The Childcare Gap Is Wide, and That Spells Opportunity for New Preschool Owners

Nationally, 46% of children age five and under live in a licensed child care desert, an area without enough licensed capacity to meet local demand. In rural and non-urban communities, that figure climbs past 70%. For anyone considering a preschool franchise, that gap isn’t just a statistic. It’s a map of where real opportunity exists.

The Gap Has Barely Moved in Years

The national child care desert figure has only improved modestly, from 51% in 2018 to 46% today, despite years of attention to the issue. That persistence tells you this isn’t a temporary supply hiccup correcting itself. It’s a structural shortage that new, well-run providers are needed to address.

State-Level Differences Reveal Where to Look

The gap between states is enormous, from a low of 5% in Washington, D.C. to a high of 96% in Alaska, which means the opportunity isn’t evenly distributed. Some regions have a genuine, severe undersupply of licensed care relative to their population of young children.

A Desert Doesn’t Mean No Demand, It Means Unmet Demand

A child care desert isn’t a place without families who need care. It’s a place where families who need care can’t find it, which is a very different problem for a franchise candidate to solve than trying to compete in an already oversaturated market.

Quality Matters as Much as Capacity

Simply adding more slots isn’t the whole answer. Families in underserved areas are often choosing between whatever’s available and nothing at all, which makes a professionally run, curriculum-driven option like Creative World School especially valuable when it opens in one of these markets.

Our franchise development team can help you identify specific underserved markets where a new Creative World School location could make a real difference. Reach out to start exploring where the need is greatest.