A COUPLE who have invested in an exciting franchise business are making quite a splash.

Alan and Louise Crisford, from South Ham, are looking to build on a solid start and hope their second year of running Water Babies will go swimmingly well.

The husband-and-wife team offer classes across north Hampshire and Berkshire, teaching around 600 babies and children to swim each week.

In Basingstoke, the business is looking to expand as Alan and Louise will soon start to offer their fun swimming lessons at Cranbourne Business and Enterprise College in addition to their regular classes at The Hampshire Court Hotel, in Chineham.

Looking forward to holding lessons at his former school, Alan explained that Water Babies lessons gently encourage babies to develop their natural swimming skills right from birth through a carefully structured programme that incorporates simple word association, movement, interactive games and popular rhymes. The programme’s teaching techniques help children develop crucial life-saving skills, enabling them to swim short distances from as young as two.

The franchise recently won a top accolade for the second time in the What’s On 4 Little Ones Awards 2009, winning the Best Baby Activity award.

The Bramley Green-based online business What’s On 4 Little Ones, set up in 2006 by local entrepreneur and mum, Sam Willoughby, offers a national online directory for activities and classes for babies and young children.

Competition was fierce, with 14,000 online voters nominating in three age categories for their favourite pre-school activities – Best Baby, Best Toddler and Best Pre-School.

“To have won this national award again totally reflects on the dedication of the whole Water Babies team,” said Alan.

“It takes a lot of commitment and stamina to be a Water Babies instructor and administrator. The dedication is reflected in just how many votes we garnered – and we’re really grateful to all our clients for taking the time to nominate us.”

The couple recently held a week of Splashathons at its swimming venues, raising £4,750 for Tommy’s – a charity that funds medical research into pregnancy problems and provides information on having a healthy pregnancy.