20 Years of Nurturing: Erin Kress on the Evolution of Childcare

Intro  

Welcome to another edition of inspired stories where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from their successes, how they’ve overcome adversity, and explore current challenges they’re facing.

Anthony Codispoti (05:20.494)
Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast, where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from their successes and be inspired by how they’ve overcome adversity. My name is Anthony Codaspote, and today’s guest is Aaron Kress, Director Assistant of Step One Child Care, a childcare center founded in 2013 that serves children from infants up to seven years old in Melrose, Massachusetts.

They believe that children are unique individuals who need a secure, caring, and stimulating atmosphere in order to grow and mature emotionally, intellectually, physically, and socially. Their goal is to help children meet their potential in a caring, warm, secure, and stimulating atmosphere. Their teaching staff and management team work together and cooperate with parents to make every effort to achieve this goal. Now, before we get into all that good stuff, today’s episode is brought to you by my company.

Ad Back Benefits Agency, where we offer very specific and unique employee benefits that are both great for your team and fiscally optimized for your bottom line. One recent client was able to add over $900 per employee per year in extra cash flow by implementing one of our programs. Results vary for each company and some organizations may not be eligible. To find out if your company qualifies, contact us today at adbackbenefitsagency .com. Now back to our guest today, the Director Assistant of Step 1 Child Care,

Aaron Kress, I appreciate you making the time to share your story today.

Erin Kress (06:48.922)
You’re welcome.

Anthony Codispoti (06:50.54)
So Aaron, I understand that you aren’t the founder of this child care center, but can you maybe give the origin story? How did the center come into existence?

Erin Kress (06:59.238)
Well, it started like you said in 2013, the director ended up getting pregnant with her own child and she moved her home center to a small center that she found in Melrose, Massachusetts so she could keep her baby home and not get subjected to germs and all that stuff. And then she just grew.

Anthony Codispoti (07:19.276)
And it just took off from there. And so at what point did you get involved?

Erin Kress (07:20.579)
It did, yes.

Erin Kress (07:25.446)
She opened in April of 2013 and I started in May of 2013.

Anthony Codispoti (07:32.17)
so you’ve been there essentially from the beginning.

Erin Kress (07:34.212)
Yes, I have nine and a half nine years.

Anthony Codispoti (07:38.048)
Okay, and how did you find out about this opportunity? Did you know each other beforehand?

Erin Kress (07:42.726)
No, she actually opened in 2015, April of 2015. 15, yes. No, actually I was looking for another job. I wanted to be closer to home because I had a child in elementary school at the time. And I wanted to be able to get her and be more closer to home. she was happened, so when my boss happened to be looking for teachers, so I applied and I’ve been here since.

Anthony Codispoti (07:47.118)
2015, okay? Okay.

Anthony Codispoti (08:08.128)
And had you had a background in child care?

Erin Kress (08:10.15)
Yes, yes, I actually have been doing this fail for over 20 years. Yep.

Anthony Codispoti (08:14.798)
Okay. And so describe what your role is there now. What do you do on a daily basis?

Erin Kress (08:21.2)
Well, right now I’m in the preschool classroom, so we’re implementing potty training. We’re doing structured stuff like circle time with them, potty training. We take them outside, know, let them learn at their own pace with them learning educational stuff.

Anthony Codispoti (08:39.148)
And so you guys actually teach potty training there.

Erin Kress (08:39.268)
Like we have them, well we help them with potty training, yes. We strongly encourage it for them to go. Where we have multiple kids in the room that are fully potty trained, the littler ones will be like, that looks fun, I think I wanna go do it. So we encourage them to potty train and we give them incentives with it and we work with the parents on getting them potty trained. We also start to help them learn the writing skills of holding pens and pencils and learning how to write.

letters, numbers, their names. So when they do get ready for the older pre -K classroom, they have the fundamental skills that they need.

Anthony Codispoti (09:19.726)
That’s great. Now, your center serves kids from infants all the way up to seven years old, which is a bit of an older age bracket than you typically see in a child care center.

Erin Kress (09:31.588)
Yes. Typically we don’t get them after the age of five due to summer camps and where it’s easier for parents to put them at summer camp where the hours are longer. Typically our oldest we have is five, but we can take them up to seven if we absolutely needed to.

Anthony Codispoti (09:49.334)
And that older bracket six to seven, that would be more for the summertime because those kids are typically in kindergarten, first grade, second grade, right. Okay. So tell me about your curriculum and your overall approach to childcare education.

