WHEN Denise Hodgetts was asked: "What are your hobbies and interests?" for the Worcestershire Business Woman of the Year Award she won in 1996, she was dumbstruck.

"When on earth would I have time for hobbies!" she exclaims.

The founder of Kiddies Day Nursery in Kidderminster and Stourport, just voted Wyre Forest Business Club's "Business of the Year", Denise agreed with the judge who described her as "obsessed" with her work. That is the secret of success, she says.

Partner Gary Southall influenced her decision 10 years ago to set up her own business because it was a way of making sure they got to see each other sometimes!

Even so, he is often on the phone at 8pm when Denise is using a quiet time to get to grips with work problems to suggest she call it a day.

Denise's first experience of childcare was as au-pair for an Italian countess. But her driving ambition was always to help mothers who go out to work and want quality childcare.

She was a "latch- key kid" herself, but that was in the days when older siblings and neighbours kept an eye when Mum was at work.

It was tough as a single working parent at 20 when Sophia, who now works in the the family business, was born.

She remembers the despair at once finding the nursery workers drinking and baby Sophia nappy-sore. She dreaded the rush to get her daughter ready in the morning and the race back from work before the nursery closed. But it was valuable experience.

Her present success she thinks is due to being in tune with mothers' needs.

When Denise left Hagley School at 16 she wanted to be an air hostess because of the glamour. Thankfully, her mother insisted on a college secretarial course. She became assistant export manager at Victoria Carpets and then worked in a training company in Dudley but was frustrated at the "glass ceilings" created by male dominance.

She also had her mother's genes: "Mum worked to get things Dad didn't want, like a TV or washing machine."

A strong feminist, she says she would have been a suffragette. She has disbanded tea rotas in offices she has worked in because "it's always the women who make the tea". Her bosses have had to bring in tea machines.

Still with a taste for glamour, Denise is planning a big 50th birthday party next summer and even taken up a hobby - getting in trim to look good in a ballgown.

She must also be fit for her daughter's birthday present - a Great Wall of China trek which she will walk in aid of the Foundation for the Study of Infant Deaths.