I'm legally really not meant to comment

on the Tinder Times. And I don't even

know if I've told the story,

but

Whitney Wilpurd, the CEO and founder of

Bumble. Whitney became one of the few

women who can add billionaire to her

title. The dating app that puts women in

charge of making the first move. Making

the first move can change your life, but

you have to do it. No one can do it for

you. Which would then become Bumble's

entire mantra. I've seen all the things

that Bumble have done over the years,

and it's always seems to be original in

its nature.

It was a lot of these tiny hacking

concepts that made no sense. No one had

ever done these things before, but if

you understand what moves and motivates

people, then you have this opportunity

to connect with them. And so that's been

the superpower of ours over the years.

As 31 years old, you're the youngest

woman to take a company public.

What's the personal toll on you in those

moments?

It's been pretty dark. It's been pretty

heavy.

Your departure from Tinder read to me

like it was horrific and sexist.

It was soul crashing. I was being

described in all sorts of ways. I had

reporters trying to go through my window

and it was really violating. There's a

whole persona that's been created about

me out there in the world. How am I ever

going to escape this? I was 24 years

old.

If I asked your teams, what would you

like as a leader? What would they say to

me?

I don't know. We did ask them.

Oh,

so

[Music]

Whitney,

what is the early context

that I would have to understand about

you and your life to understand you?

I think

probably broken gender dynamics.

growing up. I So I grew up in Salt Lake

City, Utah.

I don't know if you know much about Salt

Lake City, Utah.

Yep. So it's a very LDS is kind of the

formal religious term um or better known

as Mormon place.

And my dad is Jewish and my mother is

Catholic. So, I'm already total

um anomaly in this place. And it's a

very tough community to fit into when

you don't

look, act, behave like everybody else or

have the exact same belief systems. And

the Mormon faith and the LDS faith, not

to generalize, but it's very much a

community, or at least it was. I was

born in 1989. So, growing up back in the

90s, it was very much um a man's world

where the man is um the you know the

bread winner, the man is out, mom is at

home in an apron and everyone follows

rules, lots of rules, uh very strict

rules in fact. And I think I always grew

up with a

conflicting set of values to my

community to this ecosystem I was placed

in or was raised in rather and then that

started to come out in relationships. So

my first, you know, real boyfriend that

I ever had, it was quite toxic. And

these were kind of um these undertones

of my entire life that would then set

the stage for my entire career.

Using that first relationship, that

first sort of toxic relationship as an

example of how your belief system at

that point was causing problems. Um

could you give me some color to to what

you mean there?

Yeah, it was a it was, you know, it was

a new experience for me. I was a young

young girl at the time and I think there

was this set of behaviors I was expected

to adhere to to be on his rules his his

um you know what he believed was right

and it was quite demoralizing frankly

and I don't think at the time I fully

recognized what was taking place until

later in life but it set the stage for

me about unhealthy relationships And I

recognized just how unequal women were

when it came to their romantic

relationships. So if you were to fast

forward, here I am running this business

where women make the first move, which

when I put that into the product in 2014

was squawkked at and eyes were rolled

and people couldn't understand why we

would do such a thing because women

aren't supposed to talk first. So if you

look at that moment of a business being

born, there's so much more than just a

Eureka thought. It's really pent up

years and years of confusion, passion,

purpose brewing to essentially be born

into this moment of bumble.

Were you rebelling at all against that

environment or that belief system? I

think there was

two sides of that coin. There was the

side that wanted to fit in, desperate to

be a part of my community, desperate to

be a part of what was around me and to

fit in and to fit the mold because

that's humans. Humans want to fit into

their environments. They want to be

accepted. No one wants to be the child

sitting alone at the lunch table. This

is what devastates humans to be left

out, right? So, there was a part of me

that so desperately wanted validation

and to fit. And then there was a part of

me that said, "This is wrong. This

doesn't feel right. This feels against

my soul. This doesn't feel like how

things should be." And I feel like

that's been a theme of my life. There's

been duality on on this topic in every

every situation I've been in. And that's

that's part of navigating it.

How do we navigate that duality? Because

we all we all experience those sort of

conflicting needs at the same time.

Often one of them is like an external

one can colliding with an internal need

that's going unmet. And it feels

sometimes like we have to choose as you

said like the external comfort of

fitting in or validation versus like

this doesn't feel good to me.

Yeah.

Inside.

I think for me at least

I have to live in a place of

authenticity.

And I've lived in chapters of my life

that were not authentic. That I knew

what I was participating in or what I

was doing didn't feel authentic to what

I really believed in or what I knew to

be right. Um, and genuinely authenticity

wins. That's my fundamental belief. And

I think that when you follow and chase

that authentic space,

the world opens up for you. the world

unlocks.

Sometimes in the short term when we

especially if we've had a prolonged

period of being inauthentic, what we've

done accidentally and inadvertently is

created an environment and a community

and a job and a and a and an environment

where that's built on that

inauthenticity. So to make the change to

to one day be like, do you know what?

