How Two Students Built Treinvertraging.nl and Got 10,000 Paying Customers in 4 Weeks
In this episode of Scaling with Purpose, host Mohamed Alkaduhimi sits down with Michael Hillhorst, founder of trein-vertraging.nl, to unpack how a frustrating daily commute turned into a fast-growing startup that helps train passengers claim the compensation they are owed.
Michael shares his journey from selling designs at age 13, to building a gaming trade platform at 16, to launching a train delay compensation service with co-founder Daan while studying computer science in Utrecht. What started as a tech side project became a real business when their first publicity push landed them 10,000 paying customers in just four weeks.
We dive into:
00:00 Intro and Michael's early entrepreneurial start
02:17 How trein-vertraging.nl began as a student problem
04:25 Why the Netherlands has 95% train punctuality vs Germany's 66%
05:35 The EU passenger rights framework explained
07:33 Shifting from tech-driven to business-driven thinking
09:33 Getting the first 10,000 customers through newspaper PR
13:12 Why traditional media is not scalable for growth
14:18 Building a real marketing machine with SEO, LinkedIn and paid ads
15:32 A churn rate under 1% and the no cure no pay model
16:09 Staying lean and the decision to finally build a team
17:43 Going international and delegating the known to explore the unknown
21:14 Expanding into Germany, France, Spain, Italy and the UK
22:18 The biggest technical challenges in scaling across countries
24:32 Choosing impact over short-term profit
26:51 Where to follow Michael's journey
Whether you are a founder, a product builder, or curious about how lean startups grow across borders, this conversation is packed with practical lessons on marketing, scaling, team building, and balancing commercial success with meaningful impact.
Follow Michael Hillhorst and co-founder Daan Ekman on LinkedIn for behind-the-scenes updates on their journey.
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