Premier Education Franchise | Inspire Children and Build a Year-Round Business

Inspire Children and Build a Year-Round Business

The Premier Education Franchise is the UK's leading provider of sports and physical activity to primary schools. With over 2,700 schools across its network and more than 130 franchise territories, Premier Education has spent more than 25 years building a model that delivers year-round income, positive community impact and genuine franchisee freedom.

A Business That Delivers All Year Round

Many school-based businesses face the challenge of seasonal gaps. Premier Education has solved this by offering services before school, during school, after school and during the school holidays. Holiday camps, curricular physical education delivery and extra-curricular after-school clubs combine to create a consistent, 12-month revenue stream for franchisees.

A Premier Education coach leading a primary school PE session - the year-round in-school delivery that anchors a franchisee's recurring revenue

Franchisees do not need to deliver sessions themselves. The model supports both owner-operators and those who build a coach team from the outset, with successful franchisees scaling to teams of 50-plus coaches across dozens of schools.

Two Investment Options to Suit Your Goals

Premier Education offers two pathways into the franchise:

What the Premier Education Franchise Provides

• ✓ Exclusive territory with access to at least 75 primary schools under the Shared Ownership model
• ✓ Comprehensive 14-month induction covering sales, marketing, recruitment, operations and physical activity qualifications
• ✓ Access to Premier Education's coach candidate database with thousands of pre-registered applicants
• ✓ App-based recruitment system fully integrated with candidate database
• ✓ Dedicated business development team and franchisee mentor support
• ✓ Regular performance reviews, quarterly network meetings and an annual conference
• ✓ Full BFA membership, providing access to preferential bank finance, subject to status

Franchisee Success in Action

Gareth Simpson, operating in the Cambridge and Newmarket area, describes running a Premier Education Franchise as genuinely rewarding: the flexibility suits his family life, no two days are the same and the independence it affords has changed how he works for the better. He now manages a team of 52 coaches across his regional franchise.

The Market Opportunity

Physical education and children's health and wellbeing are at the top of the national agenda. With childhood obesity figures remaining a significant public health concern and schools under increasing pressure to provide high-quality PE provision, Premier Education franchisees are operating in a sector with clear government and institutional support.

Brand Heritage and Network Scale

Premier Education has operated in the UK primary school sector since 1999, growing from a single coaching business into the largest franchised provider in its category. The brand reaches around a quarter of a million children weekly through 130-plus territories, with 1,300-plus trained Activity Professionals delivering curricular PE, before and after school clubs, wraparound childcare and holiday camps. New franchisees inherit a recognised name in staff rooms, a proven safeguarding framework, and a head office that has already solved the back-office problems most independent coaching businesses hit early on.

Inside the 14-Month Training Programme

One thing that sets Premier Education apart from lighter-touch school sports franchises is the length and structure of its onboarding. The 14-month mentor-led programme is staged so that classroom learning is interleaved with live operational milestones, not delivered as a front-loaded course.

• ✓ Months 1 to 3: induction, safeguarding, Ofsted-compliant camp setup, school sales fundamentals, first booked sessions
• ✓ Months 4 to 8: coach recruitment via the central candidate database, timetable build across multiple schools, after-school club marketing
• ✓ Months 9 to 14: scaling the coach team, holiday camp capacity, P&L reviews with a dedicated mentor, year-two planning
• ✓ Throughout: physical activity qualifications, quarterly network meetings and the annual conference

What the Two Investment Tiers Cover

Premier Education runs two routes into the network so capital is not the gating factor for the right operator. Both give you an exclusive territory and the full 14-month training; the difference is mostly how risk and ownership are structured at the start.

BFA membership also unlocks preferential franchise finance with the major UK high street banks, subject to status, which can fund a meaningful portion of either route.

Territory, Schools and Day-to-Day Operations

Each territory is geographically exclusive and sized around a pool of primary schools, with Shared Ownership guaranteeing at least 75 schools to approach. A typical week mixes headteacher conversations, coach scheduling, parent communications for paid clubs and holiday camp planning. Hands-on franchisees often coach early sessions themselves; those with a management background tend to hire from the central candidate database earlier and step into an operations role.

UK Market Context: PE Premium and the New Partnerships Network

The market backdrop is structurally supportive. DfE research found that 76% of English primary schools already outsource curricular PE to external providers, and 88% do so for extra-curricular sport, so the buyer landscape is well established. The Primary PE and Sport Premium also continues at £320 million for the 2025/26 academic year.

The public health case reinforces demand. NHS data shows roughly one in three children leaving primary school overweight or living with obesity, and fewer than half of young people hit the 60-minutes-a-day target. Schools are under pressure to show measurable outcomes, which makes a franchised provider an easier procurement decision than a one-person operator.

Awards, Credentials and National Partnerships

Premier Education is the only full BFA member in its category, has ranked 62nd in the Elite Franchise Top 100, and was a finalist for BFA HSBC Franchisor of the Year. Exclusive partnerships with national governing bodies give franchisees recognised programme content that schools value at procurement.

What Franchisees Say

The BFA reports that top-performing Premier Education franchisees turn over up to £1 million annually, showing the model rewards operators who build a sizeable coach team and run holiday camps at scale. Most franchisees sit well below that ceiling, but the same playbook and central infrastructure underpin both ends of the network.

Interested in exploring more opportunities in this sector? Take a look at other education franchise opportunities available on Franchise Hunt.