Case Study: Kiddie Academy achieves scalable franchise growth and saves $800,000 with Microsoft Dynamics 365

Kiddie Academy chooses Microsoft to meet growth targets and save $800,000

Kiddie Academy, a 35‑year leader in educational childcare with more than 170 academies nationwide and plans to expand further, needed technology that would cost‑effectively support rapid growth and ensure consistent standards across its franchise system. The company had relied on a lightweight CRM, manual processes, and fragmented spreadsheets that allowed information to fall through the cracks, and it rejected competing solutions because licensing and ongoing maintenance costs would be prohibitively high as it scaled.

Working with Microsoft partner Slickdata, Kiddie Academy built KARES — an end‑to‑end platform using Dynamics 365, Azure, Office 365, Power BI, ADX Portal and Surface tablets — to deliver portals, CRM, training videos, a knowledge base and curriculum delivery. The solution centralized franchise workflows, improved analytics and security, met 99.9%+ uptime, and cut total estimated costs by more than $800,000 over five years (initial Microsoft licensing ~$40,000 versus about $350,000 for an alternate solution, with projected additional savings of $500,000+ as it grows).

Kiddie Academy

Greg Goodwin

Vice President, Technology