Analyzing Bright Horizons Family Solutions (NYSE:BFAM) & SPAR Group (NASDAQ:SGRP)

Bright Horizons Family Solutions (NYSE:BFAM) and SPAR Group (NASDAQ:SGRP) are both business services companies, but which is the superior stock? We will compare the two businesses based on the strength of their analyst recommendations, profitability, institutional ownership, dividends, earnings, valuation and risk.

Institutional & Insider Ownership

9.6% of SPAR Group shares are owned by institutional investors. 1.2% of Bright Horizons Family Solutions shares are owned by insiders. Comparatively, 50.9% of SPAR Group shares are owned by insiders. Strong institutional ownership is an indication that endowments, hedge funds and large money managers believe a stock will outperform the market over the long term.

Risk & Volatility

Bright Horizons Family Solutions has a beta of 1.27, suggesting that its share price is 27% more volatile than the S&P 500. Comparatively, SPAR Group has a beta of 0.34, suggesting that its share price is 66% less volatile than the S&P 500.

Analyst Recommendations

This is a breakdown of current recommendations and price targets for Bright Horizons Family Solutions and SPAR Group, as reported by MarketBeat.

	Sell Ratings	Hold Ratings	Buy Ratings	Strong Buy Ratings	Rating Score
Bright Horizons Family Solutions	1	2	4	1	2.63
SPAR Group	0	0	0	0	0.00

Bright Horizons Family Solutions currently has a consensus price target of $134.57, indicating a potential upside of 18.73%. Given Bright Horizons Family Solutions’ stronger consensus rating and higher possible upside, equities analysts plainly believe Bright Horizons Family Solutions is more favorable than SPAR Group.

Earnings & Valuation

This table compares Bright Horizons Family Solutions and SPAR Group”s top-line revenue, earnings per share and valuation.

	Gross Revenue	Price/Sales Ratio	Net Income	Earnings Per Share	Price/Earnings Ratio
Bright Horizons Family Solutions	$2.69 billion	2.40	$140.19 million	$3.05	37.16
SPAR Group	$163.63 million	0.16	-$3.15 million	$0.51	2.20

Bright Horizons Family Solutions has higher revenue and earnings than SPAR Group. SPAR Group is trading at a lower price-to-earnings ratio than Bright Horizons Family Solutions, indicating that it is currently the more affordable of the two stocks.

Profitability

This table compares Bright Horizons Family Solutions and SPAR Group’s net margins, return on equity and return on assets.

	Net Margins	Return on Equity	Return on Assets
Bright Horizons Family Solutions	6.34%	15.12%	5.27%
SPAR Group	-3.78%	-18.99%	-7.40%

Summary

Bright Horizons Family Solutions beats SPAR Group on 13 of the 15 factors compared between the two stocks.

About Bright Horizons Family Solutions

Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc. provides early education and childcare, back-up care, educational advisory, and other workplace solutions services for employers and families in the United States, Puerto Rico, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Australia, and India. The company operates in three segments: Full Service Center-Based Child Care, Back-Up Care, and Educational Advisory and Other Services. The Full Service Center-Based Child Care segment offers traditional center-based child care and early education, preschool, and elementary education services. The Back-Up Care segment provides center-based back-up child care, in-home child and adult/elder dependent care, school-age camps, virtual tutoring, and self-sourced reimbursed care services through child care centers, school-age campuses, and in-home caregivers, as well as the back-up care network. The Educational Advisory and Other Services segment offers tuition assistance and student loan repayment program administration, workforce education, and related educational consulting services, as well as college admissions and college financial advisory services. The company was formerly known as Bright Horizons Solutions Corp. and changed its name to Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc. in July 2012. Bright Horizons Family Solutions Inc. was founded in 1986 and is headquartered in Newton, Massachusetts.

About SPAR Group

SPAR Group, Inc., together with its subsidiaries, provides merchandising and brand marketing services in the Americas, the Asia-Pacific, Europe, Middle East, and Africa. The company offers merchandising and marketing services, such as resets and cut-ins; price and inventory audits; stock replenishment and rotation services; out of stock management; promotional event setup; and display management, as well as category management and set up services comprising category and product resets; planogram maintenance; display and shelf services; and point of purchase installation and management. It also provides remodel and retail transformation consisting of store remodels, store department resets, fixture and banner installations, pop-up store services, and store closings; and assembly and installation services, including assembly of merchandise in stores, in-store services, office setup/down-sizing services, and national in-home furniture assembly services. In addition, the company offers business analytics and insights services, such as product dashboards, stock out reporting, visit reporting, real-time service insights, and share of shelf analytics; and fulfillment and distribution services comprising distribution center staffing, point of purchase fulfillment services, kiosk prep, returns processing, picking and packing services, and inventory services. The company serves mass merchandisers; HBAs; pharmacies; and grocery, discount, dollar, convenience, cash and carry, home improvement, consumer electronics, automotive aftermarket, office supply, personal technology, beverage, household products, consumables, financial products, and independent stores. SPAR Group, Inc. was founded in 1967 and is headquartered in Auburn Hills, Michigan.