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• 0:00:08 Kris Murray: Welcome to Child Care Rockstar Radio. I am your host, Kris Murray. Child care leaders around the globe are breaking through challenges, leading the way in innovation, testing new best practices, and impacting children and families in a much more powerful and positive way than ever before. Each week, join me for interviews with early childhood leaders and experts that will leave you inspired to become the the next child care rock star.

   

• 0:00:34 Kris Murray: Now, let’s go. This is episode 212 of Childcare Rockstar Radio featuring Joshua and Pamela Hernandez. Hey folks, it’s Kris here, back with you on the podcast. Sitting in my office in the podcasting seat and I hope you’re doing great. My guests today, Joshua and Pamela, are from Texas and they are the owners of Montessori Kids Universe of Stone Oak. Pretty cool story. They opened with 81 children not too long ago and to open with that level of enrollment is not a small accomplishment.

   

• 0:01:17 Kris Murray: They have a capacity of 234 and they’re already at 220 kids. So in a very short time frame, 18 months, they have gotten basically full and they have 37 team members. And so we’re going to talk about how they did that. So this one is for you, especially if you’re in startup mode or if you’re thinking about adding another location and you want some good secrets for how to start with great cash flow right out the gate and how to get full quickly.

   

• 0:01:50 Kris Murray: One of their secrets has to do with word of mouth and using referrals both for their families and for employees to reward those folks to send them more business and more staff. And so we’re going to talk exactly about what they give as referral rewards and how they do that. I’ve named this episode Leveraging Word of Mouth Marketing for Fast Growth for that very reason. And this is a good one. We’ve got some team culture and leadership, talking about team engagement and talking about, of course, enrollment and marketing strategies and some cool guerrilla marketing ideas.

   

• 0:02:37 Kris Murray: If you guys don’t know what guerrilla marketing is, it’s not. It doesn’t have anything to do with the animal. It has to do with being crafty, being a guerrilla gue r I l l a and doing things outside the box that your competitors aren’t doing. Little known strategies, things that are going to really get you noticed in today’s cluttered world of marketing, advertising and enrollment building. So all of that ahead here on the podcast. I am very excited to be getting on the airplane in just a handful of days heading to Atlanta to Child care success summit 2025 at the beautiful signia by Hilton Atlanta, adjacent to the World Commerce center in downtown Atlanta.

   

• 0:03:27 Kris Murray: And it’s a brand new hotel. So we’re excited to bring all the childcare peeps to Atlanta Hotlanta and have a really good time. So I’m hoping to see you there. And I have some pretty cool big announcements that I’ll be sharing from stage, so you don’t want to miss it. What else do I have for you? I guess that’s it. Let’s dive in. Without any further ado, let’s meet the Hernandez family and learn about these amazing entrepreneurial leaders and childcare business owners right here at Child Care Rockstar Radio.

   

• 0:04:07 Kris Murray: Let’s go foreign. Welcome back to the podcast, everybody. This is Kris Murray, your host and I’m excited today to introduce you to a great couple in the early learning industry, the Hernandez team, Joshua and Pamela. How are you today?

   

• 0:04:28 Pamela Hernandez: Hi. I’m fine, thank you.

   

• 0:04:29 Josh Hernandez: Doing great, thank you for asking.

   

• 0:04:32 Kris Murray: Awesome. Thanks for being here on the podcast, guys. Where are you right now? Where are you located?

   

• 0:04:39 Pamela Hernandez: We are in San Antonio, Texas.

   

• 0:04:43 Kris Murray: Cool. And you’re in two different locations right now?

   

• 0:04:46 Josh Hernandez: Yes, I’m in my insurance office and my wife is at the school.

   

• 0:04:50 Pamela Hernandez: At the school, yeah.

   

• 0:04:52 Kris Murray: Awesome. So Joshua, you’re still working your day job in insurance and how much time in your typical week or month do you devote to helping with the business?

   

• 0:05:05 Josh Hernandez: I probably spend my time equally, you know, at this point or at this stage in both of our businesses, we’re more firefighters right now. So wherever there’s fire, that’s, that’s where we go.

   

• 0:05:17 Kris Murray: I get that. Yeah. You guys are in startup mode still, I think. So we’re going to learn more all about your journey and where you’re at with building this business. Tell us a little bit about your brand, the name of it and where you’re at in building your enrollment and just give us like your overall capacity and any of the other particulars that you want to share.

   

• 0:05:40 Pamela Hernandez: Okay, I’ll let my husband kind of share a little bit of that.

