Finding growth through purpose

It all began with a dog called Dave and a house in Spain. When online pet-sitting platform TrustedHousesitters’ founder Andy Peck went abroad to look after an ex-pat’s house and pet in 2010, it’s hard to imagine he had any idea where it would lead him. Yet, nine years later, the idea that came to him on that trip has grown into a flourishing business. It’s now moved offices five times to accommodate remarkably rapid growth and has around 60 members of staff keeping the current HQ in Brighton a hive of activity.

The business is now run by Chief Exective Tim Lyons who noted: “The first two or three years were spent establishing the concept and getting the business off the ground. Our first employee was in early 2014 – that’s our current CTO. He helped bring the website in-house. And from there the business started to accelerate in terms of growth.”

The platform now has approaching 100,000 members globally, which compared to less than 10,000 just over five years ago is a remarkable measure of success. That membership base has spread to more than 130 countries, with its biggest markets spanning the oceans, including the US, UK, and Australia. Last year, the firm picked up the Amazon Growing Business Award.

“Up until 2018, that growth was developed organically,” says Lyons. TrustedHousesitters was entirely self-funded until it received private equity investment in 2018.

“The premise of our business is that it’s travel meets pets, with a global proposition,” adds Lyons.

Mutual benefit

The success of TrustedHousesitters shows what a unique proposition and clear sense of purpose can bring to a business. Unlike other sharing economy companies, where users operate as businesses within the community, it provides a two-sided platform with pet owners on one side and pet sitters on the other. Members pay an annual subscription fee and can use the platform as often as they like. In doing so, pet owners get peace of mind and go away knowing their house and pet are being looked after, and the pet sitters get to stay somewhere unique. The in-platform rating and review function allows users to build and exchange trust.

“We feel that we’re part of the real sharing economy,” says Lyons. “A lot of businesses teeter on the edge of it. But with TrustedHousesitters, what makes it unique is that there’s a mutual exchange of value which means that each side of the platform wins from the arrangement.”

Users are offered a money back guarantee if the platform doesn’t work out for them and an insurance proposition has recently been incorporated to offer homeowners further peace of mind.

Supporting the sharing economy

This June, TrusterHousesitters was involved with Global Sharing Week, an initiative to celebrate the exchanging of skills, knowledge, property, cars, values, trust and just about anything else that might be a part of the sharing economy.

It partnered with organiser, The People Who Share, to release a book called Generation Share that highlights the work done by businesses within the sharing economy that put purpose before profit. These include surplus food-sharing app, Olio, and crowdfunding platform, Beam, that raises funds for employment training for homeless people.

“It’s really a celebration and a promotion of grassroots sharing economy across the world,” says Lyons.

“We are really mindful of where we come from, promoting those smaller grass-roots businesses which are driving social enterprise is really important to us.”

The company was also invited to participate in a recent Parliamentary Review, responding to the rapid rise of the sharing economy.

“The Review aims to provide exposure to companies which can help the government start to shape public policy around business,” explains Lyons. TrustedHousesitters is providing a piece which will go into a publication by the Parliamentary Review alongside several others. It explains what the business is about, how they fit into the UK economy and what challenges it faces.

“It’s good forward-thinking to bring businesses like ours and others into the conversation,” adds Lyons. “The sharing economy is not necessarily something that has always been on the forefront in terms of public policy and it’s important that as more and more platform businesses emerge, that the government is aware of them and can start to shape the way that they behave around them. Sharing Economy UK is a great vehicle for that as well.”

Keeping pace of change

TrustedHousitters is responding to the speed of technical change too. “It’s important as a technology business to stay in front of the curve in terms of advancement,” adds Lyons. “In the last 12 months, we’ve launched a new site, we’ve launched an Android and an iOS app and we’re incorporating multi-lingual features in 2020. We’re continually working on new features including those which promote trust at the centre of our business.”

But regardless of the technical side of things, the member focused vision, mission statement and values built on care remain at the forefront the firm’s purpose. “In terms of our strategy,” says Lyons, “we’re focused on our members and on providing an even better member experience. We want to make sure that we’re giving them what they want and the best chance of being advocates for our business and promoting TrustedHousesitters by word of mouth.”

The proof of the benefit of those values is clear: a platform based on the exchange of trust has translated into open feedback for the business via Trustpilot that has garnered the platform a 9.6 rating out 10,000 reviews. Which, like the business, continues to grow.