Today I'm gonna be authentic requires it

seems like quite a lot of short-term

loss, espec disapproval. people going

stay stay stay stay stay stay stay stay

stay stay stay stay stay stay stay stay

stay stay stay stay stay stay stay stay

stay stay stay stay stay stay stay stay

stay stay stay stay stay stay stay stay

stay stay in line stay who we thought

you were you know be the person that we

resonated with even if that was your

inauthentic self so that like I think I

see so many people kind of contend with

that they want they kind of might know

who they are that voice inside but the

apparent cost of pursuing it seems cir

as mom and dad and my boyfriend and I'd

have to leave the city and my job and my

friendship you know

of course you have to leave the tribe

yeah that's terrifying

terrifying

It's almost

unimaginable for people. And

I've been there. I've felt that feeling

before. And I think this is why so many

people stay in whatever situation

they're in, stay in a marriage, stay in

a business, stay in a church, stay in a

team, stay in a you name it. This is

what perpetuates the cycle of of the

quest to

fit in versus

just truly being who you really are. And

so that age-old saying, be yourself,

it's harder than it looks. It's really

hard and it comes with a lot of risk and

it's scary and it's dangerous and what

if I fail and what if no one likes me

and what if everyone judges me? These

are real things, but at the end of the

day, nothing could be worse than having

a broken relationship with yourself,

right? I personally think a broken

relationship with yourself is more toxic

than a pseudo phony good relationship

with a hundred other people.

But it's hard to give ourselves that

love and compassion. We're hard on

ourselves. The things we say to oursel

is something we would never say to

another ever. I mean, think about that

rhetoric, the internal self-t talk. We

would never say those things to other

people, right? And the compliments we

pay others, it's very hard to pay

ourselves. So, when you think about that

narrative, how can we expect people to

have the confidence and courage to be

authentic to themselves if they're not

even willing to accept themselves? So, I

think that's a big piece of it, right?

And I've watched

over the years women I grew up with in

Salt Lake City just now in their 30s.

They're coming out of their cage.

They're quite literally coming alive and

they're taking to Tik Tok and to social

media and they're taking to all these

platforms

like a roaring lion saying I'm alive and

I've been hiding and I've been living by

standards and I've been living by rules

and I've been living by X Y and Z and

it's not authentic. So at some point it

will burst open you know like that the

truth is the truth does prevail.

When you were when you were 18 what was

acceptance or success to you? What if I

asked you at 18 years old what you want

to be post uni when you grow up? What

would the answer have been at that

point?

Well the answer of what I really wanted

to be was not what I would have said

because I would have said something to

fit in. Right? That's standard. So, I

think the young women when I was in

college all wanted to go work for a

fashion brand or get a job at a bank or

be successful and they wanted to get

married and they wanted to find someone

that they could marry, settle down with,

have kids with eventually, maybe not

next year, but that was part of the

program, right? This dating game exists

as college students. And

this is where the undertones of Bumble

started to really form because I

remember being in college and

being completely judged and made fun of

by girlfriends of mine if I texted a guy

first. I remember I went on a date which

was so out of my character. I really,

believe it or not, being so ingrained in

the dating world. I think I've been on

maybe three dates in my life. That

sounds weird, but I went on a date and

then I texted the guy afterwards. And

they were like, "Oh no, you have

committed a sin. A sin. Like you should

be ashamed of yourself." It made me cry.

I felt so embarrassed. I felt so

ashamed. And I remember thinking, "This

is wrong. What is wrong with you? Why

why can we not text? Who wrote these

rules? What are these rules? These ru

rules are ridiculous." So this this

desire to break the rules, change the

rules, rewrite the rules was something I

inherently felt deep down. But

everybody's felt that, you felt that,

everybody has felt that it's just who

chooses to go and actually act on it is

the difference. Do you I was I was

thinking then when you when you talked

about um being 18 and having this kind

of sort of social expectation of what

success would look like and then having

a family was the orientation of a lot of

young women at that point. Do you think

there are any gender differences that

are innate to us that have

a bearing on the path or the way that we

show up that are innate? I not social

constructs, but do you think there's

anything in us as as men and women that

makes us want different things from

birth innately?

You know, it's a good question. And I

have two little boys right now. And I

think a lot of this is imposed on us as

a society. I really do. I think the toys

we buy our children and the clothes we

put on our children and the shows we

show our children, you have to really

ask yourself, is this not truly forming

what they're interested in and what they

care about and what their ambitions are.

I do believe that

there may be something, and I see this

in men too,

to folks that genuinely want to have a

family and have children and be part of

that type of a life. And then folks that

just genuinely don't. But I don't really

see it with I don't think it's a gender

thing. I really think that these are

just a personal

soul level thing. But I think society

comes in

and puts bows on it or puts trucks on it

and says, "Here's your path." So, it's

it's interesting now raising kids seeing

if I really believe this nature versus

nurture thing. And I think there's

components to it, but I think it's

definitely more

imposed upon us by others around. This

morning, I was watching my son read a

book at breakfast. I don't know where he

found the book. I think it was something

he found at the restaurant. But I opened

it and it was a picture of a pig family

in a little house and you could see

everything in all the different rooms.

And daddy was upstairs in the bathroom

combing his hair in a suit and the pig

mom was in the it's like the pig family.

The piggy mom was in the kitchen in a

pink dress with an apron cooking eggs.

And I was just thinking to myself, here

is a almost three-year-old and these are

the books they're reading and it says,

"Where's daddy and where's mommy?" So,

we have to imagine that we we do some of

this to the to the kids around us.

Did you burn the book?

I I took a picture of it and raved about

it. I raged about it at work for about 3

hours and we will not be reading the

book again.

Okay, good.

What was your what was your formal

education per se? What was your in terms

of university or anything like that?

