A Carleton graduate has co-founded a dating website catering exclusively to students at post-secondary institutions.
In January 2012, Christopher Gimmer and Marc Chouinard formed Nosco media, a web company which designs and markets social networking sites.
Their first project is ClassmateCatch, a dating website that requires its members to have a university or college email account, which according to Chouinard, makes it much more difficult for members to make multiple profiles.
“We realized how hard it is for university students to meet people who aren’t in their program,” Gimmer said.
“Or someone might see a girl or a guy they’d like to approach in class, but they don’t have it in them to go up to them and talk to them. This breaks that barrier,” Chouinard said.
“So this is a platform where you can meet people online, and then take that relationship offline if you wish.”
The website is currently available to students at Carleton, Queen’s University, Algonquin College, and the University of Ottawa.
Gimmer, who graduated from Carleton’s commerce program in 2008, is in charge of marketing and finance.
Chouinard taught himself computer programming and takes care of web development.
He said it took half a year to make ClassmateCatch.
The website requires members to create a profile and enter basic information about their age, interests and program. They must also submit a photo before they can view others’ profiles.
To find other members, students can do a search, which can be narrowed down to only include people who are of a certain age, body type, or have a certain hair or eye colour.
They can then live-chat or send messages to other members.
There are no suggested matches or personality tests on the site, Chouinard said.
“The matchmaking process is a little flawed in my opinion,” he said. “Sites like Plenty of Fish base their algorithms on the information you provide on your profile. Seems like an unreliable way to match people up.”
Gimmer said the personality tests found on many dating sites can take up to twenty minutes to complete.
“We know students are busy. We would rather promote interaction,” he said.
“The site is free,” Gimmer said. “On some sites, it’s free to sign up but you have to pay for extra features, like being able to view who checked out your profile. That’s one thing we won’t do. Students are on a tight budget, and the last thing we want to do is start gouging them.”
Gimmer said over a hundred students have signed up for the site since its launch on Sept. 1.
“The response has been really good, overall,” Chouinard said. “We’ve had a lot of people come up to us and say: ‘Wow, that’s a great idea. It’s nice to see a fresh idea, here in Ottawa.’”
“A lot of people have been supporting us, especially the local media. They seem to recognize how hard it is to make it as an entrepreneur,” Gimmer said.
