Withlocals to become the global leader in personalized travel experiences

With the recent raise of an additional €8 million in funding, Withlocals is on a mission to create a special connection between locals and visitors.

With start-up experience and two successful exits, Withlocals CEO Matthijs Keij is excited to leave a lasting impact in the travel space by connecting people and cultures. Matt is a member of Travel Massive Amsterdam.

Read the story behind the Eindhoven-based company and what makes them different.

Tell us about Withlocals?

Withlocals (withlocals.com) is a Dutch scale-up marketplace connecting tens of thousands of travelers each month with verified local hosts in over 30 cities across Europe and Asia. We offer personalized private tours and activities based on travelers’ passions like food, music, and sports.

Travelers can pick a local host from the Withlocals website or mobile app for the tour of their choice. With the help of their host, they can personalize the entire tour.

Withlocals goes directly against the grain of most mass tourism concepts and taps into the trend of personalized and private tours and activities all over the world.

We offer travelers the opportunity to experience a city like a local away from the masses. Our extensive and growing network of hosts offers us the scale and local insights to maintain an average customer rating of 9.8/10, which we’re very proud of.

What inspired the creation of Withlocals?

Here’s the story from Withlocals’ co-founder Marijn Maas:

When traveling to Sri Lanka for my honeymoon, I stayed in the most luxurious and exclusive resorts and traveled to all the tourist hot-spots in style. Because that’s what people do on a honeymoon, right?

But when me and my wife returned home and were asked what had stuck with us the most, it was that one evening where we, by sheer coincidence, ended up having dinner with a local Sri Lanki family.

Away from luxury and mass tourism, we found that truly unique experiences make the best stories and the exchange of people and cultures releases an energy that can brighten up the world.

It’s at the local family’s home that we had the best food, got the most special travel tips and had a real taste of the Sri Lanki culture.

Back home, me and my brother Willem got together and started thinking; Wouldn’t it be great if locals could indeed make a living by sharing their passion for their cities, while giving travelers unique personalized travel experiences and a taste of the real culture?

It was through the combination of Willem’s purpose and my experience that the concept of Withlocals was brought to life.

What makes Withlocals different?

In your busy life, holidays are the special moments you look forward to. Flights and accommodation have become logistics. It’s the experience that makes the difference, becomes the cherry on the cake.

Mass tourism is moving you away from the real local experiences, people and culture…

That’s why we connect travelers and locals in cities all over the world to create unique and personalized travel experiences that let you enjoy the city like a local.

Withlocals’ hosts play a massively important role when it comes to customer happiness and to create scale. Because the hosts go above and beyond to show travelers their city and their passion – from food to street art, music, sports.

As one of Withlocals’ customers put it: “I’ve been traveling all my life, but Withlocals made me see what traveling is all about.”

How are you making travel better?

We love to build relationships and connections between people and cultures. What better way to do that than through traveling, right?

Because when we are traveling, we open up to enjoy and experience the beautiful things in life, such as great local food, music, design and architecture.

To make sure we can really make that connection, we decided the experience has to be private and personalized. A group tour can be a lot of fun, but usually it makes it very hard to really connect with the local guide, as you will probably engage more with your fellow travelers.

Small groups of people and spreading them out across all parts of the city also helps to build a healthy balance between citizens and travelers, and helps avoid issues such as overtourism.

How can Travel Massive members work with you?

We’d love to learn from local chapter members about the favorite parts of their city. The other way around, we also like to help you with local events, networking, guide education and conversations with local tourism boards. If you see any additional opportunities, we’re always happy to chat!

Watch this video to learn how Withlocals works:

👉 See how you can become a partner, host or ambassador of Withlocals over the world.

Follow Matthijs and Withlocals on Travel Massive to connect with the team and learn more about their concept.