   

• 0:05:42 Josh Hernandez: So our grand is a Montessori Kids University of Stone Oak. It is a franchise. We were the second franchisee or the second location here in San Antonio. Our facility consists of two buildings. One’s about 12,000 square feet. The other one is about 2,000. We have a total capacity of 234. We’re at about 219 enrollment. So I feel like we’ve kind of plateaued a bit. So we’re just trying to figure out if that’s where we’re Going to end up staying at or maybe change some things on our end.

   

• 0:06:16 Kris Murray: Nice. Well. And how long has the school been open?

   

• 0:06:20 Josh Hernandez: 18 months.

   

• 0:06:21 Kris Murray: Okay. Awesome.

   

• 0:06:22 Pamela Hernandez: Yeah, we open on. Excuse me. We opened March of 2023 of last year.

   

• 0:06:27 Kris Murray: Okay.

   

• 0:06:28 Pamela Hernandez: Yeah.

   

• 0:06:29 Kris Murray: And congratulations on getting close to full. That’s awesome. Way to go.

   

• 0:06:33 Josh Hernandez: Thank you.

   

• 0:06:34 Pamela Hernandez: Yes. Thank you.

   

• 0:06:35 Kris Murray: Yeah, you’re welcome. What inspired you to. I’m assuming this is your first part, the first step or first big component of your ECE journey. What inspired you to get into the field?

   

• 0:06:49 Pamela Hernandez: Well, I have been in the education industry, in the child care industry for a little over eight years now. And I first started as the first certified teacher here at a local Spanish immersion school. The owner at that time wanted to open a kinder classroom, and I was the only certified teacher able to do so. But during that time, my husband and I got pregnant with that firstborn, Sebastian, which we unfortunately lost very late in the game at 39 weeks.

   

• 0:07:22 Pamela Hernandez: It was a difficult, difficult part of our lives during that time. And I decided to step out of the classroom and join a local franchise here in San Antonio, which Primrose actually is national franchise, but there were two franchisees owners that owned two schools. And during my time at Primrose, I became pregnant again with my second born, Becca. I’m now almost five. And during my time at home with him, I started searching for schools that were going to kind of spark that curiosity on my son. I wanted more hands on learning and I wanted. Wanted a dual language program or Spanish immersion program. And I came across mku.

   

• 0:08:06 Pamela Hernandez: And that’s when our journey started. My husband, I was the one that first to tour the facility. Then my husband did, and then he got this really an idea of opening our own. And that’s how it all started. So my son was born and during that time I became Montessori certified. I got my director certification. And then right when he was turning three is when we opened MKU Stone Oak. So. Well, it’s been a long journey. Yeah.

   

• 0:08:37 Kris Murray: That. I’m so sorry for your loss and I’m sure that.

   

• 0:08:40 Pamela Hernandez: Thank you.

   

• 0:08:41 Kris Murray: Difficult time to endure and you have, you know, come through it beautifully and I, I love that. I love your story. So thank you for sharing.

   

• 0:08:51 Pamela Hernandez: Thank you, thank you.

   

• 0:08:54 Kris Murray: How many teachers do you have? What’s your staff size?

   

• 0:08:58 Josh Hernandez: We have 37 team members.

   

• 0:09:01 Kris Murray: Wow.

   

• 0:09:02 Josh Hernandez: Yes.

   

• 0:09:02 Kris Murray: That’s. That’s a big team.

   

• 0:09:04 Josh Hernandez: It is.

   

• 0:09:04 Kris Murray: It is.

   

• 0:09:07 Josh Hernandez: A lot of my white hair from the last couple of years.

   

• 0:09:11 Kris Murray: Yeah. Oh, my goodness. So, yeah, Way to go. How. How is that journey of being A leader and being the visionary driving the company forward with that big of a team, how’s that working for you?

   

• 0:09:25 Josh Hernandez: It’s challenging. You know, it’s. In my experience, it doesn’t matter what industry you’re in, the size of your business, employee retention, employee morale, culture, that always seems to be where any business owner, you know, has trouble with, you know, bringing it in and controlling it on, you know, within their. Within their. Their office or within their organization. So. So it’s challenging. I’m always up for a challenge, but I feel like we do our part and trying to create that culture.

   

• 0:10:04 Josh Hernandez: I know we’ll probably elaborate a little bit on what we do, but I’ll turn it over to my wife so she can kind of give you her take on it as well.

