Skip to content

Thinking up a business model…
When it comes to tutoring, we have a broad public: all students with difficulties. The problem is that today, we aren’t responding to the needs of all those people. I started by asking myself: Who needs this? Then I asked: Whose needs are we meeting already? So I started thinking about how to fill the gap between the people already receiving the service and those who need it. I decided… we should create a structure that offers the same services since they have the same needs. For those who are able to pay, but also those who might not be. So that’s where I started building my idea for how to respond to those needs and how to fund the needs of those unable to pay for classes or at least not in full without getting into free classes. And that’s when I realized that going step by step and using the margins we make as a company… we could very likely, at least in part, reinvest some of that to finance classes for people who are unable to pay. So I started from a business model that already existed, that is a matching system between a tutor and a student. But I took things a bit farther by adding a social component and adjusting rates to household incomes.

Offering inclusive pricing…
Since the beginning, we’ve been offering several families classes at lower cost. The main issues is to have… higher turnover on our standard classes to be able to help a greater proportion of beneficiaries. The majority of parents who pay the standard rate… I wouldn’t say it doesn’t interest them that it funds reduced rate classes. But it’s the icing on the cake for them, since their priority is for me to meet their children’s needs. If I’m doing things that are social-responsible too with the money they’re giving me, well great!

Materializing it
I came up with a first idea, drew up a first estimate and put it to the test. Still today, the steps ahead aren’t immovable. It really is central in my business model… the distribution of reduced pricing. But I do think it’s something that will be continually tested, because when you’re faced with times like what we’re living through right now, chances are I’ll have to make changes to today’s organization to make it right. I think when you’re starting a business there are things you need to test over a long period if you don’t want to end up slipping away from what your market needs.