Online Personals Watch

Internet Dating Is Flourishing

COURIER POST ONLINE -- May 26 -- There are about 93m single people in the U.S, according to the U.S. Census Bureau but only three million use online dating services. And then there are countless others who turn to professional matchmaking companies. The Right One prides itself on an effective approach that results in a match nationally every 17 minutes and a wedding per day. It's Just Lunch International, doesn't release statistics but the company's president, Irene LaCota, points to its continued expansion in and outside the country as solid proof that its program for the last 18 years indeed works. Both companies agree that the majority of their clients are in their 30s, 40s and 50s, and come from all walks of life. The Right One declined to disclose pricing of its packages, and It's Just Lunch International said its lowest-tier package starts at $1,000. There are many singles that avoid online dating services because they don't want to sacrifice their privacy. FULL ARTICLE COURIER @ POST ONLINE

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Matchmakers Cash In On Business Of Love

CHICAGO TRIBUNE -- Feb 9 -- "When the Dow is down, dating and love are up," said Barbie Adler, president of Selective Search, a matchmaking service based in Chicago. Selective Search charges $15,000 fee for a full year of service. The personal touch is also fueling growth for It's Just Lunch, a matchmaking service launched in Chicago seventeen years ago with offices in 100 locations. Members pay $1,800 a year to be matched for lunch, drinks or brunch. Chicago sales climbed 8% in 2008, and January was up 4% from the prior year. FULL ARTICLE @ CHICAGO TRIBUNE

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Online Personals: Changing Norms, Changing Business Models

CLASSIFIED INTELLIGENCE REPORT -- Oct '08 -- JupiterResearch predicts the online dating industry will hit $1.9 billion by 2012, not including matchmaking services at $250m+ in the U.S. Mark Brooks, who monitors the personals industry, pegs 2004 as the year when dating sites matured. "There are less people on dating sites, but they're spending more money." The CEO of The Right One/Together Dating, Paul Falzone has been in the business 20 years. "When times are good, people want someone to share the fun with. When times are bad, they want companionship."

The Free factor - Free has become a very real factor in the industry, with the emergence of PlentyOfFish.com. POF has more than 10m profiles, and 2m active monthly users. "He's the renegade of the market," said Brooks. "He's making the other players think about advertising money." Frind acknowledges that his $10m in yearly ad revenue has gotten people's attention, but he thinks the traditional dating sites are too invested in the paid-membership model to shift gears.

The Facebook factor - Many in the online dating industry believe social networks will not be a negative factor because SN are for friends and people are posting all sorts of material there they might not want a prospective date to see. But Robert Lee, who has been reviewing dating sites at ALoveLinksPlus.com, believes Facebook is going to figure out how to establish different layers of access, so a user can create a dating-oriented profiles that not everyone can see. As of Oct. 18, Facebook had 497 dating applications.

Different marketing and revenue models - "Personals ads" in newspapers was disrupted by the Internet in the mid-1990s but is being revived with a new focus on Web-first publishing, promoted in print. Another model uses the Web as its operating venue, but drives new customers through heavy advertising in traditional media. Cupid.com makes deals with radio stations to run ads for free in exchange for a share of revenue and claims a conversion rate of 13%. eHarmony and Match spend millions on TV advertising. The typical revenue model is "browse for free, connect for a fee." Matchmaking sites such as Kelleher and Associates, Together Dating and It's Just Lunch have a dual role in the online ecosphere. First, they buy leads from online dating sites, creating yet another line of revenue. Paul Falzone bought LoveAccess.com as a way to generate his own leads. In the 1980s, Falzone's cost per lead was $200-$250 using direct mail. Now his goal is to get that number to zero.

Growth of explicit sites - At the Internet Dating Conference held in London in September, the hallway buzz was all about the explosion in numbers of women signing up for adult sites like Fling.com and AdultFriendFinder. "I'd call it a sexual awakening," said Brooks. "Guys have always been interested in the adult sites, but this is new." The average length of membership on a regular dating site is three months, compared with five months on an adult site.

