Back in 2007 we found ourselves in the position where the school holidays were approaching and we knew that our daughter Jessica was too old for child-minding and too young to be left home alone. We received the usual array of school holiday program flyers and Jessica would cherry pick her way through the programs, deciding where she would attend on what day. Inevitably there were some days with good things on at multiple programs and other days when nothing she really wanted to do was available anywhere. We pay the same for the good days and the bad, and with attendance being split across multiple venues it made the drop-off and pick-up a little more complicated than it should have been.

So we decided to create our own school holiday program. One where all of the available activities were available every day. One where the activities were developmental, where students would learn new skills, where the activities would reward patience and persistence. One where parents would know that if their children had an interest in one or more of the activities we offered that their child would have a good day.

Yet there was always going to be more to it than that...

We wanted to employ staff who were looking for their first job - in order to make their first experience of the workforce a good one. We were keen to act as mentors, helping them to understand the difference between school and work -- the difference in expectations, the different approaches to success. We wanted to be seen as a good employer, providing opportunities to develop and offering a career path that didn't necessarily involve flipping burgers somewhere.

It was also important to us that the proceeds from this endeavour would be fed back into children's charities, children's ministry, and children's advocacy groups. It seemed to come full circle when we saw that money spent by parents to have their children entertained in a safe and challenging environment would then be used to support children in less fortunate circumstances.