Europe’s Once app gives you just one match per day, promising more meaningful connections. But will it take off in the U.S.? When Jean Meyer returned to Paris after traveling abroad for several years, he was surprised to find so many of his friends still single. The fact that his smart, attractive female friends in their 30s didn’t have partners was particularly confusing. “My first reaction was, why wouldn’t they try a dating app?” Meyer says. He quickly learned they had tried them all and were fed up. Most users on Match and eHarmony were much older and in a different life stage, they said, while Tinder was about hooking up and one-night stands. There was nothing in between. “Why isn’t there a better dating app for people in their 30s?” Meyer wondered. So, he decided to create one. And with a unique twist — one that’s taking off in Europe, and maybe soon in the U.S. You heard it here first. In 2014, Meyer founded Once, the “slow dating” app. Once gives you just one match per day, every day at noon. If you’re both interested in each other, great. If not, you’ll get another match tomorrow. The important thing: The ability to incessantly swipe is gone. On average, millennials spend up to 10 hours a week on dating apps, according to a survey by U.K. dating platform Badoo. Meyer wanted to give them some of their time back. |