Partner Spotlight – Meet Rachel, Founder of Koru Kids

Did you know Tide has a Partner Programme? We offer referral partnerships across various sectors, including accounting, e-commerce, construction, logistics and more! Whether you have a clientele of sole traders, self-employed individuals, or SMEs, our programme will help your clients spend less time on finance admin and more time running their businesses.

As part of our Partner Programme, we met with Rachel, the founder of Koru Kids. We talked about her entrepreneurship journey, how she is s ‘building the world’s best childcare service’, and why she chose to partner with Tide.

Don’t hesitate to reach out to our dedicated team if you want to learn more.

Hi Rachel! Tell us about Koru Kids and where the idea came from?

When I had my first child, I realised how complicated the childcare system in the UK is. Not only do families in the UK now spend more on childcare than they do on their mortgage, it is often too inflexible to accommodate working parents’ schedules.

At that time, I was the CEO of a healthcare company and all my friends were also having kids then. Like me, they were struggling with childcare and I thought, ‘There’s got to be a better way’. I knew I’d hit upon my life’s work and started Koru Kids.

I decided to quit my job and help families find the right childcare so they can flourish. I wanted to build a childcare system that creates awesome mini-humans, puts emotional wellbeing first, that’s easy to arrange and doesn’t cost the earth. 

Can you tell us more about Koru Kids’ journey? 

Building a ‘full stack’ business is hard as you have to build many different businesses at once. We recruit, train, match, and manage nannies – that’s four very different activities. So since our launch in 2016 we have needed to be excellent at managing complex operations, people, and technology. Additionally, childcare is particularly high-stakes. Success requires superb execution with no room for error. 

After years of hard work we are now one of the UK’s biggest childcare brands, having delivered well over 3 million hours of childcare, and created thousands of great childcare jobs. Our 60 people team deploys more than 2,000 nannies each day, profoundly transforming the lives of thousands of families.

What have been the most tricky and the most rewarding moments so far?

The hardest day was early on when a company we had partnered with had a data breach. That was our worst nightmare. After that we really doubled down on everything to do with security – even though it wasn’t our breach and luckily the info breached was limited, it showed how important security is. Risks and safety is part of our company culture, which is probably because I spent my whole career in healthcare where it really is life and death.

The most rewarding happens almost every day; when parents tell me how incredible their nanny is. It’s great to hear how much Koru Kids transformed their home life and relationships after struggling so much to find the right person. Hearing these great stories just never gets old.

Can you tell us more about the Koru Ethos and how you developed it?

At the centre of Koru Kids childcare is the Koru Ethos. We believe a good life is more than academic success; it’s about health, relationships, joy, and purpose. The Koru Ethos guides how we select, train, and support great childcarers. It emphasises on play, intrinsic motivation, self-regulation, and mental wellbeing.

We want to help children find their unique path and thrive in a rapidly changing world. We aim to raise kids who are kind, empathetic, and positive forces in their communities. To do so, we think they’ll need ‘modern survival skills’ like creativity, adaptability, curiosity, and resilience. We also believe practices like mindfulness, gratitude, and spending time in nature can lay the foundation for a healthy, happy life, and we teach these to our nannies. 

A lot of development went into the Ethos. We researched globally, drawing from the best ideas and practices, including Te Whariki in New Zealand and the Early Years Foundation Stage in the UK. This is one of my favourite parts of what we do, and I love spending time on it. 

Tell us more about Koru Kids’ growth and development.

We wanted to create a beautiful, seamless experience unlike anywhere else, and that needed initial capital investment. 

We’ve done four rounds of funding, the largest of which was £10m. That’s been essential to fund the initial build of Koru Kids’ systems. 

Along the way, I’ve been lucky enough to get amazing backers like Michael Pennington, the co-founder of Gumtree.

Can you tell us more about your Tide partner experience?

We are really happy to offer Tide as a benefit to our nannies – to help them save time and money. We know so many of them have side hustles and Tide gave us a great offer to pass on to them.

We’ve had an enthusiastic uptake so far!

What’s next for Koru Kids?

We want to solve every problem in childcare – eventually. 

Koru in Māori literally translates as ‘loop in English’; we want our childcare to be a loop of care around our families and childcarers. It’s always been the vision from day one.  

We think about impact on 3 dimensions: 

• Firstly, we want to ease access to childcare so that parents, especially mums, are able to return to work and we want to do that all at a price that families can afford—which is where tech comes in
• Secondly, we want to create rewarding jobs and careers for childcare professionals at scale, with ongoing personalised training and feedback systems
• Thirdly, to provide high quality childcare to the children we look after so that they can flourish for the rest of their lives.  

Sometimes we sum it up as ‘building the world’s best childcare service’.

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📸 Head photo credit: Fiona Freund & Motherworks