   

• 0:10:14 Pamela Hernandez: It is the same. I share the same thoughts with my husband. It is one of the most difficult part of this industry is finding the right personnel. Right. You have to have love for children in order to work in this type of industry. So that has been probably the biggest challenge for us, finding the right staff. We have a beautiful, I believe, culture that we’ve built. We go above and beyond to show our teachers how much we care and love them and want them to be a part of the team.

   

• 0:10:44 Pamela Hernandez: But at the end of the day, it is a stressful industry. Working with kids is not easy. So you do have to have the passion and you do have to have that background and experience behind it in order to be able to succeed, to succeed in the classroom in this type of industry.

   

• 0:11:01 Kris Murray: So does the school have both a Montessori? You know, certified Montessori teachers aren’t necessarily easy to find. So you have that potential component as well as the language immersion. Do you have both of those components going on in your curriculum?

   

• 0:11:16 Pamela Hernandez: We do. So as the franchise gave us the option. Part of our curriculum is to have a language. It’s part of the enrichment program. But in being, I am a full bilingual and my son is as well. And Maria Montessori believed that introducing a language early on can help the child succeed and acquire that language a little easier as the years go by and he grows. So I wanted that for our families, and I experienced it with my own family, and I wanted to offer that same experience for everyone as well.

   

• 0:11:57 Pamela Hernandez: But that has been definitely a challenge. We do have. Our teachers do have to be Montessori certified. So if they don’t come, they come with childcare experience, preferably with Montessori experience as well. And they’re not certified. We pay for them to get their certification. Our leads are required to be certified. And now we are requiring also our assistance to get their Montessori certification because they both have to. We just happened during this first year. We found out that it’s easier if they both are on the same page.

   

• 0:12:27 Pamela Hernandez: And our leads need that help. They want their assistant to be well groomed in Montessori as well, so that they understand classroom routines and classroom expectations. And that’s what we started doing this year. And then the Spanish immersion, that is hard to find. It’s hard to find bilingual teachers, but they are out there. We don’t require for them to be fully fluent in English, but we do want them to be fully fluent in Spanish.

   

• 0:12:54 Pamela Hernandez: Because if we are going to teach a second language, I want it to be something that the children will learn the right way. And as far as English, we always try to pair full bilingual teacher with a teacher maybe that only speaks a little bit of English, but is fluent in Spanish. And I think that creates a balance in the classroom.

   

• 0:13:18 Kris Murray: Cool. I can tell that the passion that you’re sharing with and the quality that you guys are delivering is not an accident to why you’re so fully enrolled. Usually what we see is that some schools that are doing really well in their enrollment and in their, you know, delivery of high quality education go hand in hand. Right. So I can see that your market in San Antonio is really responding to everything that you’re bringing for the children.

   

• 0:13:49 Kris Murray: And, and also that you’re getting your assistant teachers certified alongside. That’s like, not that many schools that I know of do that. So that’s also, I think, really setting up your culture beautifully and setting your school apart. So that’s very cool.

   

• 0:14:06 Josh Hernandez: We made a decision to do that. It’s so hard to find the right candidate. We need to groom within. If you’re good enough to work within to start with us from the bottom, then you should be good enough to eventually lead the classroom in a year, two or three years from now. And, and that’s the mindset that we’ve had to pivot and just understand, like, hey, now, let’s be selective on who we bring in. But we need to play the long game and understand that these teachers will have a career with us for many, many years to come as we expand and just by natural attrition, people moving on to other schools.

   

• 0:14:47 Josh Hernandez: We need to groom within. And that’s the process that we’re embracing now.

   

• 0:14:55 Kris Murray: Love it. Very, very cool. So I learned about you two and your success story through Grow youw Center through actually from Chris Dotson that runs the Superstar staffing system S3 over there that you guys have been a part of. So tell me a little bit about how that has helped you, if at all, in your staffing with having a 37 size team member, you know, trying to keep that staff and, you know, using an ATS applicant tracking system and kind of all of those best practices. On the tech side, just talk a little bit about how that’s helped you.

   

• 0:15:35 Josh Hernandez: Yeah, we’re still perfecting that. We haven’t really seen as much traction as I want, but Chris and his team are still working with us to get things in order. I know he’s on us consistently, like, hey, you need to log in there. So what we’ve found out is the majority of our teachers are just are from referrals. And just like my business also on the insurance side, a lot of our business is generated from referrals.