Erin Kress (09:54.488)
Yes, exactly. Yes, exactly.

Erin Kress (10:05.446)
Our curriculum is based, every month we do a different theme. Like September we may do fall or back to school or farm. And each week we teach them something to do with that curriculum based, curriculum based theme we may have going on. We also have them do Chinese circle time once a week where they will learn different things about that theme for the week. So say we’re doing farms, they’ll learn about.

the farm that week and they’ll learn different things in Chinese related to that.

Anthony Codispoti (10:38.986)
Interesting choice. I’m curious why Chinese in particular.

Erin Kress (10:42.938)
because the only one is Chinese. And it’s bilingual. The kids love it. They know. They’ll go home, talk to the parents and say, mommy, I learned how to say this in Chinese. Or I learned how to say that in Chinese.

Anthony Codispoti (10:44.566)
Okay, that makes sense.

Anthony Codispoti (10:55.79)
Terrific. And you said you do a different theme each month. Here we are in September 2024. What’s the theme this month?

Erin Kress (10:56.634)
Yeah, we.

Yes.

Erin Kress (11:03.192)
Our preschool theme this month is seasons because the weather changes so quick. We’re talking about the different seasons. Like one week we talked about fall and what we need to get ready for fall. And then we talked about, like we’re talking about winter now and what we need to get ready for the winter, what we do in the winter, what our favorite season is and why.

Anthony Codispoti (11:23.712)
And is October lined up? What’s the theme for October?

Erin Kress (11:26.284)
October will probably be for my room to farm and apple picking and pumpkins and Halloween related stuff.

Anthony Codispoti (11:34.616)
What do you feel sets apart step one childcare from other centers in the area?

Erin Kress (11:39.31)
We are more like a family based. Like when I walk into work, I’m like, it’s a job. like, I get to go see my family today. I get to see, you know, what this one’s like. It’s more family based.

Anthony Codispoti (11:51.971)
Yeah.

And so do your folks tend to stay with you long, both the families as well as the employees?

Erin Kress (11:57.606)
Yes. Yes, I actually had a family that graduated with me this year who’s been with me for 10 years. And it’s amazing to see him and his siblings go all through like our center when he was a baby. Now he’s going off to kindergarten and his sister, you know, it’s amazing to see the family bonds that we get with them. And the employees are the same thing. A lot of the employees that have been here have been with us for four or five years.

Anthony Codispoti (12:27.45)
wow.

Erin Kress (12:28.122)
Yeah, so we don’t have a high turnover of teachers. Because like I said, it’s more of a family -based than center -based.

Anthony Codispoti (12:35.958)
So that’s interesting. wondering, because I talk to a lot of childcare centers and finding and retaining good folks is a huge challenge in pretty much every part of the country. I’m curious what you guys have tried and what’s working for you on that front.

Erin Kress (12:46.234)
Mm

Erin Kress (12:53.038)
A lot of it has to do with our director. She’s very, very flexible, very understanding, and she listens to our needs and concerns. So it’s more like she works with us to make us feel comfortable and happy. It’s more geared towards keeping us happy. Does that make sense? Yeah. And that’s why she holds the retention of teachers that she needs. And she’s very generous to us too.

Anthony Codispoti (13:10.104)
Sure. yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (13:19.97)
generous in terms of like time off and benefits or in what way? Okay.

Erin Kress (13:23.288)
Exactly, all that time off the benefits like if there’s family emergencies they totally understand everything. just it all comes down to how she respects us and she respects us phenomenal.

Anthony Codispoti (13:34.276)
that’s terrific. And she’s actively involved in running the center as well. So, Erin, maybe take me through what a typical day would look like for one of your students.

Erin Kress (13:37.604)
Yes. Yep.

Erin Kress (13:47.334)
A typical day for our students is we greet them at the door with their parents. We talk to the parents about their night and their morning, and then they come in the room. I’ll take my kids, for example, they’re older. They’ll come in, they’ll wash their hands, and they’ll sit at the table and read a book or play with Legos at the table and whatnot. And then we get ready for snack. And depending on the weather, we either go out first thing in the morning or 10, 30, 11, depending on, like I said, the weather. And then we’ll get ready to go out for…

playtime outside and in between the transition time we’ll have potty time.

