Pre-school dance company babyballet has taken all its UK classes online with immediate effect, enabling around 25,000 children across the country to continue enjoying dance classes even if they and their families are in self-isolation.
babyballet, headquartered in Halifax, West Yorkshire, has 83 franchises across the UK. As a result of the coronavirus outbreak, from today (March 18) the majority of the company’s classes will be taught via a private and secure online platform.
Founder and CEO, Claire O’Connor, said: “It’s a worrying time as the UK deals with the outbreak of the coronavirus but we are remaining positive. As more and more families self-isolate and limit the amount of social contact that they have, our primary focus is to ensure children and families can still enjoy babyballet, even if they can’t physically come to classes.
“Our babyballet pupils are aged from six months to six years-old and most have no idea about the coronavirus and the effect it’s having in the world around them. It’s our responsibility to keep the babyballet world as normal as possible for them. We will be delivering our online classes with as much passion and energy as ever, it’s just that instead of being in a dance studio, we’ll be on a screen in children’s living rooms!”
Claire added: “There are going to be a lot of families trying to keep their children entertained over the coming weeks. We hope that by providing babyballet online children can still enjoy the fun and laughter of classes and continue to keep active.
“As a company, we have had to adapt quickly to ensure business continuity and have worked closely with our entire network who have all been fantastically supportive over the past 48 hours to help take babyballet online.
“The response we’ve had from parents and carers has also been really positive; they’re pleased that the children can keep attending classes and that, in addition, they can continue to support our franchisees, who are all small businesses.”
babyballet was founded in 2005 and runs around 2,000 classes a week in the UK for 25,000 children. Along with the UK, the company also has franchisees in Australia, New Zealand and Singapore.
All the online classes will adhere to babyballet’s strict and rigorous policies around safeguarding. Parents who already take their children to babyballet classes are being contacted with log-in information for the online platform. New pupils can also join in – just visit www.babyballet.co.uk for more details.
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