How Much Does an Eye Level Learning Center Franchise Owner Make?

Officially, it discloses no sales, gross profit, operating profit, EBITDA, net income, cash flow or owner compensation. Item 19 states that Daekyo America does not make financial performance representations about past outlet results or future franchisee performance. Therefore, there is no franchisor-reported average revenue or owner salary to quote.

The strongest same-brand facts are structural. Item 20 reports 121 franchised centers at year-end 2025, up from 118 at the start of that year. Eight outlets opened, one terminated, two did not renew, and two ceased operations for other reasons during 2025. Those counts describe system movement, not unit economics, and they do not prove that a typical center is profitable.

The FTC consumer guide to buying a franchise explains that a franchisor is not required to make an earnings claim, but any such claim generally must appear in Item 19 and disclose its basis and limitations. The FTC also cautions that gross sales do not reveal actual profit.

The range is estimated from three revenue scenarios, a broad official industry margin benchmark and a separately valued active-owner role. It applies to one U.S. learning center for one stabilized year; it is not a forecast for a new center’s ramp-up period.

• Subject-student counts: 80, 120 and 180 are editorial enrollment assumptions, not Eye Level averages. One child taking Math and English can count as two subject-students under the FDD definition.
• Monthly tuition: $140, $160 and $180 per subject are analytical anchors informed by current official Eye Level center pages, which show examples from $135 to $224. They are not a systemwide price distribution.
• Residual margin: 3%, 6% and 9% are sensitivity points around a derived 5.9% benchmark from the IRS 2022 Educational Services corporate-return data: ($7.694 billion of net income − $3.542 billion of deficits) ÷ $70.064 billion of total receipts. The IRS category is broader than NAICS 611691 tutoring centers.
• Paid-management treatment: the model assumes the broad all-in corporate margin already reflects normal employee and management compensation. The residual result is therefore used as a paid-Center-Director proxy; adding owner labor value assumes the owner performs that management work instead. This compatibility assumption is uncertain.
• Owner labor value: $44,476 is the May 2025 BLS median hourly wage of $28.51 for preschool and daycare education administrators, multiplied by the FDD-required minimum 30 hours per week and 52 weeks. This occupation is an imperfect Center Director proxy.

In this estimated one-center annual model, owner involvement changes the economic interpretation by roughly $44,500. When the owner performs the Center Director-type work, the result is labeled owner-operator benefit because it combines residual business profit with labor compensation. When a paid Center Director performs that work, the remaining amount is treated as a residual-profit proxy because the IRS all-in margin is assumed to include normal paid management.

This is not an absentee-versus-active choice. The 2026 FDD says absentee ownership is not allowed. An individual franchisee must be physically present for all center sessions except extraordinary personal circumstances and devote at least 30 hours per week. For an entity, the Operating Principal—and certain owners with 50% or more ownership—faces the full-time devotion requirement. A separate Center Director may be hired, but the owner’s contractual participation does not disappear.

For one U.S. franchised learning center under the 2026 FDD, the continuing royalty is the largest disclosed recurring franchise obligation and can consume a substantial share of modeled tuition revenue. Item 6 sets a $33–$42 monthly charge per subject-student, a $1 monthly Brand Development Fund contribution per subject-student, and a $15 enrollment royalty for each newly enrolled subject-student. Summit of Math carries an additional $10–$15 monthly royalty for participating students.

After the first year, the continuing royalty is subject to a $1,500 monthly minimum, equivalent to $18,000 annually when the calculated amount is lower. The FDD also permits local cooperative advertising contributions, lists shipping and handling charges, and says proprietary technology currently has no fee but could carry a future charge after notice.

The fee ranges above are outer-bound envelopes using the disclosed $33–$42 continuing royalty plus the $1 Brand Development Fund fee for 12 months; they are not the exact sliding-scale tier at each modeled enrollment level. They exclude the $15 new-enrollment royalty, Summit of Math royalty, cooperative advertising, shipping, excess booklets, late fees and noncompliance charges because their annual amounts depend on facts not disclosed in Item 19.

For the 2026 U.S. franchised-center population, the largest unresolved uncertainty is unit-level enrollment and expense performance because Item 19 provides no same-brand revenue or profit distribution. The estimate cannot show the system’s median center, mature-center cohort, percentage of loss-making outlets, geographic variation, owner payroll treatment or time required to reach a stable enrollment base.

The revenue assumptions are especially sensitive to the number of subject-students. A student taking two curricula counts twice for royalty purposes and can also generate two tuition charges, while discounts, free trials, collections and local pricing alter realized revenue. The FDD’s royalty schedule changes with enrollment and contains minimum-payment rules, so low enrollment does not reduce fees proportionally.

The IRS benchmark also has a material compatibility limitation. Its 2022 Educational Services category covers corporations across a broad sector, not only NAICS 611691 Exam Preparation and Tutoring, not only franchises, and not only Eye Level centers. The derived 5.9% net-income-less-deficit margin is therefore a directional proxy rather than a franchise-specific operating margin.

For a prospective U.S. center under the 2026 offer, a buyer should replace every scenario assumption with written same-center or same-market evidence. The most useful checks are actual tuition collected, subject-student counts, retention, payroll hours, rent and occupancy costs, and the precise monthly royalty calculation.

• Request the latest FDD and all amendments. Confirm that Item 19 still makes no financial performance representation and ask for written substantiation of any sales or earnings statement made during the sales process.
• Interview a representative cross-section of current franchisees. Ask for trailing 12-month subject-student counts, billed tuition, collected tuition, discounts, new enrollments, payroll, rent, marketing, royalties and owner hours.
• Speak with former owners listed in Item 20. Ask why they left, whether the center generated positive cash flow, what owner labor was required and how results changed during the ramp-up period.
• Build a local enrollment model. Test 60, 80, 120, 160 and 200 subject-students at market-specific tuition, then apply the exact royalty tier, minimum royalty, Brand Development Fund, enrollment royalty and Summit of Math fees.
• Separate business profit from labor compensation. Price a Center Director and instructor schedule using local wages, not just national BLS figures, and decide which duties the owner will actually perform.
• Model financing separately. Debt interest may reduce taxable or accounting profit; principal payments reduce cash available to the owner but are not an operating expense. Personal income taxes depend on the owner’s entity, jurisdiction and circumstances.

For one stabilized U.S. center, the strongest defensible published range is about $49,000 to $79,000 in annual pre-tax owner-operator benefit, with a base case near $58,000. It is a limited-confidence scenario estimate, not an official Eye Level earnings disclosure. The most important driver is the combination of subject-student enrollment and realized monthly tuition. The largest unresolved uncertainty is the absence of same-brand unit-level revenue and expense data in Item 19.

Within the modeled range, pure residual business profit is only about $4,000 to $35,000; the remainder values the owner’s active work. A buyer should verify the current Item 19, request substantiation for every financial claim, and use franchisee interviews to replace the revenue, staffing, rent and royalty assumptions with actual local evidence before making an investment decision.