From Property Developer to Franchise Partner

Arpan Patel, owner of GoodOaks – Wimbledon and Kingston, started his professional career in finance after completing a degree in Maths from the Imperial College London. After working in the sector for 10 years he decided to follow a passion of his and went into property development. Arpan found he really enjoyed getting to know his clients and loved seeing how with his help and experience he was able to help people create their dream home.

Although he enjoyed working in property he always knew he wanted to do something to help his local community.

“I thought, if I’m getting this much satisfaction from helping people create their dream homes, how would I feel about providing a service to someone that could drastically improve their quality of life?”

Arpan had seen how care can help improve people’s day to day lives and knew that with his dedication and passion for helping his local community he would be able to help numerous people he already considered his neighbours.

“My brother has Down Syndrome and although he gets good care, I’m aware that there is a lot of help out there that could be improved.”

This inspired him to start looking into the care sector, after reviewing the data that GoodOaks provided for his local area he saw that there was a demand for homecare and a gap for a premium more bespoke care provider in his area too. This helped ensure it was a sensible business decision alongside a personal desire to help his community.

“I already had experience running a business and managing various teams, it was the compliance side of the business that was concerning me initially. After meeting the head office team I felt assured that with their guidance and knowledge I would be in safe hands. The operations team showed me the steps for the CQC application, how the audits are completed and answered all my questions about CQC (there were a lot!) and also how to maintain best practices in the day to day running of the care business. After the meeting my fears were mitigated and this was a huge turning point in my decision to proceed with the process.

I would advise people to not be afraid of entering a sector you don’t have experience in, as long as you are passionate and committed to helping people the training and support from head office will help you succeed in the other areas.”