UK Franchises and Business Opportunities For Women
UK Franchises and Business Opportunities For Women
September 2021
Hear from Sally Murphy Founder of Kiddleydivey. Sally is a successful business woman and Franchisor. Here, she talks about why she decided to create her own Music Class Business and what the business is all about!
I started Kiddleydivey over 25 years ago when I was looking for a music class for my own children who were very young at the time. As I couldn’t find a class that I liked, I thought I would start my own.
I had been teaching music and delivering music therapy sessions for over 17 years, in schools, psychiatric hospitals and centres and hospitals for people with special needs, so I had the experience to draw upon. I started by writing songs and putting together music programmes for children, featuring teddy bears, balls, and animal characters as well as percussion instruments.
The classes were (and still are) very active and involve jumping, wiggling, stamping and hopping and all the classes followed a specific structure with various learning aims – not just musical, but helping to develop fine and gross motor control, learning many new concepts such as up and down, fast and slow, and also learning about animals you find in the zoo, the jungle, in the sea or in the garden.
Our classes are themed, and these are some of the places we have musical adventures in each week. Having set up the children’s classes, I started to think about what I could offer the care homes.
The Kiddleydivey music sessions for the elderly and people with additional needs have been specially formulated to stimulate minds and bodies using well known songs, music, sensory equipment, old photographs, and percussion instruments.
Our approach is one of gentle encouragement, including everyone in our groups in the activities regardless of ability, with lots of interaction. Holding hands, dancing, and getting to know everyone individually is extremely important.
Over the last 25 years the classes and sessions have grown and evolved. I am constantly looking at ways to improve what we deliver, writing new songs, finding exciting new sensory equipment, discovering more songs and music that our older clients love.
Kiddleydivey classes and sessions now include, parachutes, bubbles, glitter pompoms, hoops, giant bungees, ribbon bangles and light up wands, to name but a few of our different types of equipment. We also have hundreds of unique children’s songs as well as a very large library of songs and music for the elderly – all specially adapted to include more choruses, as well as different keys to sing in.
One of the biggest and most exciting developments I implemented in 2014, was to make the Kiddleydivey music programmes and equipment, into a franchise package - available for other people who felt they too could improve the quality of life for people with additional needs, as well as to bring the music classes to children’s nurseries.
The franchisees really enjoy the flexibility of owning their own businesses – being able to take holidays when they choose, take and collect their children from school, and develop their businesses with the continued support from head office.
You can really make a very comfortable living delivering Kiddleydivey classes and sessions and still have time for your family and friends.
As one franchisee said – part time work with full time pay, at the same time as knowing you are really making a positive difference to both the children’s and older clients lives.
The Kiddleydivey franchise team keeps growing all over the UK and we are always thrilled when new franchisees join our friendly team.
If you come along to watch a Kiddleydivey music session for our older clients or a music class for preschool children, the first thing you will notice, is the fun everyone is having. Our approach for both young and young at heart, is always one of humour and laughter.
We regularly have children laughing uncontrollably at our very cheeky animal characters who perhaps don’t know how to play the drums quietly, or they carry on playing when the music has stopped! And our older residents find trying to do the Can-Can hilarious! Children can learn so much more if they are having fun and enjoying themselves and our older clients can often be anxious, so humour helps them to relax and have fun.
The arrival of Covid 19 last year, hit us all very badly. In March 2020, we weren’t allowed in any of our care homes or children’s nurseries anymore and all our work simply stopped overnight. We had to come up with ways that we could continue to offer music to our clients, without our usual interaction and face to face contact. So, we put together DVD’s for our clients to enjoy, we did sessions via Zoom, Facebook and on Instagram and sang in care home and nursery gardens and car parks!
We carried on as best we could, with most of these approaches being very successful. You can’t beat real face to face music though, and I am pleased to say that things are now much improved and since April 2021, and we have slowly been allowed back into the venues we missed so much. Hopefully this freedom will now continue and we can carry on doing what we love – bringing music, fun and laughter to our lovely clients.
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