The future - Mobile and video remain theoretical game-changers, enabling potential match-ups by proximity or direct communication. Brooks sees another potential business model emerging from academic research: a dramatic improvement in the quality of matching.
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Lookin' For Love In Canada

CANWEST -- Aug 16 -- A growing number of Canadians are willing to pay for services such as online dating, speed dating, singles groups and matchmakers. Kim Hughes, editor-in-chief of Lavalife, says there are two key reasons that people pay to date: efficiency and customized searches. It's Just Lunch is a matchmaking service that works with upscale restaurant partners and charges $1,995 for one-year membership. Meet Market Adventures is a more casual singles service. It is a "pay-as-you-play" model with no membership fee, but individual fees are charged for each event. Meet Market organizes approximately 35 to 45 events every month. Justin Parfitt was single and looking to improve on existing speed-dating models when he founded his company, FastLife, in Australia in 2003. FastLife is now based in Toronto and has expanded into Canada, the U.S., New Zealand, the U.K. and China. The price of a standard event is $79 and includes an open bar. FULL ARTICLE @ THE WINDSOR STAR

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$1900 For 14 Dates

POST BULLETIN -- June 25 -- It's Just Lunch is a dating service for busy professionals, founded in 1991 by a Chicago woman whose engagement was called off. Her tedious search to meet "normal," well-educated professionals inspired her to help others. An annual membership fee of $1,900 ensures at least 14 dates. It's Just Lunch works with select restaurants, and arranges lunch, happy hour or dinner reservations for each couple. Clients reveal only their first names and are seated together by the restaurant host. Each person pays for their own bill. The Rochester branch opened in January, although the company has been working with Rochester clients for the past 10 years. FULL ARTICLE @ POST BULLETIN

Mark Brooks: One wonders, is the internet dating industry leaving money on the table?

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It's Just Lunch Singapore Goes To Bangkok

PR WEB -- Mar 19 --  The dating agency, It's Just Lunch!, is adding another global branch. This time in Bangkok, Thailand. Now the clients have an opportunity to date a bigger pool of singles from not just one city but two: Singapore and Bangkok. FULL ARTICLE @ PR WEB

Matchmakers, And Virtual Dates With Omnidate

CBC -- Feb 15 -- Andrew Lekas is a busy man looking for love and tired of the bar scene. So he's hired a matchmaker to do all the leg work. Ruth Fox, an It's Just Lunch Matchmaker: "What we basically do is set up fun first dates, easy first dates." It's Just Lunch hand picks a blind date and no need to worry about choosing a restaurant, its all taken care of. Now let's say you want to meet people in a bar but not leave home. Omnnidate is a virtual date where singles can interact in a simulated dating environment online from the comfort of their own home. SEE THE VIDEO HERE

Finding Time For Love

ENTREPRENEUR -- Sep 26 -- Many entrepreneurs run successful businesses, but can't manage successful dating lives. Packed schedules lead to little personal time. More so than others, entrepreneurs need to identify goals, tradeoffs, and budgets. And should utilize the dating sites created just for them, including TableForSix, ItsJustLunch, EntrepreneurDating, and BusinessSingles. FULL ARTICLE @ ENTREPRENEUR

Dating Options In Tucson

ARIZONA DAILY STAR -- Aug 02 -- In a sprawling, college town like Tucson, it can be hard for more mature singles to find true love. Luckily, services like online dating, speed dating, and It's Just Lunch exist. One of the more unique options, Tucson Fun & Adventures, isn't even a dating service. Founded in 1997, the group is definitely more of an activities club, but singles looking for a little rock climbing or wine tasting adventure might find something more. FULL ARTICLE @ AZ NIGHT BUZZ

$2m Awarded to Lonely Heart Who Lost $125,000 to Dating Agency

THE GUARDIAN -- June 1 -- Orly the Matchmaker is a "high-end matchmaking service catering to celebrities, royalties, famous people and all wonderful single men and women out there." Anne Majerik, a 60-year-old widowed social worker saw an ad in an in-flight magazine but the search for romance ended in disillusion and finally court. This week a jury in Los Angeles awarded Ms Majerik $2.1m (£1.1m) in damages. Majerik's lawyer said, "She's developed a niche out there to prey on women who are lonely or divorced." The size of the jury's award is unprecedented. "I hear of high-end matchmaking firms charging tens of thousands of dollars a year," said Mark Brooks, the editor of onlinepersonalswatch.com. "But to pay $100,000-plus, that's just not wise."  Ms Hadida plans to appeal. FULL ARTICLE @ THE GUARDIAN