Erin Kress (14:25.286)
And then we go into circle time too. like after snack by nine 30 quarter of 10, they’ll learn the days of the week, the months of the year, how to spell their names, you know, what we’re talking about for the themes and get through circle time. And then we go out.

Anthony Codispoti (14:40.514)
And by the time students are ready to leave, they’re heading into kindergarten or first grade, you feel like they’re generally very well prepared for that transition.

Erin Kress (14:49.902)
Yes, yep. Because I’ve seen kids that have started in my room not being able to spell their name or write their name to going off to the older preschool room, which we call pre -K, to spelling their names, know, writing their names, holding their, writing their names, holding the pencils the way they need to be done. And it’s a huge to see. I was going say it’s huge to see how they learn and respond.

Anthony Codispoti (15:09.92)
And it, I’m sorry, go ahead, Aaron.

Anthony Codispoti (15:15.886)
I imagine that’s pretty rewarding. Yeah. I’m wondering if maybe you’ve got a particular story in mind of a student that maybe was struggling early on and that you were able to really help them kind of transition through and see them kind of come out the other side. You’re like, wow, this is exciting.

Erin Kress (15:17.925)
It is.

Erin Kress (15:37.286)
Not a particular story about somebody struggling, but like how they’re learning. I have a little boy who would fidget around at circle time, look at this, look at that, touch all his friends and everything as we’re talking about the Mayflower. He goes home that night and he’s playing with his boat and he’s like, mommy, look, we’re learning about the Mayflower and this is the Mayflower. So I was pretty happy and impressed that he’s actually learning that I taught him, look, the boats and he’s bringing him home.

Anthony Codispoti (16:03.712)
Even when the kid is really fidgety and it seems like he’s paying attention to everything else but you, his ears are still taking it in. His brain is retaining it. Yeah, that’s got to.

Erin Kress (16:08.995)
Exactly.

Exactly. And his parents were like, are you teaching them about the Mayflower? I’m like, yeah. They’re like, he’s telling us about it at home playing with his boats. And to me, that’s rewarding because he’s learning. I’m teaching him something.

Anthony Codispoti (16:22.371)
Yeah.

You know, I’m curious, Aaron, what are some of the most common concerns that parents have when starting their kids in a new school like yours? And what can you tell them to put their mind at ease?

Erin Kress (16:33.355)
It’s mainly with them, it’s the socialization aspect of it. They want them to learn to be friends and be comfortable. I will encourage the parents if their child is starting out at our center for the first week to bring in, or a couple of weeks, depending on how the child adjusts, a lovey or a stuffed animal for them to hold and talk to if they need to. And we’ll reassure them that mommy and daddy’s are coming back and send pictures to the parents so their mind is at ease to know that.

The child is okay.

Anthony Codispoti (17:08.384)
And do the parents get updates during the day or just kind of when they come to pick the kids up at night?

Erin Kress (17:13.926)
If the child just started, they’ll get pictures and emails throughout the day. the end, because typically the center is very busy with schedules and whatnot, they do mainly get one at night.

Anthony Codispoti (17:21.219)
Mm

Anthony Codispoti (17:25.678)
Yeah, I remember when I got two boys who were eight and 10 now and they were going through local child care center that were a huge fan of. We always loved getting those updates and on the days where they didn’t come, we’re like, what, what’s going on? We have no idea. Like it’s sort of a black box. We don’t know what’s going on in there. But like we always understood because it’s like we would much rather them be attentive to the children than, know.

Erin Kress (17:37.584)
Mm

Anthony Codispoti (17:52.824)
taking pictures and uploading them. There’s a priority list there.

Erin Kress (17:57.762)
Exactly, the safety and the education of the children is obviously more important.

Anthony Codispoti (18:02.562)
That comes first, yeah. But it would be interesting to hear your perspective on kind of what goes on and what the teachers are sort of dealing with on a daily basis because parents on the outside dropping our kids off and picking them up, we have no idea kind of what goes on between those hours.

Erin Kress (18:22.276)
Right. Like I said, typically here because we’ve been with Samanthen for so long, the days run smooth. My kids are all happy to come in. They ring the doorbell. They come in. They’re all smiles and comfortable. And if our parents do have a concern about their child, they’ll just call and be like, how are they doing today? And we talk to them.