What did you study? Yeah. So, um I went

to a college in Texas and I really

wanted to go into marketing and I wanted

to go into advertising and marketing,

which is funny because now somehow I've

ended up there a little bit. Um and I

sat down for the test and completely

failed it. I could not answer any of the

questions. It was so confusing to me. It

was all about,

you know, return on investment and

television views and it was super, not

to be disrespectful, but super boring. I

was like, this is probably not for me.

But anyway, I did not get it accepted.

So I studied um international studies

and that was just this huge mix of

big people problems you know

globalization

anthropology women's studies gender

studies um international relations I

mean it was really fascinating and that

was the best marketing degree I could

have ever gotten because it's the study

of people why do people do what they do

and if you look at the business I'm in

I'm quite literally immersed all day

long into why do people date who they

date? Why do they want what they want?

How do they behave? Why do they get

aggressive? What causes aggression? What

causes online abuse? Where is this

stemming from? And this stuff is really

interesting. So, I'd say my education

really did help me connect those dots.

And as you leave that that degree,

that gap between like the working world

and leaving university, college, what

was that gap and how how what were you

thinking in that moment? Where were you

heading? What were you applying for?

Where were you um seeking the next

chapter of your life?

So I really wanted to be a travel

photographer, like a photojournalist,

and I had no training in that obviously,

but I was just obsessed with the idea.

And it's actually funny at the Bumble

office right now, we have this photo of

this incredible woman that I met in uh

Burma

and she is holding a Bumble lighter and

it's my

never made it to Nat Geo moment.

But that was my dream. I wanted to be a

Nat Geo photographer. And so I went

traveling through Southeast Asia.

Mhm.

And took a lot of photos. And I remember

on my travels thinking, gosh, there's

such a disconnect for someone trying to

explore a new country place. It's only

Trip Adviser. And if you follow Trip

Adviser, you end up eating a hamburger

in Laos at some version of a hard rock,

right? And this is not really the

experience. I thought, why can't I get

to know a local? I want to ride around

on the back of a moped in Laos, and I

want to go understand what do they do

here? Like, where do the 18-year-olds

go? What what what was their life like?

like what what does their day look like?

And I thought, why is there not an app

that does this? Why is there not

something on my phone that can put me in

touch with these people? But then of

course that idea fell by the wayside,

went into, you know, the back of my

brain somewhere and by chance one day

would end up in this wild world of

connecting people on the internet. So,

some of these things were already

brewing and already starting to bubble

up in ways that wouldn't totally expose

themselves yet.

By chance, you ended up in this weird

world of connecting people. What was

that chance?

So, the chance was

that I went to a dinner in Los Angeles

one night with one of my very dear

friends and she had been friendly with

um a couple of these these guys in LA

and we all ended up at dinner because um

I didn't end up driving back to my mom's

house that night. It got too dark and it

was quite a long drive. So, we all had

dinner and I was staying at her house

and one of the guys at dinner was um the

general manager of this incubator and

was telling me all about this incubator

and here I was a 22year-old just barely

22 if that even 2-year-old woman that

needed a job. I needed to make money. I

needed to find my way in the world. And

I had just been kind of adventuring and,

you know, seeing the world and exploring

and taking this very, you know,

risky path of not going straight into a

career and going to travel and going to

see the world and find my passion. And

he said, "Well, maybe you could take a

marketing job." And I said, "Okay, I'll

try. I mean, I'll call you tomorrow."

And he's like, "Okay." Probably thought

I'd never call. And I did. Long story

short, that incubator would be the

incubator where we ended up launching

Tinder. So, it was um by happen stance

that that connection happened. But I

think it was about taking advantage of

an opportunity, right? Seeing an

opportunity. And it didn't feel perfect.

And I think this is a good lesson for

people is the way it was described to me

at that dinner. People think, "Oh, well,

she got so lucky. She, you know, she met

the so- and so of so and so. That's not

what it was like. This that concept of

Tinder was never mentioned. It was never

called Tinder at the time. And it was a

totally different opportunity, but it

was putting my foot in the door of

something that would then turn into

something else and something else. And I

think so many people wait around for the

most perfect headline when it comes to

an opportunity that they can't really

see or read between the lines. And

everybody has that potential. Everybody

can do that. They just have to be

willing to say, "Well, this is a

stepping stone or this is a door that I

could bust open, right?" And I think

that's kind of how I've tried to

approach most things in my career.

It's so so true. It's, you know, that

moment there, there's so many other

outcomes that could have happened from a

dinner.

Um, namely one of them is you just don't

call the person back. I mean, the amount

of times in my life someone's given me

their number and said, "Call me." And I

just haven't called back most of the

time.

99%. It's like all of us do that.

Yeah. Yeah. But there's a philosophy of

like leaning into stuff, especially when

you're young, just like leaning in

regardless of certainty as you've

described. Yeah.

And people have a I I see this in

people, I'm sure you have as well, where

people have a tendency to be like

lean-in people or kind of just lean out

people. Even when the world is changing,

crypto, Bitcoin, blockchain, all these

things, meta, all the typically people

lean in or lean out. And um I think

people that lean in are the ones that

end up creating opportunity, which looks

like luck in hindsight. Yeah, I agree

with you. And being brave enough to just

say even if it doesn't work out, at

least I explored it, right? I think

people

what I've seen and it's something that

I'm guilty of as well in my life is

it's a risk and we have to be willing to

get excited about risk instead of being

afraid of it.

It's the uncertainty though, isn't it?