Mark Brooks: Orly is giving reputable matchmakers a bad name. I can understand $10's of thousands for high-end service, but $100k+. Obscene. Buyer beware. Great Expectations, It's Just Lunch, The Right One/Together Dating, and Table for Six are examples of exemplary, well established, real world services. $2500, ok. $25k, hmm?  $125k, crazy! 

Love on the Web

BBC NEWS -- Feb 2 -- There are 12 million unattached people in Britain. Since the 1960s, the number of people with no-one to go home to has quadrupled. Two thirds of single people looking for love have signed up to dating agencies. Nate Elliot, an analyst with JupiterResearch explains "the sites give people an opportunity to see a lot of other singles in an environment that's very comfortable for them. "There's not a lot of risk and there's not a lot of stress involved in browsing profiles from home." Upmarket conventional agencies are riding high too. Far from being wiped out by the web the internet's actually brought dating into people's homes and it's taken away a lot of the taboo.  Offline agencies cater to a much more select clientele.  FULL ARTICLE @ BBC NEWS

Mark Brooks: Great Expectations, Together Dating/The Right One and It's Just Lunch are the biggest national matchmaking organizations in Great Britain.

Patent Threat Looms

VNUNET -- Aug 31 -- Former web acceleration company EpicRealm has filed lawsuits against 13 companies, including eHarmony, It's Just Lunch and FriendFinder, for allegedly infringing on two patents that cover the way in which many dynamic web pages are constructed and served.  The Texas-based company filed the first lawsuit If the patents are upheld in court, they could apply to "most modern e-commerce sites involved in dynamic web page generation and caching", according to Ira Rothken, representing FriendFinder.  Rothken claimed the patents are invalid because somebody else invented the technologies covered in the patents before EpicRealm.  FULL ARTICLE @ VNUNET

Willing to Buy a Little Help in Finding Love

TORONTO STAR -- Feb 19 -- It's Just Lunch is a growing operation with annual revenue of more than $30 million, 70-odd franchises, and plans to expand all over the world.  Websites like match.com and lavalife are reportedly runaway successes and business darlings.  Tory Howat started Equal Chemistry in 2004 after deciding to turn her knack of knowing who would love whom into a business. The focus of her business is fitness: those people who are serious about sport and training (therefore have something in common right away).  FULL ARTICLE @ THE STAR

Mark Brooks: Many predicted the demis of traditional dating services with the rise of online personals.  Both seem to be faring well. 

Old-school dating service for the cyber-averse

MIAMI HERALD -- Feb 14 -- It's Just Lunch has stuck in there, and today claims a presence in 75 cities.  $1,500 annual membership for 14 lunch dates. An hourlong face-to-face interview follows.  Discretion is built into the system. Pannucci works with about 50 restaurants, where she has an understanding with the maitre d': No one is to utter, 'It's Just Lunch.'  After the date, Pannucci's staff calls clients to get feedback about whether it was a good setup. ''That's what separates us from all the other services out there: the personal touch,'' she said.  She advertises in the Miami New Times and seven airline magazines, and is listed in the Yellow Pages. Members who enroll a friend get an extra first date. She currently has a total of 1,000 members, she said.

Mark Brooks: $1500 a year to meet singles who are screened and really serious about not being single...and can afford $1500.   

Las Vegas Business Press

LVBP--It's Just Lunch (founded '91) has 65 outlets around the world that match clients with dates through lunch or cocktails after work. Taylor opened the Las Vegas It's Just Lunch in March and has built a client base of more than 200 singles in 6 months. With it's one-year membership cost of $1,500 (16 dates), the company targets individuals between 30 and 45 years old...$75,000 average start-up cost...50%+ operating expenses is advertising; print and radio.  LAS VEGAS BUSINESS PRESS