The mail-order bride boom

[spookyturtle 9,465]

Not really mail-order, but a modern version of it.

AnastasiaDate, the leading ‘premium international dating’ site, opens its books for the first time. And business is good.

FORTUNE — Anastasia doesn’t seem particularly concerned that I’m not interested in marrying her. The 23-year-old Ukrainian is gamely answering questions in our private Internet chat room, which is costing me about a buck a minute. In fact, she seems to like me. She’s sending me emoticons and even wants to know what I would title a book that was based on my life. (Not really sure, I tell her.)

I’m on AnastasiaDate.com, the leading provider of “premium international dating” services for singles looking for love abroad. (Her name being the same as the site’s is a coincidence.) Premium international dating is a new name for what’s traditionally referred to as the mail-order bride business. And thanks to people like me willing to pay to talk with beautiful young women like Anastasia — who was paid to respond — the trade is doing pretty well.

Revenue numbers for the mail-order bride industry are hard to come by. But AnastasiaDate shared its sales and growth statistics exclusively with Fortune. The company made $110 million in 2012. In 2013, it projects it will make $140 million. Its user growth is even more impressive: The site’s traffic grew 220% in 2012. It now has four million users, who cumulatively spend some 360 million hours on the site per year. It racked up 2.6 million visits in March alone.

AnastasiaDate is not alone. The advent of globalization and the ubiquity of online dating has set the stage for new-age mail-order bride companies to gain unprecedented popularity. According to market research firm Experian Marketing Services, the top 10 premium international dating sites drew 12.2 million visits in March.

That’s a 29% uptick from March of last year — a huge increase compared to the rest of the relatively stagnant online dating industry. In March, AnastasiaDate was the 29th most popular online dating service period, in a category of 1,400 sites.

And the company believes there’s room for expansion. “I think there’s a lot of pent-up demand,” says Chief Strategy Officer Mark Brooks. “People are realizing that there’s a bigger world than Match.com.”

To achieve the kind of growth Brooks is hoping for, though, the company will have to overcome the deep stigma surrounding the mail-order bride industry. The practice conjures images of women desperate to marry out of failing economies; and of unappealing American men looking for a traditional (read: submissive) mate to keep the house clean. Not surprisingly, the growing industry is attempting to shine up its reputation.

Brooks sees international dating today as being on the cusp of respectability — in much the same way online dating was in its early stages, before people accepted it as just another way to meet someone. Eventually, he foresees American women using the site and predicts that the economic disparities will fade away, but that may be a long way off. For now,

AnastasiaDate is making a big push to go mainstream with its current model, as mainstream as courting younger foreign women from underperforming economies can really get, that is.

Early this year, the Moscow-based company hired Brooks, who is a prominent online dating industry consultant, to head up its growth strategy. It has also expanded its U.S. presence, hiring more Americans and opening a New York office. It brought on a Manhattan-based PR firm and says it will spend more than $45 million on marketing this year. Recently, it ran ads on CNBC, Discovery, Golf, the History Channel, and CNN. Says Brooks, “We are very, very sensitive to reputation now.”

The company is also trying to clean up its act. For example, the online interaction I had with Anastasia, where she got a small kickback for minutes chatting with me, is against company policy. “It is outright forbidden,” Brooks says. “Abuse still happens, and we’re raising our game to stamp it out.” The company is planning a crackdown on its local partner agencies who pay women to interact on the site.

Brooks chalks up problems so far to the growing pains of globalization. The site simply scaled too fast to meet strict standards of quality control. But he says those wrinkles will be smoothed out as dating overseas becomes more widely acceptable. “If you consider where we’re going as a global society there’s no question that this is the direction we’re heading,” Brooks says. “Socially, we’re becoming more international. This is a good thing.”

Today’s premium international dating industry looks radically different from the mail-order bride trade did 10 years ago. For starters, it’s much bigger. According to U.S. immigration statistics and analysis from the Tahirih Justice Center, there were roughly 200 international marriage broker agencies in 1999, which coordinated between 4,000 and 6,000 marriages.