How good are you at dealing with

uncertainty without how how how

guaranteed do you need the outcome to be

before you take a step

right and for me not very guaranteed

personally because it's like what do you

have to lose right are is are you

creating risk for yourself not really

but I do think that it's scary to pick

up the phone and make that first move

right which would then become Bumble's

entire mantra and tagline and product

and everything but making the first move

and taking that first step can change

your life, but you have to do it. No one

no one can do it for you. And I learned

that the hard way. I I had very little

support along the way in terms of

advocates or community. You know, I had

a handful of people I could call upon,

but candidly, even when I was starting

Bumble, all of my confidants, with the

exception of a couple, were like, "No,

don't do this. Why? Why would you expose

yourself to this? What's the point? that

won't work. There's already dating apps.

They're going to eat you alive

and you can get bogged down in that. You

know, it's really it's easy to drown in

that noise.

In those in those early years of Tinder,

I I remember being told the story maybe

10 years ago in San Francisco when I was

working there with um a guy called

Michael Burch who was the old Bibo

founder. You'll know Bibbo.

Bibo the old social. Oh, no. It didn't

go to the US. It was just I remember

that

it was like Facebook here before before

Facebook.

Okay, cool.

Um and he in his little sort of

incubator that I was in when I was 20,

they were telling me the bump the Tinder

story of how you went to a fraternity.

Mhm.

For people that don't know what a

fraternity is, what's a fraternity?

Uh so I guess in the UK it would be like

college clubs maybe. Do they have like

members clubs or something like that? So

basically sorities and fraternities and

sororities are a house of women and

fraternities are a house of men and

there's different names. So they all

have these Greek names, right? So for

example, the one I joined was Cappa

Capagama.

You could have um Trid Delta. There's

all sorts of them. And essentially a lot

of college students, they do something

called rush where they rush and they go

house to house and they meet all the

women or all the men and then they

basically prep. They put in the name of

the one they would really love to be a

part of and then they see who accepted

them back. It's been criticized up and

down and there's a lot of things that

are not, you know, spectacular about it,

but this is a way a lot of people find

friendship and community. It's it's a

community gathering for their college

campus. So with Tinder, I essentially

went back to my alma mater at SMU. I had

just graduated. So, a lot of my best

friends were still in school. So, I got

access to the campus and I would start

at the sororities and then go to the

fraternity. So, I'd essentially have all

the young women download it and then run

to the fraternity and then they would

download it and then everyone would

start connecting. So, you know, is that

good? Is that bad? How do you want to

chop that up 10 years later? Who knows?

But that's the reality and you know,

can't escape the truth. But so, so you

heard about this way back when? I heard

about this 10 years ago because we were

building communitycentric apps. We're

building something called Blab, which

resembles what Clubhouse is now. Um, and

when we were talking about the marketing

strategy, Tinder kept coming up. And

Sean Puri, who's now who we the company

got acquired by Amazon in the end,

Twitch, um, who own Amazon, who other

way around, Amazon own Twitch. Um,

but yeah, that was the that was the

thesis. It was like should we go to

fraternities and go get you know and to

to try and build that sort of isolated

tight community to try and get product

market fit.

Yeah.

Because network effects really really m

especially in the dating game.

The most important that's why there's

only a handful of dating apps that have

ever survived. I mean at least during my

time doing this which is almost a decade

now. But what's interesting is there's

such a and not to not to say only I

could do this or only somebody else

could do this, but there was a

superpower in the timing of it all

because I had just graduated and I I

knew all of these people. So if some

random startup founder knocks on a

sorority door, the police are coming,

you know, like you can't you can't do

that. So I felt like I had this insider

hook, right? because I was technically

an extension of that by proxy because I

had just been on the college campus and

all of my girlfriends were still there.

So, they were part of these sororities

and all my guy friendss were there. They

were part of these fraternities. So,

I'll never forget

I took the photo of one of my guy

friends back then who was, you know, all

the young women had mega crush on on

him. And then I took the photo of my

best friend, um, Danielle, who

was very well-liked on campus. And I

went into Danny's journalism class

because she was still a student. And I

basically snuck into her journalism

class and used Photoshop. And I took the

Tinder screens and I put the guy's face

on one and her face on the other and I

said, "Find out who likes you on

campus." And then I saved it to a file

because this is the olden days at this

point. And I went to FedEx, which is

like the office supply store across the

street. And I printed a thousand copies.

And I quite literally handed different

students on campus $20 to go distribute

them under dorm doors and to put them on

windshields and to put them, you know,

in their different social clubs and to

essentially distribute these flyers

everywhere. So this entire campus, and

now in hindsight, it's probably not

great. It's littering. There's all sorts

of bad things involved with it, but like

I'm just telling you a story. So, um,

yeah, basically that was that was just

one of the tactics I I used to go and

put it all over campus. And then I had a

few t-shirts printed up that said,

"Don't ask for my number, find me on

Tinder and I had my girlfriends wear the

t-shirts and we went to the bar and so I

gave them, you know, a couple hundred

bucks and they would go around and buy

drinks and then when people would ask

for their number, they'd essentially

say, "You have to download Tinder." So,

it was a lot of these tiny hacking

concepts that made no sense. No one had

ever done these things before. I had no

playbook. It wasn't like, you know, I

was reading some manual to marketing. It

was just what felt

around me. It was it was just bringing

the real life dating experience to life

through through an app. Um, marketing.