Anthony Codispoti (18:44.908)
And so what’s it like for the teachers interacting with these kids? Like what are maybe some of the struggles that, you know, they go through? Cause I mean, I know what it’s like trying to deal with my own two children, you know, let alone put me in a room where, you know, the ratios are much different than that. it’s somebody else’s kid. You know, I know that you guys are hiring people who are well wired and built for this. They’re well trained, they’re caring and they’re loving, but you know,

Kids are kids and they can be really challenging. What’s that like for the teachers?

Erin Kress (19:14.884)
Right. It can be hard at times that, you know, we get those really challenging kids. It happens, but like in my room there’s two teachers. So if one of them is really, really challenging for one teacher, the other teacher will step in and be like, I’ll take them for a few minutes and I’ll calm them down or we distract them. So that tough child usually has a bond with a certain teacher that they’ll go to. So they’re not so much of a struggle that they finally, you know, the challenging behaviors dissipate.

Anthony Codispoti (19:45.186)
Well, it works very similarly in my own house. My youngest son, when he’s having a really hard time, he generally gravitates towards my wife, and with my older son, he gravitates towards me. So it makes sense that you would have a similar kind of bond with a particular person inside your child care center.

Erin Kress (20:03.63)
Right. Yeah. And you’ll see that like as the babies start off in the infant room, they form that particular bond with that certain teacher. And then as they move up to the centers, they form that bond with one other teacher.

Anthony Codispoti (20:18.774)
And so your role as director assistant, you’re in the office part of the time, kind of managing business stuff. Maybe you’re in the classroom some of the time, kind of paint that picture. What does this look like for you on a daily basis?

Erin Kress (20:24.197)
Yes.

Erin Kress (20:30.33)
Well, I’m in the classroom some of the time and then with the office stuff, I help my boss like do tours of the center and help her fill the snacks and answer the phones and stuff like that if she needs it done.

Anthony Codispoti (20:43.702)
And what would you describe as your favorite part of your job that you get to do?

Erin Kress (20:48.122)
being in the classroom, watching the kids learn and talking to them and teaching them.

Anthony Codispoti (20:56.246)
Aaron, what advice do you have for parents who are maybe trying to decide between different schools?

Erin Kress (21:05.264)
Different schools, tour as many as you can if they’re pregnant and get on as many wait lists as possible because infants seem to fill up the quickest. And to hang on, something will come up and they will find something that they love.

Anthony Codispoti (21:06.242)
Mm -hmm.

Anthony Codispoti (21:21.302)
And do you currently have a wait list? Yeah. And for those listening, we’ll have this in the show notes, but their website is step and then the number one, not spelled out, just the number step one childcare .com. And so if they go to your website here, is there a place for them to schedule a tour or I see your phone number on here and your email address, step one childcare at gmail .com and.

Erin Kress (21:23.214)
We do. Yep, we do.

Anthony Codispoti (21:49.198)
phone number is 781 -322 -0026. Are those the best ways to schedule a tour or find out more information?

Erin Kress (21:57.54)
Yes, definitely emailing would be the best way to schedule a tour as our director is awesome. She will get back to them immediately and set up a tour so their family can come and see.

Anthony Codispoti (22:11.948)
What are some of the trends that are happening right now in child care in the state of Massachusetts? Or maybe more specifically, just in your local geography in Melrose? Well, I don’t know. I talk to a lot of child care centers in California, and they are going through transitional kindergarten, being moved.

Erin Kress (22:22.918)
Well, what do mean by like, trends?

Erin Kress (22:31.002)
Mm -hmm.

Anthony Codispoti (22:36.846)
So they’re losing sort of their four to five year olds because now the state is taking over educating those kids. And so their centers are having to sort of adjust and they just lost a big portion of their students. And so I don’t know if anything like that’s going on there or.

Erin Kress (22:44.942)
Okay.

Erin Kress (22:54.254)
Yes, we have that typically a lot of the centers in Massachusetts will lose kids come the end of August, beginning of September because they either moved out of state, moved to different schools, or they started like public schools. So that is very common in childcare for them to lose kids and start back up again once they’re settled in school.

Anthony Codispoti (23:18.094)
What are maybe some of the specific hardships that you see childcare centers going through now?

Erin Kress (23:24.944)
Kids leaving. And I say that for the reason a lot of them due to COVID, lost a lot of centers lost kids. Some are fully recovered, some haven’t, but Massachusetts, I’m sure you’ve heard is one of the most expensive states to live in now. So people are moving at an alarming rate. So it’s causing numbers to drop, I think.

