Potentia Tutoring, the educational business set up by prominent Australia book retailer Dymocks looks set to boom this year.

Back in September, Dymocks unveiled plans for its initial Potentia Tutoring hub, citing a goal of six sites within the first 12 months.

After a strong start to year, the company is making good on that promise. 

“It has been an amazing start to the year, exceeding even our most optimistic expectations,” Mark Buckland, Potentia Tutoring managing director told Inside Franchise Business.

“From a solid launch last year, we are experiencing growth of 600 per cent on enrolment numbers. We are on track to continue this rate of growth throughout the year.”

Buckland revealed that the brand plans to launch 30 corporate Potentia Tutoring hubs throughout Australia, before focusing on franchisee expansion.

“These (the hubs) will anchor the presence of the Potentia Tutoring brand in each state. They will also enable it to use the hubs as a base for expansion into other educational endeavours like training at times of day when tutoring is not occurring,” Buckland said.

“With a national corporate footprint we will have the infrastructure to support a much broader network of ‘satellite’ learning centres. These will all be franchised. We intend to franchise the Potentia Tutoring service throughout the country to ensure that all students, wherever they live, have access to affordable tutoring which helps them get results.”

Potentia Tutoring regional plans

Forming the cornerstone of the Potentia Tutoring business will be a focus on regional development.

“We see regional areas as having great potential to support an engaged and passionate franchisee. We believe that rural areas have some great teachers and educators who would like to give a little more or perhaps invest in their own business,” Buckland said.

“We do see there as being an equity issue; the experience of tutoring across the country is highly variable. We want to standardise this and ensure that when a parent and student invests in tutoring they can rest easy that they are getting the best materials from well trained tutors and at the most affordable price. That proposition has to hold true in regional areas just as much as metropolitan.”

While he admitted the business is still very much in the start-up phase, Buckland believes Potentia Learning, with the support of parent company Dymocks has the framework to significantly alter the franchised education space.

“Dymocks has a highly engaged customer base that is invested in learning and understands the value of education. It is the far larger brand for the moment and the team at Dymocks under MD Steve Cox have provided us with access to exceptional technology and personnel which really give us a leg up in this market,” Buckland said.

“Clearly there is the growth in corporate and franchised learning hubs that will devote significant time and energy. However, there are big goals around exploring the role of educational technology in the learning experience as well as vocational education and publication of our own learning resources.”

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