It was as though she struck gold when Jana Conev opened her Brookfield home day care in 1983. Conev's Cradle Infant Care Inc. quickly became an outlet for people looking for an alternative to franchise day care centers.

After Conev decided to return to work, she needed day care for her one-year-old daughter and her second daughter she was pregnant with at the time. She quickly discovered there was a lack of the type of care she wanted, so she started her own home day care business.

Conev then found ways to set herself apart from the competition.

Parents who were going to be late to pick up their children – or who needed their children to stay at Conev’s overnight – had a special signal to communicate their dilemma.

“They would call and let the phone ring once,” she said. “Then I would know not to worry, and that their child would be staying with me for a while.”

A day care located near Conev, a branch of KinderCare Learning Centers Inc., charges $279 a week for a two-year-old, including meals and snacks. But KinderCare fines parents $1 for every minute they are late after 6:15 p.m.

Conev charges $300 a week and includes meals, snacks, diapers and a flexible schedule.

Conev wanted parents to feel comfortable when leaving their child, and she worked hard to make sure they did. She even renovated a room in her home where mothers could breast feed before leaving their child.

Her hard work paid off when five of her original clients followed her when she moved to Willowbrook in 1990, a 15-mile roundtrip commute to keep their children in Conev's care.

"It was like my daughter was in her own home," said Martha Brunette, one of Conev's original clients. “I liked [Conev's Cradle] better than day care centers because I liked all the one-on-one attention. It was an extremely positive and personal environment."

As demand increased, Conev’s Cradle expanded.

Conev added seven rooms including a second kitchen and a 550-square-foot playroom to her Willowbrook home, which also had a two-acre backyard.

Conev has always cared for children between the ages of six weeks and five years old. Soon-to-be mothers filled spots on her waiting list, which two years ago reached 10 families. The list slowly disappeared, however, as the sluggish economy took a toll on business.

Conev's Cradle reached its lowest point around March 2008.

"My phone is usually ringing off the hook at that time [of year]," Conev said. “But I can count on one hand how many interviews I have had in the last year."

Conev now advertises on sittercity.com, a Web site that connects parents with local babysitters and day care centers; on dexknows.com, an online local business directory; and in three local newspapers.

The marketing increased Conev’s advertising expenses to almost $500 a month, up from $200.

The number of registered licenses has been decreasing in the past few years, according to the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services. Between December 2007 and December 2008, the number of licensed home day cares dropped 3.1 percent to 9,761 from 10,063.

The number of licensed day care centers in the state also dropped during that time, falling 3.2 percent to 2,896 from 2,990.

Illinois state law requires the operator of a day care business to obtain a license from DCFS. The license is required to care for more than three children who are not siblings and also includes guidelines for total area dimensions and food.

Recessions often lead to an increase in both legal and illegal "underground" child care, or care without a license, according to Tom Copeland, family child care business coordinator at Resources for Child Caring in Minneapolis. Parents who are laid off often turn to day care for a quick income, but avoid getting a license, for fear of not passing state regulations, he said.

"It has happened during recessions in the past," Copeland said. “And it's happening now.”

Eva Hartwig, director of Wee Care Children's Center at Skokie Valley Baptist Church in Skokie, Ill., said her center has lost quite a bit of business over the past year.

"Parents are looking for alternatives to day care,” Hartwig said. “Or they're putting their kids in fewer days a week. We took a huge hit last summer…and another decrease as this summer has been approaching."

According to Copeland, day cares often lower prices to help when families are suffering financially. However, since Conev’s expenses haven’t decreased, she couldn't lower her rates quickly enough for parents to really see a difference.

"It doesn't matter if I have two kids or eight kids here, because the bills are the same and they keep going up,” she said.

Conev lowered her license capacity from 12 children to eight to reduce expenses. Her enrollment is now down to five children, when only two years ago she had a dozen, with a waiting list.

Three years ago she could bring in annual revenue of $100,000, which fluctuated only slightly from year to year. Her income has since been cut in half, so Conev has gotten a little more creative in her marketing.

"I leave my business cards near the baby food in the grocery store, or in the shopping cart," she said. "I leave them everywhere."

Five-year-old Joshua Sander has gone to Conev's Cradle since he was three months old. Although Josh's dad lost his job last winter, his parents wanted to keep him enrolled at Conev's Cradle as long as possible.

"I'd rather have their lives not be affected and have them not really understand what's going on," said Julie Sander, Josh's mother. "They get a lot of attention here... It's like they're family and that's what you want when you aren't the one that's going to be watching your children."

Despite the struggles from the slow economy, Conev isn’t ready to give up.

"I've got 16 years until I can retire," she said. “I'm gonna hang in there… I just have to figure out how to let the people who need me know I'm here."