Anthony Codispoti (23:48.962)
Yeah, tell me a little bit about how COVID impacted you guys. Like you said, some centers have come back to pre -COVID levels, some have not, some have closed. They weren’t able to make it through. What was it like for you guys?

Erin Kress (23:56.164)
Yes, yes, exactly.

Thankfully, we were able to come back and fully recover from COVID with the numbers. When we first reopened after being closed for the four months, we weren’t fully up to capacity running at capacity in rooms due to people were still out of work, maybe looking for other alternatives. It took us about a good six months to eight months to get fully up and running. Every room open, kids full.

Anthony Codispoti (24:28.566)
What allowed you guys, step one childcare, to sort of persevere through that challenging time when others just couldn’t?

Erin Kress (24:37.146)
I think a lot of it had to do with our director. She was keeping us updated on what was going on, what was happening with the center, what was happening, just our director keeping us updated on everything.

Anthony Codispoti (24:48.844)
Yeah, yeah, that communication is really important. I’m curious now that you are back up to pre -COVID levels, maybe some of the other local centers didn’t make it. There’s wait lists. Is there any thought about expanding, maybe adding on to your current center or adding another center down the road?

Erin Kress (24:52.408)
Exactly.

Erin Kress (25:08.024)
I don’t know, I’m trying to convince my boss to open up another center. But right now we’re good where we are and we’re happy. My fear theory is the more you open, are you going to lose more kids or are going be able to get more? You know, we’re comfy, we’re cozy where we are. The more you expand, you you’re going to hire more help. Are they going to stay? You’re going to have kids, are they going to stay, are they going to leave? You open too big, you may not succeed.

Anthony Codispoti (25:10.733)
You

Anthony Codispoti (25:35.618)
Yeah, there’s a capital risk involved there, right? Like, you know, doing a build out, leasing a new facility, right? And how long would it take to fill up? Could you find the additional staff? Yeah, there’s lots of risks involved there. So I understand certainly being comfy in your current place as you described it.

Erin Kress (25:53.286)
Well, because when we first started, we started off as one center. And then the center we’re currently at now, we have two centers that are in the same building. They’re divided by a couple of stores. And it’s worked out for us that way. And we were able to expand in the newer center than we were our first current one.

Anthony Codispoti (26:17.358)
So you have two centers in one location. Is it just separated by age groups or how’s that done?

Erin Kress (26:20.335)
Yes.

It is separated by stores. We’re in like a, I guess you would say a complex. We’re in an apartment complex with retail in it. And we have one section in one section. And then at the end of this complex is another section. So we’re divided by buildings, if that makes sense, stores. We might after 10 years sell and retain the employees, but just sell under different ownership.

Anthony Codispoti (26:28.727)
Okay.

Anthony Codispoti (26:43.798)
Okay. Gotcha.

Anthony Codispoti (26:53.727)
Okay, understood. Aaron, what’s a serious challenge that you had to overcome in either your professional or your personal life and what did you learn going through that experience?

Erin Kress (27:05.712)
I haven’t had any major serious challenges in my personal life per se, only for work. And that major challenge would be biters, having multiple biters at one time and how to overcome it. Would be like, lots of communication with your co -teachers and being on your toes at all times to make sure that this child’s not biting that one. We got through it. Like if I had to go to the bathroom, I would be like, I’m going to the bathroom. take two kids, put them in.

Anthony Codispoti (27:18.934)
And how do you overcome that?

Erin Kress (27:34.81)
like a different area of the room where the other two kids stayed in another area of the room, separated them at all times. Communication though is key.

Anthony Codispoti (27:44.716)
Yeah, this is a this can be a big deal. I remember when my kids were in childcare, and we heard about a biter in my son’s classroom, and we were like, you know, horrified, like, what’s wrong with that kid? What’s wrong with those parents? And then a couple months later, one of our closest friends, who had a daughter in the same classroom, she became the biter. And that really sort of flipped the script for us because it was like

We know this kid, she’s a good kid. We know the family, they’re good families. I forget how old she was at the time, six, eight, 10, 12 months old, something like that. And she’s just figuring out her way in the world. She’s not a bad person or a bad child because she’s doing this, but the parents were horrified. They’re like, we don’t know what to do. It keeps happening. We want it to stop. We don’t know why she’s doing it. And so I don’t know, what would you have?

