Daily Local News (West Chester, PA)
Gymboree Play & Music completes renovation
COLLEGEVILLE » Tucked away in the Collegeville Station, the only remaining Gymboree Play & Music in Southeastern Pennsylvania received a grand makeover recently, complete with a new look and new equipment, that is already boosting business, noted owner Joan Daly.
Daly and her husband Pat, who live in Pottstown, bought the 21-year-old franchise at West Third Avenue and Chestnut Street in Collegeville about a year ago, well aware of the additional investment waiting around the corner
“We went in with our eyes open and were planning it with our finances. When we saw the new equipment at a training in San Francisco it was a no-brainer. We just felt like we had to have it. It’s about a $50,000 upgrade,” Daly allowed “The place looked dark before and the equipment was old. The new equipment is like a huge playground. It’s more engaging, more colorful and has more things going on with it. It keeps us more competitive with all the things that are going on out there today.”
The remodeling, from design to installation, took several months, Daly said.
“We had to be closed for about five days, and we did it in the summer when a lot of our members were on vacation,” she added.
The renovation to Gymboree Play & Music of Collegeville, where parents and grandparents engage in the developmental fun right along with their kids and grandkids, includes a soft new play floor that is a layered system composed of plastic surface tiles and foam underlayment, providing a firm yet soft surface with impact-absorbing qualities, Daly explained.
“Parents like the new floor because it’s safer. With Gymboree, parents have to stay within an arm’s reach of their child, so it’s safe that way, and now the floor is safer too,” said Daly, who added that the flooring offers the ideal foundation for the new equipment, agility activities and imaginative play.
The equipment is now
all modular, which should keep the playful learning from ever growing stagnant.
“Every two weeks we change the equipment, tear it all down and put it back up to go along with the lesson plan we’re teaching,” Daly said. “It’s a lot of fun because it’s always something different for the kids to be engaged in. Each set up includes new lesson plans and song lists that are developmentally designed for each age group. The lessons are engaging
and encourage interactive imaginative play and they still end with our famous Bubbles and Parachute activities. The new equipment is taller, to better accommodate the 3-to-5 age range,” Daly added. “A 5-year-old can literally swing from the bar. It kind of helps the business that way too, because the older kids can play.”
The new programs embrace such innovative concepts as Baby Lab and S.T.E.A.M. powered Play Lab.
“Baby Lab is a multi-sensory play and learning lab for babies 0-10 months that is all about building brain power and stimulating reflexes through themes like art, music, signs, and literacy,” Daly explained. “Our Steam Power Play brings S.T.E.A.M. (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, Math) learning to life through a variety of themes that encourage learning through projects and play. Play labs are for children two to five years of age.”
An ongoing attraction of Gymboree, which was founded in 1976 in San Francisco, is that it is designed for infants as well as older kids, Daly noted.
“Since it is the only operation that deals with 0 to 5, we have people coming from Reading, Pottstown and Philly. Not a lot of programs are offered for infants, and it’s really also for moms because they’re in the house all day and they want to get out, so they go and talk to other moms. And once we get
them in we can keep them here with what we offer.”
Parents and their children, up to age five, are welcome to come in for a free preview Gymboree class. In addition to the programming, Gymboree offers Play and Learn classes on the new play floor, along with Music and Art classes in the Studio, as wells birthday parties.