The Story
A Swedish investor, who we highly respect, pinged us: "What's your opinion on the Withlocals team?". "Eh ... let me get back to you on that" was our answer. We realized something was cooking in our backyard and we weren't paying attention.
A short train ride to Eindhoven later and we heard about unique travel experiences, fast growth momentum and customer satisfaction rates that were going through the roof. We paid attention.
We studied all the unit economics but realized that just cohort analyses weren't doing the opportunity full justice. The very experienced Withlocals team had seemingly cracked a paradox. A model that could deliver uniquely local and personalized experiences - at scale. The one liner that hooked us came from founder Marijn: "We're the story people come home with."
After fessing up to our Swedish friend, we sat around the table with the team and hashed out an investment that would set the company up to 10x the number of stories people come home with.
