UKTN | The Podcast

This week we are joined by Mathew Prior, CEO of TrustedHouseSitters - an integrated platform and community that allows pet owners to find sitters to look after their home and pets whilst they are on holiday. Prior shares his thoughts on why their platform is a better service than Airbnb and what they’re doing differently to counteract over-tourism and the safety of traveling alone. He gets into how they built a passionate community of 85,000 members globally and the importance of engaging your community for the success of your business. Prior also opens up on recently closing a $10m Series A round to fund their US expansion.

Show Notes

Mathew Prior gets candid on the concept of TrustedHouseSitters and why they’re different in more than one way to Airbnb. Making sure they weren’t just another travel app, Prior talks about how they actively built a likeminded community passionate about pets, travel and being environmentally conscious. He gets into the bones of the business and how they ended up with an immensely large American user base. Prior highlights what it means to engage your community and how that, for them, massively contributed to the success of their business. Recently closing a $10m Series A round, Prior shares future plans for TrustedHouseSitters and what a US expansion will look like. 

Prior is a successful and highly respected global travel and leisure leader with significant experience across multiple industry sectors, business models and geographies. He has led and grown some of the most iconic experiential leisure brands across the globe, ranging from Crystal Ski, the UK’s largest ski tour operator, Le Boat, the European leader in self-drive boating vacations and Sunsail & The Moorings, the worldwide leader in yacht charter vacations based in the USA. As a portfolio Managing Director at Travelopia, Prior also co-led the buyout of TUI Group’s niche leisure businesses. 

Prior balances clear strategic thinking and decision-making with a robust approach to strategy execution in international organisations. He has led both high growth businesses and those requiring the strong leadership of a performance turnaround, harnessing the power of digital technology to deliver new and innovative customer experiences to drive growth.  
His focus now is on scaling TrustedHousesitters globally to fulfil its potential to disrupt the vacation pet care market. 

What is UKTN | The Podcast?

Each week, Jane Wakefield sits down with some of the key movers and shakers from the UK tech ecosystem for the UKTN Podcast. Learn growth strategies from both seasoned and up-and-coming founders, hear market sentiments from investors, and understand the tech policy affecting businesses across the country.

The UKTN Podcast provides insight into the most influential people in the UK’s innovation economy, exploring their personal and professional journeys and hearing their views on the hottest tech topics of the day.