There's like so many important messages

of of marketing there. I mean, the first

one that you said was was that you were

the customer. You were so close to the

customer that you understood them. I

mean even you said um about how if

another startup had come and knocked on

the soriety well they wouldn't even know

which door to knock on for a start they

would have knocked on the wrong door got

the wrong people um and they wouldn't

have understood those people their

motivation so like really you being the

customer I think is such a key thing and

then the second thing you said about

like if I had read a marketing book um

and you were kind of just doing it based

on intuition

I've I've seen over and over again from

speaking to really successful CEOs and

founders how important naivity was like

not knowing

so important just following your gut

Yeah, cuz then you that's like first PR

that's creating something from first

principles as opposed to convention.

That's real innovation, right? Like

and it creates solutions that are more

suited for today and for the challenge

that you're solving which no one has

ever had the the challenge of solving,

right,

on that date ever,

right?

Um but naivity, you know, this is this

is sometimes why I think some of the

best founders don't come from like

business school or from marketing

school. The best marketeteers aren't

marketing graduates because naivity is

such a superpower. It's a superpower and

following

your instinct.

And if you understand

what moves people and what motivates

people, then you have this opportunity

to connect with them on a real level. I

mean, we've done things that are

ridiculous. So, I remember we would make

these signs that said um they had the

big X's like no, you know, like you're

not allowed to. and they said no

Facebook, no Instagram, no Snapchat, no

Bumble.

This was like week three of Bumble or

something, some ridiculous early maybe

first year, I can't remember at this

point. And we would post those all over

the universities. So there was this

association where it was like, wait, I

can't do the things I really want to do.

I want to sit in class and Snapchat. I

want to sit in class and Instagram. What

the hell is Bumble? And so we were

essentially seating this psychological

curiosity

curiosity. And then we were actually

sending

young women wearing Bumble shirts into

classes 10 or 15 minutes late

interrupting a class of 300 people and

saying, "Oh, sorry, wrong room." But

everyone's looking at this young woman

and or young man, whoever it was,

wearing a Bumble t-shirt. So, we were

seeding curiosity in this like why is

Bumble everywhere type of thing.

And so, you know, a lot of people think,

oh, well, I can just go start a an app

and I'll just buy some, you know,

Instagram ads and I'll just be

successful. But if people only knew the

fraction of the insane everyday little

hacks that, you know, I did and our team

did to bring this to life. We were the

first people,

certainly the first tech brand to do

humor accounts to pay for the humor

memes. Do you remember the humor memes?

Well, we we ran out of 100 million

followers on hum meme accounts. So,

yeah. So, you know all about this, but

like we were way back years and years

ago. I remember reaching out to I can't

remember what it was, one of these meme

accounts and they're like, "Wait, you

want to pay us to I'm confused. How does

that work?" And we're like, "Okay,

here's the deal. we give you a hundred

bucks or whatever it was, we turn around

a year later, that same account is

charging $100,000 a post. So we there's

also something about luck and timing

being

just right before something,

you know, and if you look at Bumble, we

were also beating the woman drum, the

the this this drum of we need to

advocate for women, beating this drum of

let's put women first. Let's let's

elevate women. Women are not equal in

their relationships. Women are not being

treated respectfully. Women are being

abused on the internet. Women are not

being treated right. We were saying this

in 2014 and then me too would come a

couple years later. So I think we've

we've been lucky as a business to

basically

be right before the wave

and then we've been able to be a part of

that wave versus chasing a wave. And so

many people chase a wave. So many people

chase a wave. They look around them

like, "Well, what's cool? How do I chase

that?" And I feel like we've always had

the good fortune or whatever you want to

call it,

conviction,

inspiration

to go first. And so that's been um maybe

a superpower of ours over the years

because you're making those decisions.

It's so clear to me that you're making

those decisions from original thought

and from like what I think Elon calls

like first principles as in what do we

know is true and create a solution from

that versus how's it done? how's it been

done before and that like and even you

being early to the meme account things

just for context. Um we were probably

like probably probably maybe one of the

first companies in the world I'd say to

to do the meme thing. That's really like

how my business began. We had like 100

million followers on these meme

accounts. That became this big social

media business, this big media company

and it kind of ecom and then it went

public. But it started with meme

accounts.

It's amazing.

It's how I met

I think your original investor. It's how

I met Boo. It's I remember speaking to

having these long conversations with

them in London about we'll make you

trend number one on Twitter, we'll do a

Thunderclap. All the accounts say the

same like but for you to have been one

of the brands that was leaning into

that.

No other brands had no and to your point

yes the meme accounts were there. You

were pioneering all of that but I don't

know if you experienced this brands did

not see their place there and the brands

that did that I had seen had been like

buy my bracelet or buy my fashion. You

know, it was something very

consumercentric, which made sense,

but it wasn't the download my app

and that was such a different

way of promoting something even for the

app world. It was it was so out of

bounds for the app space because the app

space used traditional app space

Yeah.

acquisition strategies.

You're right. It wasn't it wasn't say

and the reason why we managed to get so

many followers was because um people

didn't value those accounts. I remember

buying Beef Fit Motivation which had

about 10 million I'll say followers. Um

Love Food which had about 7 million

followers and Beef at Fit Motivation on

Twitter which had 2 million followers on

Twitter. Um just those just that 20

million followers cost me about 10

grand.

Oh god.

And then the other imagine it's like

really good real estate. It's like

buying a house in some crazy part of

London a thousand years ago.

Yes.