In 2010, there were 400 such agencies, and between 10,000 and 15,000 resultant weddings. But that’s only part of the story. The business now exists largely online. In fact, the vast majority of AnastasiaDate users will never actually go abroad to meet the women they’re chatting with.

http://fortune.com/2013/04/09/the-mail-order-bride-boom/

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

I'm surprised those sort of dating sites are allowed to operate to be honest.

While it's entirely possible to meet someone online and fall for them (and it's how many people meet), developing such a relationship over a long distance definitely has the odds stacked against it those sites seemed to be geared towards a particular outcome. Personally, I think it's a bit dubious.

Edited April 28, 2015 by Venkman

[spookyturtle 9,465]

I'm surprised those sort of dating sites are allowed to operate to be honest.

While it's entirely possible to meet someone online and fall for them (and it's how many people meet), developing such a relationship over a long distance definitely has the odds stacked against and to be part of the site deliberately seeking such an outcome seems a bit dubious to me.

I would guess that there is a sizable portion who are seeking that outcome, but I do know a few couples who met online in other ways and ended up getting married- they weren't seeking a spouse on sites that specialized in hooking people up. Several years back I knew a couple that met on an online cribbage forum!

[Trumplestiltskin 5,791]

Oh it happens for sure - people meet through online games, chat rooms, message boards etc. It certainly does happen. But again when the relationship starts with a significant distance barrier... Well let's just say that it's no coincidence that the divorce rate is higher than average.

[Janelle2002 3,865]

This amazes me. Mail order brides. American women struggle with getting married. Dudes want to date and play the field for years, but will order a bride off of the internet. Unbelievable.

[spookyturtle 9,465]

This amazes me. Mail order brides. American women struggle with getting married. Dudes want to date and play the field for years, but will order a bride off of the internet. Unbelievable.

In all fairness, there are a lot of US women on this site with foreign husbands too.

[Janelle2002 3,865]

In all fairness, there are a lot of US women on this site with foreign husbands too.

Cause you can't get a husband in the states.

[spookyturtle 9,465]

Cause you can't get a husband in the states.

Plus the foreign men have bigger tally whackers.

[Janelle2002 3,865]

Plus the foreign men have bigger tally whackers.

so guys in the U.S. feel bad about their small tally whackers so go they abroad and get women who are used to even smaller tally whackers to make them feel better?

[Rob L 3,811]

Plus the foreign men have bigger tally whackers

tally whackers, Porky's the movie is the cultural gift that keeps on giving

Edited April 28, 2015 by Rob L

[spookyturtle 9,465]

tally whackers, Porky's the movie is the cultural gift that keeps on giving

[We Keep Receipts 9,238]

Brink Porky's back!!!

[The Nature Boy 4,224]

Not really mail-order, but a modern version of it.

AnastasiaDate, the leading ‘premium international dating’ site, opens its books for the first time. And business is good.

FORTUNE — Anastasia doesn’t seem particularly concerned that I’m not interested in marrying her. The 23-year-old Ukrainian is gamely answering questions in our private Internet chat room, which is costing me about a buck a minute. In fact, she seems to like me. She’s sending me emoticons and even wants to know what I would title a book that was based on my life. (Not really sure, I tell her.)

I’m on AnastasiaDate.com, the leading provider of “premium international dating” services for singles looking for love abroad. (Her name being the same as the site’s is a coincidence.) Premium international dating is a new name for what’s traditionally referred to as the mail-order bride business. And thanks to people like me willing to pay to talk with beautiful young women like Anastasia — who was paid to respond — the trade is doing pretty well.

Revenue numbers for the mail-order bride industry are hard to come by. But AnastasiaDate shared its sales and growth statistics exclusively with Fortune. The company made $110 million in 2012. In 2013, it projects it will make $140 million. Its user growth is even more impressive: The site’s traffic grew 220% in 2012. It now has four million users, who cumulatively spend some 360 million hours on the site per year. It racked up 2.6 million visits in March alone.

