77. Tutorful

Founders: Scott Woodley and Mark Hughes
Founded: August 2015
Website: www.tutorful.co.uk

Frequently asked by parents to recommend high quality private tutors that could boost their child’s performance, primary school teacher Scott Woodley quickly became frustrated at how difficult it was to match somebody reliable and recognised an opportunity to start a business.

He recruited his childhood friend Mark Hughes, then working as a technology analyst for a large investment firm, to help him solve the problem. Together they launched Tutorful (formerly Tutora) – a service that connects families in the UK with “the best” private tutors for after-school, at-home visits.

Although a number of similar companies have sprung up in recent years, Tutorful allows parents to browse tutors for free and only pay when a lesson has been completed – unlike rival marketplaces that require them to pay upfront to access a list of tutors.

The company takes a platform fee from the payment, starting at 25% and reducing down to a cap of 15% as the tutor teaches more lessons. Tutorful also uses a ‘best-match’ algorithm that allows tutors to be searched by number of lessons taught, reviews and ratings from parents, cost, proximity and more, to ensure students find a perfectly suited tutor.

Bootstrapped with around £18,000 of the founders’ own money, the company has already secured more than 7,000 active tutors, who are collectively delivering nearly 5,000 lessons per week, and is currently seeing 700% monthly revenue growth.

Having doubled its initial target to secure £700,000 in a campaign on Crowdcube in April 2017, Tutorful plans to unveil a range of exciting features including an online tuition portal and apps for students and tutors. And that’s just the start as it looks to become the largest tuition company in the UK within the next 12 months…