And then all the other accounts were

free because I I offered the people jobs

that ran them. You'll have a proper job.

You get paid loads. I know your mom

doesn't think it's a job. I think it's a

job.

I think I see you. I validate you.

People like, "Oh, you're exploiting."

Well, no, nobody valued it back then.

And then they eventually did value those

social media accounts. And what you're

talking about the whole, you know, it it

was attention. It was it was attention.

It was eyeballs. And from a first

principal perspective, you go, "Well, we

want attention and eyeballs. They are

here. I don't care if it's safe, cool,

or the done thing. That's where we're

going to go." I saw Bumble doing that

and and I've seen all the things that

Bumble have done over the years and it's

always seems to be original in its

nature. It feels that way. Feels like

someone has had an original thought

today about how to solve a problem and

not just they're not just focused on

showing what Bumble is. That they're

communicating how you should feel about

Bumble.

That was always the goal.

Yeah.

And I think there was a lot of people

that thought it was ridiculous early on.

They're like, "Why are you doing a

campaign that has nothing to do with

dating?" You know, we did this huge

campaign where our team put together

this, you know, huge push on be the CEO

your parents always wanted you to marry.

And then in parenthesis, it said, "And

then find someone you actually like or

want to date." And I remember a lot of

people being like, "We're not going to

do this. This there's no ROI here.

What's the ROI? There's no call to

action. And there's no download in the

app store. And what was fascinating was

it built this wild following of our

brand. So people that would never have

downloaded a dating app are now wearing

our hat. Now their mother is carrying

around a Bumble tote because they're

proud of the brand and they are, you

know, it created this

untangible feeling, right? This magic.

And there was a sentiment that was more

powerful than any, you know, ROI

campaign you could do on any other

channel. And so I feel like for me, I

always wanted Bumble to be more than

just an app in your pocket. I wanted it

to be something that gave you a feeling

and a good feeling, not a bad one.

Because so many of these products give

us bad feelings and they make us feel

uninspired and they make us feel lonely.

They make us feel broken. They make us

feel exhausted. And I wanted us to do

something different and our team wanted

us to do something different. We had

such a passionate team. We still have an

incredibly passionate team. But that

early community of our team is really

what made this company so magical,

right? It was that genuine purpose and

buy in and candidly naive. Our team was

young. Our team was separated from a lot

of our infrastructure, meaning like a

lot of the more technical stuff was

isolated from the marketing stuff. And

I've been criticized over the years by

the, you know, the tech publications and

the tech this and the tech that and

whatever. I don't really care. The point

is, it's been like, well, this isn't

this isn't how Silicon Valley does it.

where are the engineers and why are this

and why aren't you sitting with the

engineers and why

and there was a method to the madness.

It was, let's let this team go out and

paint the town yellow and do it with no

interruption, no distraction. And then

let's let our fantastic infrastructure

team really solve big problems through

tech while these two heart and brain can

operate together, right? And it had

never really been done before in this

like traditional Silicon Valley world.

My first startup experience is not like

my second startup experience. You learn

all the lessons. You learn well

hopefully you learn the lessons. I think

I've learned hopefully learned some of

them. Um but your first startup

experience at Tinder. This is when you

know cuz especially when it's moving at

the speed of light

light

you know I mean my startup didn't move

at the speed of light quite like Tinder

did but still absolutely the speed of

light Tinder moved at. And there's that

culture out in San Francisco about, you

know, move fast and break things, which

is I think Facebook popularized. I think

that was their slogan, but everyone kind

of has adopted that mindset of just go

[ __ ] lightning fast and figure it out

later. Fix it while it's fix it while

we're falling kind of thing. Um, talk to

me about that. Talk to me about the the

cost of that, what it taught you and and

really give me a picture of what it was

like in those early rocket ship days.

Well, you know, I think

it was so new to everyone involved. No

one

no one really understood

what the next day held. Um, this was

such a different time also, you know,

Instagram had just had its big sale.

Now, in retrospect, not such a big sale,

but at the time, remarkable, right?

um still remarkable regardless and it

was just such a new environment. Tech

was still relatively niche. Mobile was

very niche, right? It was not super

mainstream. Apps were kind of hitting

the scene, but not like where we are

today. There's an app for this or app

for that. And

we were this tight tribe of people that

really probably had not much to do with

each other outside of this. But it

became this 24/7

unit and we were just fighting every day

to keep it going. I mean our blood,

sweat, and tears went into this

business, right? So when I left

it was completely devastating because I

wasn't just leaving this rocket ship of

a business. That's one thing. But I've

just been essentially, you know,

one day in a 24/7 environment with the

same people for more than 2 years to the

next day never seeing any of them ever

again.

and in the middle of that ending up on

the front page of all sorts of magazines

and newspapers because of the

narrative of the ending, right? And it

was it was extremely traumatic,

extremely. I was I think I was stuck in

fight orflight mode for years. um

because you know that was all I knew for

years and it had been such a 0 to 100

experience as you know when you're in

these startups it's they're almost their

own I'm definitely not accusing the

company of being this but they become

their own little cult

and it's really hard to

go from that one day to not that the

next day and then to go end up launching

ing a woman version to some degree

within 6 months of leaving. So, if you

can just try to imagine what every day

looked like to both mourn and grieve my

exit from Tinder and deal with all the

logistical pieces of it and the media

pieces of it which were coming at me, I

had reporters trying to go through my

window at my little apartment in Beverly

Hills from some rag magazine. I mean,

this is just crazy for me. I was a

nobody. I mean, I'm still technically a

nobody, but it's not like I was on some

reality show and I became popular

overnight. Like, this was traumatizing

to me. And,

you know, it's funny like the land of

everyone trying to be famous. I was

probably maybe one of the only people

not at that point, right? So it was very

crazy to just all of a sudden in a very

scandalous way by the way I was

described in the media.

