Startup secured $5M funding on July 23rd, 2024
Courses, extracurricular activities, sports sections, dance, yoga — what do they all have in common? That’s right — teachers and coaches. But sometimes, finding them is a tough task, scheduling can be tricky, and so on. That’s exactly where today’s startup comes in.
Core Idea
TeachMe.To offers people an “easy way to learn how to play.”
The core idea is to find the right coach near you and start taking lessons.
To do that, the startup has an app where you can search for instructors in your chosen discipline within your area, watch short videos where instructors introduce themselves, check out their pricing and conditions — and choose the one you like best to start learning with.
Through the app, you can learn not just baseball, basketball, soccer, tennis or golf. You’ll also find instructors for dance, healthy eating, dog training, yoga, guitar, piano, violin, singing, and even entrepreneurship. If something is taught in the world — chances are, there’s a teacher for it here.
Both kids and adults can use the app to find instructors — beginners or those continuing their education, whether they want to study one-on-one or in groups. The app has flexible filters to help you set your preferences and narrow down the search.
The startup doesn’t just connect students and teachers — it also handles issues and challenges that come up during the learning process. Their support team is available 16 hours a day, 7 days a week.
The startup charges instructors an initial fee to connect them with a student and also takes a commission for every lesson, since booking and payments are handled via the app. The upfront fee seems to exist to offset the risk of the teacher continuing lessons with the student outside the platform.
TeachMe.To raised its first $2 million in funding 2023' fall — and even OpenAI’s Sam Altman joined the round. Then, the company has raised another $5 million in 2024.
Fun Facts & Highlights
On one hand, the market has already seen plenty of similar projects that failed to take off.
But on the other — if even Sam Altman was impressed by their pitch, maybe this startup really has a shot at an untapped market?
Back in 2021, the startup’s founder decided to learn kite surfing.
He went to Google and searched for “kite surfing lessons near me.”
And then he felt like he’d been transported 20 years into the past — ugly, outdated websites run by kite surfing instructors, who were not only hard to trust at first glance but also constantly caused problems throughout the booking and communication process.
That’s when the founder decided to build an app that would let you quickly find local instructors for anything, instantly check details, instantly book lessons, and instantly resolve issues.
Turns out, the demand for well-organized offline lessons nearby was seriously underserved.
Traditional instructor marketplaces are basically just business card directories — no booking system, no integrated learning tools, no guarantees of quality. You’re on your own. And if you're a beginner who doesn't even know what to look for, good luck navigating that mess.
As a result, the startup's revenue grew 10x last year, and this year it's on track to grow another 4x.
According to the founder, TeachMe.To became the Airbnb or Uber for nearby offline lessons — unlocking not just massive demand, but also massive supply.
On the left side of their slide: number of instructors in one area when the app launched. On the right: number now. The difference is wild.
Why the explosion in instructors?
Because before, teaching private offline lessons was a nightmare.
You had to start a business, build a website, invest in marketing, persuade people, convert visitors into clients, accept payments, manage your own schedule, beg for reviews, do accounting and file taxes.
Now, all of that happens inside TeachMe.To:
A built-in CRM for managing students, scheduling, payments, customer support, and even tools for filing taxes.
All the instructor has to do is — teach.
This “out-of-the-box business” setup, with zero hidden costs or extra effort, keeps attracting more and more instructors.
More instructors means more choice and better prices, which brings in more students.
More students attract even more instructors.
And just like that — the app triggers a self-sustaining growth flywheel.
And that flywheel can keep spinning for a very long time — because the U.S. private instruction market is estimated at $100 billion, with $15 billion of that in local in-person lessons.
If $15B still sounds like a stretch, consider this:
Golf lessons alone in the U.S. account for $1 billion.
But why is the “offline lessons near me” trend only taking off now?
- Remote work is making people crave face-to-face interaction. Local offline lessons are a perfect way to mix real-world human connection with self-improvement.
- The aging population is growing thanks to longer life expectancy — and they want to stay mentally and physically sharp. That means activities like private chess coaching are on the rise.
- The remote-first generation is now becoming parents.
But they're having kids relatively late — the median age for a millennial's first child is 30.
And they’re looking for places where their kids can learn and socialize — sometimes even joining in the lessons with them.
Where Are We Runnin’?
When someone is learning to get a result, they can easily do it on their own or online. The internet is full of resources and online courses for self-education. But, interestingly enough, for many people, learning is a lifestyle — and a way to socialize. Some people learn languages on their own. Others prefer, say, in-person group Spanish classes, just to get out, meet people, and have some human interaction. And then there are things that are just hard to learn online: sports, music, working with your hands, dog training, gardening, landscape design — you get the idea. That’s why TeachMe.To is now heavily focused on sports instructors — one of the most offline-dependent teaching categories out there.
So yes — the demand for offline lessons nearby is real.
The real question is: how big is that demand, actually?
TeachMe.To’s core hypothesis is this:
Right now, demand is being artificially capped by lack of supply.
In other words — if tomorrow you suddenly had tons of good-quality local instructors available for anything, with clear availability, instant booking, and someone resolving all the logistics and misunderstandings — the number of people signing up for lessons would explode.
And in that sense, the comparison with Uber and Airbnb totally holds up.
Before those platforms existed, people used taxis only on special occasions.
Same with short-term apartment rentals — they were for niche cases, not everyday use.
But once Uber and Airbnb made those services accessible, fast, simple, and cheap, the behavior changed.
Everyone started using them.
And because the platforms increased demand, they didn’t lose revenue — they grew like crazy. TeachMe.To is betting on the same loop: Their platform makes it easy for anyone to start teaching offline, privately. That unlocks a wave of new instructors in every neighborhood — which brings in more students — which attracts even more instructors — and so on a spiral of growth.
If they’re right, we’re about to see the same kind of explosive growth in offline education that we saw in online learning a few years ago. And if that’s true — then now is the perfect time to build something in this space. Maybe even your version of TeachMe.To — but with more tools, more verticals, and more impact?
About Company
- Name: TeachMe.To
- Website: teachme.to
- Latest Round: $5M, 07.23.2024
- Total Fundings: $7M, rounds: 2