   

• 0:16:06 Josh Hernandez: So I think in theory that platform is great, it sounds great, but then it becomes also more transactional and it kind of takes that one on one component out of the mix. But, you know, it’s something we need to embrace technology. It’s just we do need to embrace technology. I think businesses that don’t embrace technology, they will suffer in the near future. So we’re learning the system, we’re still getting acclimated with it, but I do see the benefit in their system.

   

• 0:16:39 Kris Murray: Yeah, I totally agree with you and I love that you talk about the referral component because I think a lot of leaders and owners that we feature on this podcast sometimes forget about the magic of the word of mouth component, but incentivizing and having a system to incentivize your teachers to refer and then incentivize your parents to refer and really working that system, like staying on top of it, changing out the rewards, making it fun, celebrating people that actually refer, to turning them into mini celebrities. Those are all the kind of the things that we teach at Child Care Success. And I think sometimes folks maybe shy away from some of those practices.

   

• 0:17:23 Kris Murray: So talk a little bit about how you use referrals in either business. Anything that you’re doing that you find gives fuel to your referrals or any rewards that you’ve done or anything for teachers, maybe it’s even just a handshake or a hug or an atta girl for a referral. It doesn’t necessarily have to be monetary. Right. So just talk a little bit more about what you guys do.

   

• 0:17:45 Josh Hernandez: So we offer a. I think we started at a $2,000 bonus.

   

• 0:17:50 Pamela Hernandez: Yes, we did.

   

• 0:17:52 Josh Hernandez: As long as they stayed, you know, within 90 days. So I think there was one month where I, I almost paid out $8,000 in bonuses. So we definitely scaled that back. Now it’s a thousand, but it’s still decent money, you know. Yeah, but that’s what we’re doing as far as the referral or the incentivizing for team members on our end, we do have a pretty aggressive referral campaign with our students and our families that we provide a $500 credit towards their tuition for each family that they refer as long as they’re enrolled with us for 90 days and it’s unlimited. I think there was one month where a family got their entire tuition paid for but two or three referrals. So we’ve been seeing a lot of traction on that. We post it on social media, we highlight it in our, in our monthly newsletter just to gain the gain. Get, get more momentum and traction.

   

• 0:18:51 Kris Murray: Perfect. Love that. Yeah, that’s fantastic. Way to go. Thank you. Yeah. So is that like one of your main marketing strategies? What else are you doing to market your school?

   

• 0:19:03 Josh Hernandez: Well, I mean we have Google paid ads that seems to be working really well. Same thing for Facebook. But I, we’re very active on social media. I’m blessed that I already had a marketing team in place with my insurance office. So, you know, insurance is kind of dry. We try to make it fun. So when we opened up this business, you know, the excitement was there. I’m like, oh yeah. Now it’s we, we can see our marketing efforts on our end to market within the insurance industry.

   

• 0:19:33 Josh Hernandez: We have huge players, progressive geico multimillion dollar ad budgets. It doesn’t work. But on a local level with our school, it does work. So we’re able to see the fruitfulness and the ROI on our efforts. We post about three times a week. We give lessons on our social media page, Montessori lessons and then just even lessons at home that the parents can teach their kids to to help bring them where they need to be.

   

• 0:20:08 Kris Murray: So switching gears a little bit with working as a husband wife team, I’ve done it with a startup husband wife team with a small child. It’s a lot. It can be a lot. It can be stressful. So how do you guys manage to keep your marriage, you know, going well and as stress free as possible? Do you have any strategies? Date nights or not talking about work when you get home for dinner or anything else that you want to share for. How you guys, how do you, how do you Manage it all.

   

• 0:20:40 Josh Hernandez: We did actually have a date night last. Last Friday, so it’s been a long time since. Since we had that. But both of us work out on a regular basis, so I know that contributes to our. To keeping us sane, you know, five days a week is the plan.

   

• 0:20:59 Pamela Hernandez: Yeah. But it’s definitely about balance, and we don’t have it all together, but definitely we’ve learned to. This is our first time working together, our first year, and we have had our challenges, but we’ve also come out of those challenges. Josh is really well versed on the financial business side, and I’m well versed on the childcare side when it comes to licensing and teachers and curriculum. And so I think that we both bring our strengths to the table and we have created what I feel. It’s a beautiful team of husband and wife.

   

• 0:21:36 Pamela Hernandez: We do try to not talk about work or take work home, but sometimes you do have to. He’s busy with his business, so good during the day, and there are times where we do need to discuss things that we need to fix or work on or things that are going well in the business at home. But we do do date nights. They’re being less frequent, but we are trying our best. We do have a daughter as well, Sloan. She’s just turning 14 months, and now with Beckham almost 5.

