Immigrant family turns child care challenges into new business

London, Ont. -

An immigrant family struggling to find daycare has become a success story during the pandemic, expanding Angels Daycare to three locations, with more on the way.

Owner Mostafa Heikal and his family struggled with finding child care when they arrived in Canada from Egypt in 2015, waiting months for a spot.

It's an experience that led him to invest in creating Angels Daycare in 2019, starting in Arva before expanding to Komoka and Thorndale, with another location planned in Sarnia this fall.

Their long-term goal is to expand further with franchising, but all that expansion requires qualified staff.

"We need to hire more people, we created about 32 full-time jobs in the midst of the pandemic in Middlesex, but we’re still hiring more, we need more staff,” Heikal says.