AnastasiaDate is not alone. The advent of globalization and the ubiquity of online dating has set the stage for new-age mail-order bride companies to gain unprecedented popularity. According to market research firm Experian Marketing Services, the top 10 premium international dating sites drew 12.2 million visits in March.

That’s a 29% uptick from March of last year — a huge increase compared to the rest of the relatively stagnant online dating industry. In March, AnastasiaDate was the 29th most popular online dating service period, in a category of 1,400 sites.

And the company believes there’s room for expansion. “I think there’s a lot of pent-up demand,” says Chief Strategy Officer Mark Brooks. “People are realizing that there’s a bigger world than Match.com.”

To achieve the kind of growth Brooks is hoping for, though, the company will have to overcome the deep stigma surrounding the mail-order bride industry. The practice conjures images of women desperate to marry out of failing economies; and of unappealing American men looking for a traditional (read: submissive) mate to keep the house clean. Not surprisingly, the growing industry is attempting to shine up its reputation.

Brooks sees international dating today as being on the cusp of respectability — in much the same way online dating was in its early stages, before people accepted it as just another way to meet someone. Eventually, he foresees American women using the site and predicts that the economic disparities will fade away, but that may be a long way off. For now,

AnastasiaDate is making a big push to go mainstream with its current model, as mainstream as courting younger foreign women from underperforming economies can really get, that is.

Early this year, the Moscow-based company hired Brooks, who is a prominent online dating industry consultant, to head up its growth strategy. It has also expanded its U.S. presence, hiring more Americans and opening a New York office. It brought on a Manhattan-based PR firm and says it will spend more than $45 million on marketing this year. Recently, it ran ads on CNBC, Discovery, Golf, the History Channel, and CNN. Says Brooks, “We are very, very sensitive to reputation now.”

The company is also trying to clean up its act. For example, the online interaction I had with Anastasia, where she got a small kickback for minutes chatting with me, is against company policy. “It is outright forbidden,” Brooks says. “Abuse still happens, and we’re raising our game to stamp it out.” The company is planning a crackdown on its local partner agencies who pay women to interact on the site.

Brooks chalks up problems so far to the growing pains of globalization. The site simply scaled too fast to meet strict standards of quality control. But he says those wrinkles will be smoothed out as dating overseas becomes more widely acceptable. “If you consider where we’re going as a global society there’s no question that this is the direction we’re heading,” Brooks says. “Socially, we’re becoming more international. This is a good thing.”

Today’s premium international dating industry looks radically different from the mail-order bride trade did 10 years ago. For starters, it’s much bigger. According to U.S. immigration statistics and analysis from the Tahirih Justice Center, there were roughly 200 international marriage broker agencies in 1999, which coordinated between 4,000 and 6,000 marriages.

In 2010, there were 400 such agencies, and between 10,000 and 15,000 resultant weddings. But that’s only part of the story. The business now exists largely online. In fact, the vast majority of AnastasiaDate users will never actually go abroad to meet the women they’re chatting with.

http://fortune.com/2013/04/09/the-mail-order-bride-boom/

I will conjure up KIP and get him to elaborate .

[Jacque67 7,328]

I joined a dating service as a joke over Christmas but didn't post my photo. (my location is JAPAN).

Well I have been inundated with messages from males in the US and Canada. They usually ask me about Japan etc at first. Then they progress into how they love Asian women. When I tell them that I am a Caucasian in Japan they all cease contact with me -ha ha!

[spookyturtle 9,465]

I joined a dating service as a joke over Christmas but didn't post my photo. (my location is JAPAN).

Well I have been inundated with messages from males in the US and Canada. They usually ask me about Japan etc at first. Then they progress into how they love Asian women. When I tell them that I am a Caucasian in Japan they all cease contact with me -ha ha!

And when they find out you're a man that must really blow their minds.