Winning the National Nursery Management Today (NMT) CEO of the Year Award for groups under 10 settings is something I feel incredibly proud and humbled by. More than anything, this recognition belongs to the people around me.
In truth, I almost didn’t submit the application at all. It was our Head Office team who encouraged me to put myself forward. They reminded me that while the award may carry an individual title, everything we have achieved at Bright Little Stars has always been a collective effort built on passion, dedication, and teamwork. This award feels like recognition for the entire Bright Little Stars Nursery (www.brightlittlestars.com ) family.
When we opened our first Bright Little Stars Nursery in Mill Hill in 2013, our vision was simple: create an environment where children could thrive, families felt supported, and employees could build meaningful long-term careers. Coming from a professional corporate background, I had experienced highly regulated, high paced and performance driven environments, but I found myself wanting to build something with greater social value and community impact. Education, and particularly the early years sector, offered that opportunity. For example, at the time in 2013, 80% of nurseries were single or two-setting operations. Unlike schools, many of which had been established for decades or centuries, the early years sector was still professionalising.
Today, Bright Little Stars has the privilege to care for 900 children and employs over 300 people, with further nurseries planned in Hornsey and Enfield in the coming two years. However, from the beginning, I made a conscious decision that growth would never come at the expense of quality or culture. One of the biggest challenges in early years is balancing expansion while maintaining standards of care and education. As we have grown, I have always believed that growth only makes sense if it means our employees receive more support, children experience better outcomes, families still receive a high-quality service, and employees see genuine opportunities to progress in their careers.
That philosophy has shaped many of our long-term decisions. Bright Little Stars started as a family run business, and I can say with pride that after all these years, it remains independent, with no third-party investors and, most importantly, still feels like a family run group.
Early years is an incredibly rewarding profession, but it is also demanding, and strong nurseries are built by strong teams. I have always believed that investing in people is the single most important investment I can make. Over the last few years, we launched the Bright Little Stars Careers Academy, creating structured development pathways from Apprentice level through to Leadership and Management.
Most of our Managers and Senior Leaders originally joined Bright Little Stars in junior roles and developed with the business. Five of our six current Nursery Managers each began their journey with us, newly qualified educators out of college to Room Leaders, and progressed through the company to becoming thriving Nursery Managers. I am so incredibly proud of our team. Seeing them grow and develop is one of my most rewarding pleasures. We have such a dedicated, loyal, and dynamic leadership which continues to help drive the company forward. Alongside training, we have worked hard to create a culture where employees feel recognised, valued, and supported through wellbeing programmes, apprenticeships, reward initiatives, team-building events, private healthcare support, hardship assistance, and long-service recognition. The result is something we value enormously: a loyal, long-standing team and a culture that has remained strong even as the business has expanded.
Nurseries today are not simply childcare providers. Families are also looking for trust, guidance, and reassurance during some of the most important years of their child’s development. That is why we introduced a range of initiatives such as our Parent Educational Programme (including Paediatric First Aid for Parents, Oral Hygiene, Mindful Parenting, E-safety and more), School Readiness Workshops (including School Information, Phonics and Maths, School Readiness), and 4+ assessment preparation sessions.
There is currently significant national discussion around the use of CCTV within nurseries. At Bright Little Stars, we have offered ParentCam access to parents, with time limits, since the very first day we opened our doors, helping parents feel reassured and connected to their child’s journey. Alongside this, CCTV is also used internally by Nursery Managers and nominated safeguarding leads as both a safeguarding measure and a reflective practice tool to support continuous improvement and accountability.
People often associate innovation purely with technology, but for us innovation is anything that improves children’s experiences or strengthens what our employees can offer. That includes evolving our bespoke learning programme, embedding STEAM, sports, and language specialists, improving sustainability, and creating smarter systems that free our educators to spend more time focused on children. We also continue to invest heavily through our Annual Maintenance Week (Nursery Closure), where each Nursery Manager is able to reinvest a portion of the previous year’s revenue back into their learning environments and outdoor provision. Alongside this, we are continuing to strengthen our specialist educational support, including SEND provision, speech and language support, and sensory environments. At the heart of all of this is a simple belief: every child deserves the very best possible start in life.
Compared to many of our group peers, we have expanded at a much slower pace, but this has been entirely intentional. We own the land and buildings for every nursery we operate, which gives us something incredibly important: long-term stability and the freedom to continually reinvest into our people, facilities, and educational environments. It also allows us to look beyond short-term targets and instead focus on sustainable growth, while consistently delivering exceptional, high-quality education and inspired learning.
Sustainability is becoming increasingly important to us as we grow, and across the group we have invested in solar energy, reducing our carbon footprint by over 10 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions (tCO2e) each year, while cutting operational costs and ultimately delivering greater value to our parents. Our future nurseries aim to further reduce energy consumption through renewable technologies and modern environmental systems.
Although this award is a wonderful milestone, our focus remains very much on the future. Over the coming years, we will continue to grow carefully and responsibly, opening new nurseries while protecting the quality and culture that define Bright Little Stars. Whilst like any business or individual, we will sometimes make mistakes, we will always aim to learn, improve, and stay true to our values. Most importantly, we will continue striving to make a positive difference to the most formative years of a child’s life.
Thank you to everyone who has supported Bright Little Stars on this journey so far. This recognition belongs to us all. While I am honoured personally, this recognition genuinely reflects the incredible people around me: our Head Office team, Nursery Managers, employees, service partners and the families who place their trust in us every single day.