I was literally painted as this like

scandalous gone girl of the tech world.

And it was soul crushing cuz it's not

who I was. It's not who I am. So I was

watching this narrative unfold about me

and I was in these Twitter discussions

with all the most important people in

the tech world and it was just crazy. It

was just watching this narrative unfold

about this person that wasn't me. And

then I'm turning around in the same

breath,

meeting up with Andre, and then I'm, you

know, even before that trying to start

Marci, this complimentsoriented, kinder

social network, which then I meet up

with Andre and one thing leads to

another. And now Bumble is my new path.

And now we're starting Bumble and this

is all going on. It was a whirlwind.

A whirlwind.

What is What is the the context you're

able to share about why they were

writing those headlines about you and

why you are ostracized from your as

you've described it something that felt

a little bit like a cult, which is

actually a good description of how all

my companies have pretty much started.

It feels like a 24/7.

Come on, we're going to take over the

world. It's that kind of

it's I mean it's crazy. I mean like the

way people speak about what you're going

to do. I mean there's such big ideas and

they're such like passionate ideas and

then you go from

real world which is so mundane right

it's like quite boring out there in the

real world

to this like super like high energy you

know the there's you know going to be a

disaster if we don't do this in the next

5 minutes this is crashing that's

crashing this metric's up this metric's

off one day you're booming the next day

you're cr I mean the adrenaline you know

what I'm talking about the ups and the

downs and

the hard work that goes into it and the

skipping meals and the no sleep and

everything feels potentially fatal as

well at that point, doesn't it?

Fatal. And the other thing that is

interesting is you

can't connect with everybody else the

way you used to because they're they

can't quote unquote get it. They don't

get it, you know? So, it's like trying

to like have a Sunday afternoon meal

with your family or your friends during

that. you're like, I can't like we don't

even speak the same language anymore.

So,

I'll just avoid them. That's a waste of

time.

You have no idea what's going on. So,

which in hindsight, I think I lived in

that mindset for years between Tinder

and Bumble. I mean, kind of coming up

for air now and having time to breathe

and think like that's a

I'm sure a lot of people that have built

companies feel this way though. I'm sure

you feel this way where you're like,

"Wo, I isolated myself from a lot of

important relationships

that there's regret to that at some

point." Do you ever feel that way?

100%. I was incredibly lonely. I didn't

speak to my family. Didn't really see

them for many, many years. And I thought

that I thought that something mattered

much more. And you eventually, even if I

used to think I was immune, but

eventually your body will remind you

that you are a human too and you have

needs and your needs are being unmet.

The signal will come in many ways. I

hear this signal sometimes come for

people. They'll have panic attacks.

They'll they'll feel growing sense of

loneliness. Their health will give out.

I've had certain examples where the body

has just shut down.

Yeah.

And it's I've gone through that.

Yeah.

As you know, Intel are now one of the

sponsors of this podcast and I'm here to

tell you about one of the latest Intel

Evo designs. I've been recently using

this laptop and honestly, I've been

blown away by how userfriendly it is to

use. Intel has spent thousands of hours

studying the way people use their

laptops and then collaborating with

leading PC makers to co-engineer,

optimize, and test these laptops to

create the Intel Evo platform, which

delivers the ultimate mobile experience.

Laptop designers only receive the Intel

Evo badge after they've been rigorously

tested to pass Intel's own strict

requirements and deliver an ideal

combination of features such as

long-lasting fast charging battery,

Wi-Fi connectivity standards, and a

super slim design. The result is a

premium laptop that delivers an ideal

combination of features. In the coming

weeks, I'm going to break down exactly

what features you get when you buy an

Intel Evo certified laptop and how

they've made my life on the go 10 times

easier. To find out more about the Intel

Evo platform, go to intel.co.uk/eo

and let me know how you get on. This

episode is brought to you by

Mercedes-Benz, who recently got in touch

to support the DEO. Thank you. I'm a

huge fan of their cars. In fact, I have

one of my own, which is like an office

on wheels, and they have an exciting

wide range of cars that I'd love to tell

you about. The Mercedes EQ is the luxury

electric range of Mercedes-Benz, and it

is available across many models from the

SUVs to the saloons, meaning they're

ideal for all business needs. The

innovative next generation technology

found in all Mercedes EQ cars is really

paving the way for the electric car

industry. To make your electric car

switch so much easier, Mercedes-Benz has

a service called Mercedes MI Charge.

It's a subscription which provides you

with access to a wide network of

charging stations across the entirety of

the UK. The app shows you the precise

location and current availability and

price at the selected charging station

of your choice. And this enables

businesses to effectively plan their

route ahead of their journey. You can

search Mercedes-Benz Fleet today to

discover how the Mercedes EQ car range

can help your business get ahead. And if

you already drive a Mercedes EQ, let me

know how you find it. I read that your

departure from Tinder was um ominous to

say the least. In fact, that's actually

the word that's written in my notes in

2014. And in the early days of the

foundation, the founding of Tinder,

you'd had a relationship with somebody.