Erin Kress (28:21.424)
hehe

Erin Kress (28:28.934)
you

Anthony Codispoti (28:39.234)
What would you have to say for parents who have been in that position where their child is the biter?

Erin Kress (28:44.71)
We tell them, well, I’ve used from my own experience that it is age appropriate and it’s developmental. You may have those biters that are frustrated because they can’t talk as well as their friends. They may be teething and they need that fixation of, I’m gonna bite something. It happens to be a friend to feel better. They could be bored. They could be hungry, especially with the little, little ones that are biting, like the 12, 13 months old. They don’t really tell you, I’m hungry. So they may bite their friends.

So a lot of it is teasing, developmental. I’ve had a child bite a friend and I asked him, said, why’d you bite him? said, because he was standing in my spot. Yes. So you know, you have kids that’ll bite out of the sake of that’s what they want to do. And those are the ones that you explain to them that, no, that’s not what we do. You use your words and it’s not okay. But typically I found that the biting happens for a reason, that either hungry,

They can’t talk as well as their friends or they’re stressed out because we can communicate how we feel. If we’re stressed out or bothered, they may not, they can’t, not all of them can. Like I have kids that are three, two and a half, three year olds and I had a child that was a bite and I’m like, why did you bite? And he’s like, I want mommy and daddy. Once he’s calmed down, he might be able to tell you, but in that moment they’re upset and that’s their way of feeling better. We just tell the parents, we work through it with them. We’ll get through it.

We come up with different strategies as to help prevent it.

Anthony Codispoti (30:14.134)
Yeah, that’s good. That’s good advice. Aaron, what’s…

Erin Kress (30:17.582)
Like I had a little boy who bit in one room and then he moved up to my room and we knew he was a biter. So one of us would constantly like keep a close eye on him, but let him go play with his friends. And we’d talk to him if he’d stuck it in upset, we’d be like, you can’t bite your friends. It’s okay. We’re right here. And we talked him through it.

Anthony Codispoti (30:35.736)
So you kind of have identified a child who has a tendency to bite and you’ve identified that it happens when he or she gets really upset. And so you’re kind of keeping an eye on them, checking their mood. You see them start to get wound up, then you can sort of go in preemptively and stop it from ever happening in the first place. Yeah, that’s smart.

Erin Kress (30:55.448)
Exactly. Exactly. I noticed in the toddler room when I had biters, they don’t talk nearly as much as the preschoolers did. So that was a little more challenging. Like we’d be like, okay, if they play, are they going to bite for the sake of just biting? We couldn’t tell. A lot of that is teasing too. You know, I’m a firm believer of teasing. There’s a reason why they bite and they may want a toy, but they can’t say, I want it. They’re going to bite their front, it go. Cause they’re crying. They get it. You’re just going to watch their clues as to.

why they’re doing it.

Anthony Codispoti (31:27.346)
You’re like a little bit of a forensic childcare specialist. That’s great. Aaron, what’s something you wish you could teach a younger version of yourself?

Erin Kress (31:30.894)
Yeah, I’ve been doing this forever.

Erin Kress (31:41.216)
younger version of myself.

Anthony Codispoti (31:43.65)
Something that’s obvious to you now that maybe wasn’t when you were younger. Okay.

Erin Kress (31:47.494)
don’t know. I don’t really have anything. More patience at home, guess, would be the key. Because now, I’m patient, but after the end of the day, I’m like, okay, I’m done. I don’t want to do that whole leave and work type of thing at home, work and then going home and dealing with my husband, my kid, my dogs, whatever it may be.

Anthony Codispoti (31:53.42)
Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti (32:08.674)
Yeah, and here’s a question that I like to ask, and maybe this is not appropriate for your role, you can tell me, because it sounds like you are involved in the office side of things, that you’re also involved in being in the classrooms. But as business leaders, oftentimes this falls to an owner, we’re always keeping an eye on the bottom line. Like, how can we make sure that the profits are sustainable and steady so that we can continue to keep our doors open, pay people well?

Erin Kress (32:29.562)
Exactly.

Anthony Codispoti (32:38.61)
and continue to serve these families. And there’s generally two levers that we can pull. And one is like, how do we increase sales? Right. So we get the revenue up. And the other one is how do we decrease expenses? Do you ever get involved in any of those sort of bigger thought processes on how can we pull those two levers?