   

• 0:22:12 Pamela Hernandez: Our life is busy. I clock in at 8:30 and I have to clock out at 3:15 when my son gets out of school. And sometimes I do have to come back to work and finish the day at. But we are trying to create a good balance between, you know, with our children, spending time with them at home, spending time with them on the weekends, and then let work be work, you know, on those hours that we’re clocked in. So it’s been challenging, but we are trying to find a balance and I think we’ve done well so far.

   

• 0:22:44 Kris Murray: Love it. Did you guys see yourself as entrepreneurs throughout your did you always have a dream for wanting to start or own your own business, or is this something that you kind of stumbled on later in your adult life? Pamela, why don’t you share?

   

• 0:22:58 Pamela Hernandez: No. I’ve always had the vision of wanting to own my own school. When I started in the child industry, I was like, you always feel like you can do better, right? You see things that I was in the classroom as a teacher and I knew that things I’ve always loved to learn and discover new things. And I was always very eager to learn the administrative side of things. And when I became a curriculum coordinator, I was more involved in the administration side as well. So I was always very eager to open my own school. Even this location. My mother in law lives just down the street and for three years straight we will always drive by and this location had a white picket fence outside.

   

• 0:23:42 Pamela Hernandez: And I will always tell Josh, that will make a great school. That will make a great school. And I feel like I always call it into existence and now we’re here. Granted, the white picket fence is not there anymore. We had to actually close and make it a little bit more safe for children. But it has always been my dream. And so I feel that what happened in our lives with our firstborn and where it led me professionally and personally is what drove me even, you know, have that eagerness to, okay, this is the path that God took me and I’m just going to go with it and then use that pain into turn it into something beautiful. So this is more than just a school for me.

   

• 0:24:23 Pamela Hernandez: This is my second family and the passion that I share with my teachers. I hope that the parents can also see it. We have great relationships with all of our parents and I feel that they can see that.

   

• 0:24:37 Kris Murray: That’s awesome. Joshua, how about you? I mean, you’ve been doing the insurance thing. Did you have a dream to want to start another type of business and be an entrepreneur in a different way?

   

• 0:24:46 Josh Hernandez: Yes. I mean, entrepreneurship is in my blood. I actually have several other businesses and new ventures that I’m actually starting as well. But I have a good friend, he’s in, he’s into numerology and I’m a number seven. And if you’re not familiar with. So number seven is more like constructive. That’s the type that’s. It’s in your blood and that’s. He kind of hit the nail on the head. So I’m always constructing things, but there’s nothing more beautiful than taking someone’s passion and monetizing it. And that we were really blessed. I was.

   

• 0:25:18 Josh Hernandez: You know, just because you love to education and love children doesn’t mean that you’re going to be successful in running a business. Same thing for running a restaurant. Right. Just because you’re a great chef doesn’t mean you can run a successful restaurant. But luckily, you know, my wife was on board. Without her, without her sister, which is our director, there’s no. And even our parents, there’s no way that we would have the success that we have. So it is a joint effort, it’s a team effort and we’ve been beyond blessed.

   

• 0:25:46 Kris Murray: Amazing. I would love to ask Each of you, who has been an inspiration for you in this, whether it’s an entrepreneurial inspiration or just somebody who’s inspired you on your path, who comes to mind when you think about somebody who’s inspired you or a personal hero? Pamela, you go first.

   

• 0:26:08 Pamela Hernandez: Well, and really, it’s in my blood. I mean, my mom was a social worker. She was a professor in Mexico, and she was also a director of a school. So I think we just kind of follow her path. So my dad, I have a stepdad, but my real dad was actually a philosophy professor who was also working at the same school with my mom. That’s where they met. So I feel like it’s just in my blood.

   

• 0:26:38 Kris Murray: So.

   

• 0:26:38 Pamela Hernandez: But definitely my mother has been my inspiration. I mean, I’ve seen. I remember my sister and I, my mother used to teach late night classes to one of those technological schools in Mexico. And we used to sit, till this day, I remember, sit in the corner and waiting for her to finish her lesson so we could go home. So I always saw myself being that teacher and being behind that desk and just like my mother did, running a business in a school. And that’s where we are now.

   

• 0:27:10 Kris Murray: So beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. That’s awesome.

   

• 0:27:14 Pamela Hernandez: Yes, ma’.

   

• 0:27:14 Josh Hernandez: Am.

