CA Magazine

August, 2007

Going Concern

by NICK ROCKEL

Ken Sim, CA,
Co-Founder, Nurse Next Door Home Healthcare Services Inc.

COMPANY PROFILE: Nurse Next Door is Western Canada’s largest homecare provider. Its trained and insured staff deliver a wide range of services, from live-in and post-surgical care to meal preparation and support for the disabled. Although the Vancouver-based company caters to people of all ages, the average age of its 1,000 clients is 85. Nurse Next Door has approximately 1,000 employees and its field-workers speak more than 40 languages. Since launching 2001 with just six caregivers, it has served 3,000 people and grown by 3,400%.

HOT FACTOR: A rapidly graying population – Statistics Canada projects that the number of senior citizens will almost double within three decades – is fuelling demand for homecare. At the same time, Nurse Next Door is part of a trend toward private health services. Last year, Sim and co-founder John DeHart won the emerging-entrepreneur prize for the Pacific region in the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year awards. The pair was also among the 2005 winners of Business in Vancouver’s Top Forty Under 40 competition.

COOL PROJECTS: With its back office in place, Nurse Next Door recently started signing up franchise partners to drive its aggressive expansion plans. It now has three franchise locations in BC and will open 12 more across Canada by the end of the year. After reaching 50 North American franchises in 2009, the goal is to hit 500 – and $1 billion in sales – by expanding internationally, including in Australia and Europe.

IN HIS OWN WORDS: “It’s all about longer-term opportunity. We think in terms of 15- to 30- year horizons, and at the end of the day we focus on our clients. Going forward, one thing that will really differentiate us and make us successful is the fact that we’re going to be running a centralized call centre for franchisees.”

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