Erin Kress (32:56.686)
I don’t, I leave that up, because I don’t really want the paperwork and the money aspect of it, but I do know that where we are, we do have rent that we have to pay every month. So I know that if they go up, we have to increase the prices. But we are well, well, not educated, I shouldn’t say, well aware of when it’s going to happen so we can notify the parents as to, six months, I’m going to up the rent or whatever it may be.

Anthony Codispoti (33:05.826)
Mm

Anthony Codispoti (33:22.966)
And I’m curious where you are in Melrose, Massachusetts. Is there ever the opportunity for child care to be supplemented by a grant or a government program?

Erin Kress (33:33.766)
We do have supplemental daycare through the government. We are not one of them. We do have government funded daycares in Massachusetts. Yes, but we’re not.

Anthony Codispoti (33:45.794)
Gotcha. This is separate from you guys. Aaron, what’s a fun fact that most people wouldn’t know about you?

Erin Kress (33:49.253)
Yes.

Erin Kress (33:54.65)
A fun fact that people don’t know about me. I guess that I love animals. I have two cats and a dog.

Anthony Codispoti (33:59.534)
So, okay.

Yeah, what are their names?

Erin Kress (34:05.178)
Sonic’s Windallan Simba.

Anthony Codispoti (34:08.018)
Swindell. What’s Simba and Sonic? I get those references. What’s Swindell?

Erin Kress (34:09.477)
Yes.

Erin Kress (34:13.976)
My daughter loves country music and there’s a country singer named Cole Swindell. So that’s how she named him the black one Swindell after.

Anthony Codispoti (34:16.865)
Okay.

Anthony Codispoti (34:22.318)
And did your kids also name Sonic and Simba? Yeah. Yeah. And it’s so funny that those are the names. My youngest son, really into Sonic. My older son, he’s kind of moved out of this phase. He’s 10 now, but super into the Lion King and Simba and had the dolls and the posters and the characters and everything. So yeah, it’s kind of a universal thing for young kids. Those are fun characters to follow.

Erin Kress (34:25.496)
Yes, my daughter did.

Erin Kress (34:38.822)
Mm

Erin Kress (34:49.583)
us.

Anthony Codispoti (34:50.22)
Aaron, are there any specific mentors or books, maybe other podcasts that you’ve enjoyed that have kind of helped to shape you personally or professionally?

Erin Kress (35:01.156)
Well, I have read the book, especially if the children are really challenging, it’s called Tuck of the Turtle. It’s about a turtle who when he gets really, really upset, instead of throwing toys or hitting his friends or biting, we tell them to tuck themselves into their shell to calm down and hold them. Tuck of the Turtle’s a good one. Hands are not for hitting. There’s a series of book called Hands are Not for Hitting, Feet are Not for Kicking, and Teeth are Not for Biting. And it explains to them what the…

body parts are used for, which I seem to think is really helpful. And like the toddler room, you can explain to them as you’re reading it that we touch our friends nicely. We don’t kick them or we don’t bite them. We bite food. And you can explain it to them so that they understand it with the books.

Anthony Codispoti (35:48.108)
Yeah, and now that you mentioned that, remember Teeth Are Not Forbiting was a book that our friends who were having trouble with their daughter biting picked up and were reading to her on a regular basis. Yeah.

Erin Kress (35:58.702)
Yes, and they can’t believe it or not the kids will relate to it in their own way that it will click for them be like, I learned that in my book that I can’t bite my friends because I want that toy. They will learn. They do learn from it.

Anthony Codispoti (36:11.906)
Yeah, that’s great.

Anthony Codispoti (36:16.795)
Let’s see, Aaron, I just have one more question for you, but before I ask it, I want to do two things. Everybody listening today, if you like today’s content, please subscribe, like, or hit the share button on your favorite podcast app. Aaron, I also want to let people know the best way to get in touch with you or the center. What would that be?

Erin Kress (36:34.63)
The email that is on the front of our website, the one that you just read off, would be the best way to get in touch with us in the phone number too.

Anthony Codispoti (36:44.974)
So that’s step one childcare and one is not spelled out, it’s the number step one childcare at gmail .com and the phone number is 781 -322 -0026. We’ll have it in the show notes, but for those who are not at their computer and are listening on their favorite podcast app, that’s how you can get in touch with them. Aaron, last question for you. I’m curious, how do you see the childcare industry evolving in the next five years? What do you think the big changes are?

Erin Kress (37:01.935)
Okay.