   

• 0:27:15 Kris Murray: Joshua, how about you?

   

• 0:27:17 Josh Hernandez: I hate to say the same thing, but it’s also my mother. You know, my mother is my. My best friend. She’s my confidant. I saw her work many, many hours. My mother was a comptroller at a radio station for many, many years. Raised three kids, single mother, raising three kids, working on the weekends. So I saw that type of work ethic. And if I want to put in the hours that I put in again, we wouldn’t have the success that we have.

   

• 0:27:45 Josh Hernandez: So she certainly taught me how to. How to work hard. And it didn’t matter what who her employer was. She always treated that company like it was her company. And that’s what we also want to try to instill within our school. As this is also your school, we’re selling you. Yes, we’re selling the school, but we’re also selling you as a lead guide or as an assistant.

   

• 0:28:10 Kris Murray: Love it. I know that you’re not too far into your early education entrepreneurship journey, but looking back over the time that you’ve been in so far, what has been a big lesson that you’ve learned or something that was a big challenge that you had to overcome when you were just starting out. Who would like to go first?

   

• 0:28:36 Josh Hernandez: I’ll take it. So we grew very, very Quickly. You know, I don’t know if I would necessarily change it because we have bills to pay. But looking in hindsight, I mean, we opened the facility with 81 pre enrollments and just a year later we were at 192. So we doubled and actually more than doubled. And we’re always going to have growing pains. I think I’m just going to kind of revert back to what I had spoken to you before.

   

• 0:29:11 Josh Hernandez: If we would have had the vision to groom within, you know, that has probably been the most challenging thing, is just the turnover that we have with teachers. So just hiring the right looking, looking at it from a, from peripheral vision and long term instead of short term, but obviously that’s easier said than done. So. But just creating, even if you spark, even if you mentioned to any team member that’s coming in that where do you want to be in five years from now? Where do you want to be in 10 years from now? Just planting that little seed does a lot. It sets the mindset, it sets us apart from the competition. So maybe approaching it in that manner instead of just interviewing and hiring anybody with a pulse.

   

• 0:29:56 Kris Murray: Yes. I love that. And I want to ask you about that since you’ve learned that lesson and looking at how you potentially either onboard team members differently, interview them differently, set that expectation with those new hires up front. I love the question of where do you want to be in five years? And I love setting the journey and letting them know that you want them to stay with you.

   

• 0:30:20 Pamela Hernandez: Absolutely.

   

• 0:30:21 Kris Murray: You know, and what they gain out of it, what’s in, what’s in it for them? Professional development or other benefits or a mentoring program and friendships long term and being able to make an impact for kids. So I love that you brought that up. So tell me a little bit about, in addition to that question, if you ask that question on onboarding or hiring, what else do you do that you feel has really helped you in finding the right team members and then getting them in that mindset to stay with you long term?

   

• 0:30:52 Josh Hernandez: Well, this is something that we just recently implemented this approach. But yes, I mean, you kind of also hit the nail on the head with you are a mentor and it doesn’t matter what, what position they’re feeling, they’re still a mentor. The assistant can be a mentor to a floater. Obviously the guide is a mentor to the, you know, it’s just we, we’re collaborating within each other. But I, I, I’m planning on maybe taking a step further and actually having an assessment done.

   

• 0:31:23 Josh Hernandez: We started doing Assessments on the insurance side just to identify if that personnel fits within that job description. I did hire a business coach earlier this year, so they’re helping us with that. So I may even implement that on a school level. I don’t know how well it’ll work, but it’ll be kind of a work in progress. And. And I can certainly report back to you guys to see if it works or not, but that’s what we’ll kind of be working on here in the next 90 days.

   

• 0:31:51 Kris Murray: Yeah. I’ve got a lot of experience using so many different kinds of assessments through my career, whether it’s predictive index, StrengthsFinder, DISC, Myers, Briggs and Colby, to name a few. There’s so many good ones out there. Do you. Is the name that I just shared anything that you guys are using or what are you using?

   

• 0:32:15 Josh Hernandez: I think there was. It’s. There was a mixture of two, and I think they. They’ve. It’s proprietary to them, but they. They’re mixing a few of them together.

   

• 0:32:23 Kris Murray: Okay.

   

• 0:32:24 Josh Hernandez: Is. Is as well as it has been told to me.

   

• 0:32:27 Kris Murray: Yeah. Nice. Yeah. You can really learn a lot about both a candidate and a new hire and where they fit in those puzzle pieces of what their natural strengths are and their natural DNA. Right. How are they hardwired? So I love. I’m a huge fan of that, so way to go. Yeah.

