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Missouri-based Varsity Tutors Expands Business to Business Model to Help Working Parents

  • September 08, 2020

Varsity Tutors, an innovative Missouri-based company and the nation’s leading provider of one-on-one instruction, has been hard at work since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic earlier this year.

In March, the company launched a free set of online classes for students in kindergarten through 12th grade. In April, the company doubled down on its response to COVID-19, announcing that it had developed a virtual summer camp program. And in May, the company stepped up its game even more, adding four celebrities to its lineup of teachers.

But the company hasn’t stopped there. Virtual learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic is creating growth in a new sector: business to business sales.

Varsity Tutors founder and CEO Chuck Cohn said the company has experienced a “massive uptick” in outreach from companies, as many school districts nationwide have geared up to begin their school year remotely. Companies are looking for support for employees simultaneously navigating their child’s virtual school day and working from home.

“It’s just not possible to balance all the different demands and companies are starting to become very concerned about productivity and attrition,” said Cohn.

The shift comes as Varsity Tutors has expanded and altered its product offerings in recent months amid the pandemic. Cohn said companies are approaching Varsity Tutors with different needs.

“Given that each organization is different, we’re set up in such a way that we can customize it based on really any budget,” said Cohn. “I’d say half the companies are squarely focused on just supporting the K-12 parents and the other half want all of their employees to have access to the program, and are very interested in the professional training solutions we have, too.”

The startup had been focused on expanding its classes prior to the pandemic. However, that all changed as much of the country shifted to remote working.

“We’ve really evolved and transformed our business over the course of the last five months,” said Cohn. “We’ve moved to a 100% online business and then we’ve grown the number of people that are participating in classes dramatically. We now have more people doing online classes than we do tutoring, which is a huge shift for the business.”

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