Thursday, January 30, 2014
It all started in 1993 when Ms. Fran became the Matriarch, a name that 1000’s of children over the years have grown to love and respect, of Learning Tree Daycare. After 20+ successful years in Real Estate, Ms. Fran recognized the need for responsible and extraordinary child care in the Memphis area. She also recognized the movement of young families to the Cordova area, hence the creation and building of the Cordova Learning Tree Daycare.
Ms. Fran and daughter Debbie put their hands and heads together and spent countless hours, 24/7, putting the new center together. They worked nights and weekends focusing on creating and maintaining a quality daycare meeting the needs of children and parents. Over the next 8 years the news of this quality daycare spread and Ms. Fran saw and heard the need to share what she had created in Bartlett. Hence, they built the 2nd daycare which is still thriving today in Bartlett. Once again, Debbie and Ms. Fran embarked on long days and nights putting together and maintaining another quality day care. The story continues…
Ms. Fran was on a roll and seized the opportunity to purchase land in Lakeland and Arlington to again meet the needs of young families moving to these new areas. The only issue was that she could not be in 4 places at once. Her desire was to keep this a family run business. Hence, when the oldest grandson Nick graduated from TCU, he heard of Ms. Fran’s desire to grow Learning Tree. Nick and his bride Liz embarked on their new life together in Memphis. Nick then began his training with Ms. Fran and continues managing Cordova today. You will often see Liz and their 2 kids participating in the classrooms when you visit Cordova. After Nick and Liz had moved to Memphis, Ms. Fran’s son and Nick’s dad Bob, who was running day cares in TX, decided to make a career move and move himself to Memphis to help with Bartlett and the 2 future centers. The story continues…
In keeping with Ms. Fran’s desire to manage a tight ship with family in every center, she wanted to proceed with Lakeland and Arlington. It was at time that Bill and family made the decision to move back to Memphis from San Francisco to help build Lakeland and has been in that center for almost 9 years. Ms. Fran’s other grandson Keith also relocated from Texas and now manages the Bartlett location with Bob spending most of his time in Arlington. This is truly a family labor of love with children, grandchildren and many long time loyal employees making sure that each Center maintains their THREE STAR RATING by the State of TN – the highest achievable rating. Although Ms. Fran claims that she retired, you will still see her tooling around at each center and actively participates in the management of all 4 centers. The best is when a parent registers a new baby and says “My parents brought me here when I was young”!