   

• 0:32:42 Josh Hernandez: The days of just looking at resumes, you know, and just kind of rolling the dice, unfortunately, we have to. We have to take it many, many steps further. We can’t afford just to hire based on a resume that was submitted, unfortunately.

   

• 0:32:55 Kris Murray: Right. Cool. Where are you guys headed for the remainder of 2025 and into the coming year? Are you thinking about. I might, you know, maybe I should bite my tongue, but are you possibly thinking about opening another location? Is that in the dreams or.

   

• 0:33:10 Josh Hernandez: My wife thinks I’m crazy. As a matter of fact, I just reached out to our. Our corporate. Our corporate office asking them if they had a consultant that they could refer me to to identify a location that, you know, I can look 5, 10, 15 years out with the economic growth. And back when we first signed up with them, they didn’t have. They just had a realtor, but now they do have a consultant. So they did send me their. Their data. Their. Their data that they found which kind of aligned already with what area within San Antonio that we wanted to open up a second location. So, yes, I think probably next year we’ll. We’ll start identifying where that second location goes.

   

• 0:33:50 Kris Murray: Ooh, Pamela, how does that make you.

   

• 0:33:52 Pamela Hernandez: Feel very, very, very nervous. I mean, my husband, and that’s one of the things that I admire, and he, he’s just a Energizer Bunny. He’s. His mind doesn’t, doesn’t stop. Um, he’s a, he’s a visionary, and he loves, you know, the adrenaline of just, you know, the excitement of, you know, what is next, right? He, he finished this business, and he’s like, okay, what’s the next thing? You know, and we have been, we have done so well that I know, you know, I know we can, we can accomplish that with the second location. But it does make me feel nervous because it’s just, you know, I feel like where I am right now as a, as a my mom role, right.

   

• 0:34:35 Pamela Hernandez: I want to make sure that, you know, everything will be taken care of and everything will be running perfect. I know I need to give myself a little bit more grace, but because I am a perfectionist, I want everything to be perfect. But one of the things that I’ve learned during this process is that, you know, that growth is a process, and sometimes the best lessons come from challenges. So I, I, I think that, you know, with the second location, if it does happen within a year or two years, I just, I know that we’re going to do well.

   

• 0:35:10 Pamela Hernandez: And I, and I trust my husband 100. I know that he knows what he’s doing, and then I’m, I’m 100 on board. But, you know, I’m still a little nervous.

   

• 0:35:20 Josh Hernandez: Yes.

   

• 0:35:21 Kris Murray: Let’s see. I get it. I get it. Well, you guys are a good balance. And, and of course, he’s a constructor, right? So he is, he has to get going on the next thing. But yes, a lot of our, you know, a lot of the women owners that we have in Husband Wife teams are more wanting everything, you know, to be perfect. And so sometimes they learn that that’s not super realistic. But that’s okay. That’s part of your journey.

   

• 0:35:47 Pamela Hernandez: Yeah. Yeah. That, that’s what I kind of have to remind myself is like, it’s okay. So I’ve learned to take day by day. I still have my days. I’m like, okay, but yes, yes.

   

• 0:35:57 Kris Murray: Awesome. Very cool. I wanted to ask you kind of as a fun fact, too, because Chris Dodson told me something about an ice cream truck. So I have to ask you, in terms of guerilla marketing or anything that you’re doing in the community, to try to get your name out there. Tell me more about what that’s all about.

   

• 0:36:13 Josh Hernandez: So my director of operations and my insurance office. She has a 3 year old and they’re always consistently going to the local park. And she saw somebody at a table out there promoting, I don’t know what type of business it was, but she’s like, hey, what about, you know, we have a table out there and you guys give away some ice cream? And I said, oh, yeah, that’s. That, that’s cool. We can do that. And then I just had an epiphany and said, why don’t I look for an old school ice cream chuck a VW 1970 van.

   

• 0:36:49 Josh Hernandez: And I found one and it had a pop up. It was so cool. I had already signed the paperwork and sent the deposit. It was in Laredo, so it wasn’t too far from here to go check it out. But when I asked for more pictures, I could tell, like, it was not painted the way that I wanted. And the. The owner was not willing to budge on the price. I had somebody go out there and do kind of a mechanical assessment on it, and it still needed some work. But what I want to do, and we haven’t done it yet, but is actually have some type of little vintage ice cream truck just to hand out free, you know, ice cream popsicles just to promote our business and go to the local parks. So that it’s still in the. In the plan. Still in the works.