Erin Kress (37:12.954)
Retain it in staff. I really do. I think that will be the biggest challenge for a lot of centers. I’m seeing it now through like the public schools where my daughter is attending that, you know, that they have a budget deficit. So now that they have to pull teachers from this room or they have to pull teachers from that school, I think that’s going to be the most challenging. That and being able to money, like finding money to open centers and…

All that I think is gonna be the biggest in the next five years.

Anthony Codispoti (37:45.41)
Why do you think it’s gonna get harder to staff the childcare centers? What do you think is shifting?

Erin Kress (37:51.942)
Well, because a lot of staff, and I was one of them when I first started at this field, and I’ve come to realize that it’s not that case. They need, they expect more money. They think because, you know, especially in childcare settings that they want more money. They want $25, $30 an hour. But yet if we pay all the staff that we need to charge a lot more for tuition, it’s not going to be feasible for some parents to pay $3 ,000 a month so we can fund our teachers. And you’ll see it.

teachers and kids leaving for that reason. Like I know one center currently in Melrose, Massachusetts is raising their tuition a lot that a lot of the kids have left.

Yes, not us, but another center. And so what are you going to do? How do you retain them? That’s the biggest thing would be financial.

Anthony Codispoti (38:44.79)
Yeah, you know, I’ve heard this from multiple childcare centers. There’s this unspoken balance that needs to be kept, right? Like the teachers, they want, they deserve to be paid more, but there’s a certain threshold at which parents can afford childcare because it’s an expensive endeavor. You know, a lot of parents, you know, a huge portion, if not all of one of the parents’ paychecks, you know, goes to pay for childcare. And, you know, the only way to…

Erin Kress (39:03.737)
Exactly.

Anthony Codispoti (39:14.072)
to be able to pay your staff more is to charge more in tuition. And there gets to be a certain threshold where parents are like, we can’t do this. And so how do you find that balance? And I think some people are hoping that maybe state or federal government will step in and be able to contribute. Maybe local employers will be able to contribute. I don’t know if you’ve got any thoughts on sort of how to fix this math problem that exists.

Erin Kress (39:23.193)
Exactly.

Erin Kress (39:41.644)
My only thing is if the state steps in, what’s going to happen to the employees? If the state’s saying free child care for let’s say preschoolers and pre -K, okay, that’s fine and dandy, but now where’s that money coming from to pay the teachers? You can’t pull it from another teacher’s pay to pay them so the teacher’s out of a job if they have. So it’s kind of messy, I think.

Anthony Codispoti (40:05.294)
You also mentioned where would money come from to open up new centers because it’s an expensive endeavor to open up a new center.

Erin Kress (40:12.184)
Exactly. Exactly. Do they wanna, do they wanna, you know, get out that equity loan or that mortgage to open another center? Are they gonna fail? It’s just, it could create more debt than they need or want.

Anthony Codispoti (40:26.712)
Yeah. Yeah. And I think this is, this is another thing that people outside of the childcare industry or people who, you know, don’t have kids in that age bracket, maybe aren’t aware of or fail to appreciate like what, what we really lost going through COVID. Like COVID was hard on lots of industries. A lot of people who, you know, were, were affected by this, but childcare centers in particular, you know, it was hard for them to keep their doors open. A lot of them didn’t. And then.

Erin Kress (40:43.01)
Exactly.

Anthony Codispoti (40:56.45)
new owners are not stepping in to fill that gap. So there’s not enough childcare. It’s becoming more expensive, you know, because we’ve had inflation, wages are going up, wage demands going up. And so, right, how do we sort of fix this gap? It’s very similar, but kind of a different math problem. you know, how do we even get more centers open to sort of fill that gap in the coverage that, you know,

Erin Kress (41:05.733)
You

Anthony Codispoti (41:25.47)
coverage that used to exist even before COVID, at least where I live, people were still on waiting lists for months. And so, you now it’s gotten even worse.

Erin Kress (41:32.93)
Exactly, because now that everything’s up and running, everybody’s going back to work, in the office more, the children are getting older. They’re like, we need childcare. That’s why they get the money that they need, because people are desperate.

Anthony Codispoti (41:47.98)
Well, we haven’t come up with all the answers here today, but maybe somebody listening will have some ideas on this. But Aaron Kress, I want to be the first to thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us today. I really appreciate it. Folks, that’s a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories podcast. Thanks for learning with us today.