On a Thursday night, there were ten people in line to enter Hair of the Dog, a sports bar on the Lower East Side of Manhattan (New York) that usually attracts crowds on Sundays, to watch football games and drink during the day.
When each of the people arrived at the security guard, they had to show evidence to be admitted: official ID, proof of vaccination and profile on a dating app – not that they were there to look for singles online.
Instead, a company called Thursday was promoting a singles meeting — an antidote to online dating discouragement.
Participants expressed all sorts of frustrations with modern romances: app-driven encounters that rarely result in more than a chat; the waste of time involved in scouring profiles for redeeming qualities and possible warning signs; the pattern of racial discrimination in dating apps, which is very well documented; and the general feeling of hopelessness.
“I never find a ‘match,'” said Harrison Gottfried, 27, shortly after entering the bar. And when someone comes out of nowhere and stands out, on Tinder or Hitch, he said, they are often not legitimate.
Thursday seeks to differentiate itself from the competition through artificial scarcity: the app can only be accessed one day a week (yes, on Thursday).
When the clock hits midnight, users activate an icon that identifies they are free to date that day. And then, for 24 hours, they can select profiles and chat with people, just like on other dating sites.
When Thursday comes to an end, however, all matches are deleted and the app deactivates. The implication is that there’s no time to waste on small talk: the time to make an appointment is now or never.
To encourage real gatherings like these, Thursday organizes events in London and New York, the two cities in which it is currently operating. The meeting at Hair of the Dog was the eighth held in New York and attracted around 450 participants.
Antoniy Fulmes, 24, heard about the event through a promotional email. Asked about his position on online dating, he said that “I don’t want to find the love of my life through a sex app”. He added that “nobody on apps wants to talk. Maybe it’s personal. Maybe I’m ugly.”
Even the luckiest people finding matches seem to have asked for patience with apps. “Spending too much time looking through apps doesn’t necessarily result in a date,” said Andrew Chekalenkov, a drug rehabilitation therapist who participated in three of Thursday’s events. “It may feel good, but there is no substance.”
Matthew McNeill Love, 31, one of Thursday’s founders and vice president of operations, wanted to create a product that would help people go beyond the initial “ego shot” of finding a match, and move toward a connection. genuine.
“Getting ‘likes’ on Hinge is like getting ‘likes’ on Instagram,” he said in a phone interview in January.
“We’ve noticed that by limiting the use of the app to one day a week, people are forced to make a decision,” he said.
Love said that after it launched in July 2021, the Thursday app was downloaded 340,000 times before the company introduced its offline event series, called AfterParty. The first date took place in a London bar three months ago.
“All we did was promote it on the app,” Love said. “We didn’t do any advertising, no branding, we didn’t have representatives there wearing pink shirts, no ice-breaking activities. Just a normal bar.”
BUMBLE OPENS WINE BAR IN NEW YORK
Other dating apps have also started to explore the analogue side. Bumble, for example, opened a cafe and wine bar in New York’s NoLIta district recently.
The establishment is called Bumble Brew “and it’s designed not only for new connections to be built, but for everyone to come together and interact,” Julia Smith-Caulfield, the company’s director of brand partnerships, said in an email, adding that “real-life events have been one of our focuses.”
Despite their growing dissatisfaction with digital dating, most of those present at the Thursday meeting appeared to be using the same apps. They described Tinder as an app for casual sex, and Hinge as a marketplace for those looking for relationships. Hanna Choi, 28, said she uses Bumble to “talk to handsome men.”
A few participants said they now exclusively use Thursday, particularly for events that bring together singles. Moses McFly, 39, participated in three of them. “All the other apps are available seven days a week,” he said, and that can be exhausting.
And how is dating working, for singles? “I’m still not impressed, but the idea is a good one,” said Becky Kaploun, 24, an event planner who, when asked what dating apps she uses, responded with feigned amazement: “All of them.”
She’s sitting at a table with a friend, waiting to be approached by someone she’s interested in. “It’s the closest experience to meeting someone in real life,” Kaploun said.
The date seemed to be going well for Fulmes, who at one point yelled at his roommate that “I’ve already talked to six women! You’re falling behind.”
Nearby, a man was leading a woman through the crowd dancing to Sean Kingston’s “Beautiful Girls” and saying, loudly, “Let’s go over there to the corner. That’s where we can make out.”
Celeste Ortega, 26, an industrial designer, was at the event with Choi and said they had been approached by “zero people.” She said of the people in attendance that “I’m half disappointed and I don’t care”, and added that some of them seemed “desperate”.
When asked if she would attend another event, Ortega did not hesitate. “Oh my God,” she said. “Probably every Thursday for the rest of my life.”
Translation by Paulo Migliacci
I have over 8 years of experience in the news industry. I have worked for various news websites and have also written for a few news agencies. I mostly cover healthcare news, but I am also interested in other topics such as politics, business, and entertainment. In my free time, I enjoy writing fiction and spending time with my family and friends.
