What is Business Consultation for Child Care? Consultation is one of the 11 essential elements for building an adequate supply of quality child care in FCF’s State Child Care Business Ecosystem. FCF defines business consultation as one-on-one business support in which a consultant helps develop or review a child care entrepreneur’s real financial and operational data. A consultation is usually structured to achieve a specific goal (i.e., conduct a breakeven analysis) and last a specific amount of time. Common consultation packages needed by child care businesses include: For sustaining child care businesses: cash flow projection models, cost-per-child calculations, breakeven analysis; For starting and expanding child care businesses: business plan development, financial projection development, marketing plan development, creating an operating budget, setting up financial systems. (author abstract)