   

• 0:37:34 Kris Murray: Yes.

   

• 0:37:34 Josh Hernandez: But, yeah, that’s the plan.

   

• 0:37:36 Kris Murray: Well, I love it and thank you for sharing. If you’re listening to the podcast, because usually at least a thousand people listen to this podcast, if not more, or watch it on YouTube, you’re not allowed to steal that idea. Especially if you’re in San Antonio. You guys are not allowed to steal that idea. So if you do and I find out, I’m going to come and give you a spam. Yeah. So that. So thanks for sharing. I love that idea. I’m a huge fan of guerrilla marketing, quote, unquote, any. Any unusual, fun, cool ideas that get your brand out there in a unique way for the community.

   

• 0:38:09 Kris Murray: I’m all for it. So look forward to hearing that your ice cream truck is live and it’s happening. So, yeah, love that. Cool. All right, well, we are rounding out the time for our show and I’m sorry that this is already over. It went really fast. Anything that you would like to share as we say goodbye? Any final thoughts for our audience?

   

• 0:38:36 Pamela Hernandez: Well, now we just want to say thank you so much for having us. And I guess my final thought is that my hope is that other school leaders or parents or aspiring entrepreneurs listening now that are building something meaningful for them to know that building something meaningful takes time, persistence, and a lot of heart. But it’s worth every step. So I don’t regret anything that went on. The long hours of stressfulness.

   

• 0:39:04 Pamela Hernandez: I remember crying at night, thinking, is this ever going to happen, happen? You know, and then now that we’re here, you know, and looking back, it was worth every step.

   

• 0:39:14 Kris Murray: So awesome. Thank you, Pamela.

   

• 0:39:17 Pamela Hernandez: Yes, ma’.

   

• 0:39:18 Kris Murray: Am.

   

• 0:39:18 Josh Hernandez: Yeah, I think I will attest to that. Don’t give up. I mean, it took us probably about two years to find our location, and then once we did, I had actually, I bought the location and I was still trying to secure financing, so I could have been in a position where my financing wasn’t secured. And I’m sitting with, you know, a. A two million dollar real estate note that nothing to do with. So don’t give up.

   

• 0:39:45 Josh Hernandez: You know, it, it.

   

• 0:39:46 Kris Murray: We.

   

• 0:39:46 Josh Hernandez: There’s no way that we would be here, we wouldn’t be here without our team, our family.

   

• 0:39:50 Kris Murray: That’s right.

   

• 0:39:52 Josh Hernandez: It was, it was a joint effort and I would like to encourage more owners to collaborate amongst each other. I feel like, like this industry lacks collaboration. I mean, I realize that, you know, we are competitors, but I’m not competing with somebody in another city or another state. So I just feel like there’s no sense in us reinventing the wheel. If we could collaborate more, that would be awesome.

   

• 0:40:17 Kris Murray: Yeah. Love that. Thank you for sharing that. I always say entrepreneurship and leadership are not for the faint of heart. And if it was easy, I’m still in there. Everyone would be doing it if it was easy because of those sleepless nights. And it’s your baby. Like building a business is another child. To me, it’s a baby. So especially with two young kids at home, you guys are doing awesome. I love your story.

   

• 0:40:43 Kris Murray: Joshua Hernandez, Pamela Jimenez, thank you so much. Montessori Kids Universe, Stone park of Stone Oak. Excuse me. Thank you so much for being here.

   

• 0:40:53 Pamela Hernandez: Thank you. Thank you for having us.

   

• 0:40:56 Kris Murray: Yeah, good luck on everything and thank you. All right, well, we look forward to learning more about your journey as you go and thanks everybody for tuning in to the podcast today. Appreciate y’ all and we’ll see everybody next time. Take care and God bless. Bye bye.

   

• 0:41:14 Pamela Hernandez: Bye, bye bye.

   

• 0:41:18 Kris Murray: I hope you liked this episode of Child Care Rockstar Re Radio. If you did, please leave a review and share it with someone you know to help spread the word to friends in our industry and on social media. Child care business success is my passion, and I’M honored to be on this journey with you. As a thank you for listening, I’ve got a new video training that shows you how to add six figures or more of new revenue to your program in the next 60 days by improving your hiring and your enrollment systems.

   

• 0:41:47 Kris Murray: To watch my new video, just go to www.fixmyschool.com. that’s fixmyschool.com thanks. Take care and God bless.