By Kim Hilsenbeck.
Ah, February. That month with the holiday about love. But this story is about the part before love: dating.
Specifically, how technology has changed the dating scene, seemingly forever. And perhaps for the better? Or maybe not.
Years back, using a dating service wasn’t necessarily something couples shouted from the rooftops. Not quite scandalous, but not quite acceptable either, couples frequently kept their answer to the “how did you meet” question hushed. They might agree to say they met in a bar to keep the truth from their children and the in-laws.
Back then, dating companies matched up two people who were considered compatible based on a series of profile questions. Customers had to go into an office, fill out some forms and have a photo – typically a Polaroid – taken.
Then they reviewed pages of profiles that seemed to match their own, based on interests and philosophies.
Fast forward to 10-15 years ago. Online dating sites sprouted up everywhere. One of the first mainstream companies, eHarmony, may have revolutionized the online dating industry with showing happy couples in TV ads on national networks with catchy music in the background.
Match.com came along and told everyone “It’s OK to look,” swinging the pendulum further in the direction of legitimizing the industry.
Since then, online dating websites have sprouted everywhere and advertising is abundant in every medium.
As with most everything, along with the good came the not-so-good … the questionable Craigslist postings, the Backpage.com website and the “hook-up” websites, such as tinder.com.
More recently, niche websites came along that segment customers into narrower groupings: Christiansonly.com, Farmersonly.com and Jewishonly.com. It’s perhaps Martin Luther King Jr.’s worst nightmare — people dating only within a certain group or race or category.
These days, there are even dating websites that promote short-term relationships, affairs and so-called sugar daddy arrangements where an older man pampers a young woman and takes care of her financially. Today, those women are increasingly college students looking for a way to pay the fast-rising cost of getting an education.
Whether one agrees with the premise or not, these sites are big business. At SeekingArrangement.com, their customer base topped 2.7 million users worldwide. Only sugar daddies pay a membership fee, though.
A recent news release by the Nevada-based firm touted the site as offering “Sugar Scholarships [to] provide real solutions to the problem of student debts.”
The idea is catching on. More than one million of its customers are college students. While Florida tops the list of the 20 fastest growing sugar baby schools – where female co-eds use sugar daddies to pay for their education – Texas is no slouch.
Five of the state’s colleges rank among the top 70 such schools, including #10 Texas State University in San Marcos and #30 the University of Texas at Austin.
Texas State alone has nearly 200 female students signed up with the website. Of course, there are sugar mommas looking for younger men on the site, too, but not nearly as many.
Spokesperson Leroy Valasquez said college students today graduate with an average debt of $24,030. Sugar daddies will pay for a sugar baby’s college education and living expenses, along with shopping sprees and other perks.
According to Valasquez, the average salary of a sugar daddy on the site is $225,000. About 33 percent also claim they are married. And while he said the site doesn’t actively promote adultery, he said nor does it filter out or prevent it from happening.
“We believe in mutually beneficial relationships,” he said.
The average college sugar baby receives approximately $3,000 per month in allowances and gifts from her sugar daddy. As an incentive, SeekingArrangement offers free premium memberships to students who register using their .edu email accounts.
(That’s how they know so many female college students use the site.)
Valasquez said SeekingArrangement.com is the world’s largest sugar baby/sugar daddy website. Founded in 2006, it was the brainchild of Brandon Wade, a self-proclaimed Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) nerd who never kissed a girl until he was 21.
Frustrated with women, he decided to take his mother’s advice: “Don’t worry, work hard, have a successful career and be generous to women.”
He created SeekingArrangement.com, along with four other online dating websites, as a result.
Valasquez said the site’s premise is all about generosity.
“There have always been wealthy men who find attractive women and take care of them,” he said. “Generosity goes a long way.”
All the way to the bank, it seems. Or the college tuition payment office.
