcare, as a matter of priority, which has been key to our success. There is significant opportunity in the market right now for acquisitions and for recruiting as we continue to scale. With renewed investment, we look forward to working with Fremman, and replicating our success in further regions across the UK.’

Founded in 2020, Fremman is a pan-European, independent mid-market investment firm with offices in London, Madrid, Munich, and Paris. 

Chris Carney, partner at Fremman, said, ‘We are very excited to partner with Clare and the whole team to support the outstanding Kids Planet growth story. The management teams unequivocal focus on best-in-class quality, strongly differentiates the group as they continue to develop into a national leader. We look forward to helping accelerate the potential of the company whilst sustaining these core values, and are confident that Fremman’s experience and shared vision will help support the next phase in their journey.’

Ricardo de Serdio, founding partner and CEO at Fremman, added, ‘We are absolutely delighted with the opportunity ahead, and look forward to partnering with Clare and the Kids Planet team.’

Pinesh Mehta, investor at BGF and board director at Kids Planet, said, ‘We’re incredibly proud to have backed Clare and her team over the past five years, who have delivered some truly impressive milestones. The rate of growth and pace of the acquisition strategy has been outstanding, and we’re really honoured to have played a part in their story and success.’