That relationship had ended. You were

then treated in a pretty horrendous way

from everything that I read online. um

threatened multiple times, people saying

that they would they would fire you for

things that they didn't have a

justification to fire you for. Um sort

of patronizing, condescending behavior

to the fact that you were um a young

female co-founder and and how they would

take that co-founder title from you. Um

it's actually really hard for me to to

read actually just from it kind of makes

me a bit feel a sense of injustice in my

core. um you were called annoying and

dramatic at certain times when you

raised certain concerns and as a result

um you you know you were you ended up

leaving the company, you were fired. I

read you fired from the company uh which

is even worse when you raise certain

concerns. You then filed a lawsuit um

which went on um and there was certain

actions taken and there was a reported

settlement reached at one point. But

overall your treatment while you were at

Tinder specifically from men read to me

like it was allegedly horrific and

unfair and sexist. Um, and then upon

leaving Tinder, Tinder, there's this

huge wave of press who are

mischaracterizing you, what happened,

and you fall into this situation where

you've been in this cult. We'll call it

a cult cuz that's how it often feels to

both of us for so long. You come out of

that and you're greeted with this wall

of like mischaracterization, attacks,

um, from all sides and you're kind of

out on your own. That's the moment where

you're ostracized from the tribe um and

you're dealing with this wave of

negativity.

Yeah. So, you know, I'm legally really

not meant to comment on the Tinder

Times, but

what I will say is

I was literally

broken

during that chapter where I was waking

up to headlines about myself. Like you

said, I was being described in all sorts

of ways and people were calling my, you

know, my uncle and my ex-boyfriend. I

mean, it was this digging weird

investigation into my life and all I

wanted was to just do my job, right? And

so it was a very dark, toxic moment. And

I felt

so alone. Um, and I felt so unsupported

because this was before me, too. This is

before Times Up. Any woman that said

anything out of line was called names.

And this was still during a chapter,

even in modern land, that was

not really pro- women. And so no matter

what I said or did, I wasn't going to be

able to get through. There was judgment.

I had friends from college didn't want

to talk to me anymore. They were like,

"Oh, this this feels this feels icky. I

don't this isn't that cool." You know,

like all of I was ostracized. I was just

I had a scarlet letter. And that was

such a devastating feeling because let's

just remember I was just a young

professional. I was 24 years old and

I've been working my tail off for two

plus years. I had obviously teamwork

makes the dream work. I still

fundamentally believe that. But I had

played my role and an important one,

right, to get the company to where it

was. So to be called all of these names

and to be basically just written off by

Twitter and the random media and the

random everyone

and I have big respect for media and I'm

not criticizing them. I'm just saying

this was the narrative at the time. So

it was really hard. I was super

depressed. I was paranoid.

I was actually don't think I left the

house for like a three weeks at one

point. I'll never forget actually. I

don't even know if I've told the story.

Maybe I have, but when I was launching

Bumble again, because you have to

remember Bumble launched within 6 months

of my departure. So, not the departure

itself, but 6 months from kind of

when the legal pieces were put to bed.

That was August. I want to say August

3rd. December 1st, Bumble is live in the

app store. You know how much work goes

into launching something. It's a 24-hour

job. I had another 24-hour job of

grieving and being in fight orflight

defense mode of whatever Twitter was

coming after me with. And it was really

hard. So, I think there was a chapter

where I didn't leave the house for

several weeks. And when I was launching

Bumble, um I think it was Business

Insider, I can't remember who, they were

doing a piece on Bumble and they needed

a picture of me and I was like, "Well,

I'm not taking any pictures. There's no

way I'm in sweatpants and Uggs. I'm not

leaving this house." So, I went outside

in my front yard in sweatpants and Uggs

with a sweater on and did like a half

fake smile and had someone take a

picture on some camera I had at home

that I had, you know, used way back when

when I wanted to be a travel journalist

and use that. And I just had to peel

myself back up. I just had to peel

myself off the ground. And I was lucky

to have a couple really strong people in

my life that had my back, like my now

husband, like Andre. Um, there were a

couple people that were like, "I don't

care what people say about you. I don't

care. We believe in you. We know that

you're capable. We know you're smart. We

know that you can do this again. So, you

need to go chase your dreams. You're not

done." And you know, I very soon after

leaving Tinder in this moment of despair

and drinking too much, not like

socially, like at home, like very

depressed, trying to numb myself in any

way I could. Um, I had this moment where

I was like, I have to solve this. Part

of my psyche is find a problem and solve

it. It could be anything, micro,

anything. It's it's just part of the way

my brain works. And the being attacked

on the internet felt like such a big

problem to me. And I felt like this was

something so many people were going

through. So many young girls in

particular were going through being

bullied. And I thought to myself, I'm an

adult. Like I can get in a car and I can

drive to a grocery store and I can do

all these things. These young women are

trapped at home after school, often in

bad circumstances at home and they're

being abused by people they actually

know. How horrible would that be? I'm

getting attacked by strangers. They're

getting attacked by friends at school

and strangers not really in the sense of

stranger to us, like proxy strangers,

right? Friends of friends. And I was

like, I have to fix this. I have to fix

this. It's my duty on earth to fix this.

So, I started quite literally with a

pencil and a pen. I still have the early

drawings. Sketching out a new social

network. It was called Marci. And the

only currency and the only way to

communicate was compliments. So instead

of saying, you know, you're stupid or

you don't look good or you're this or

body shaming or that or even, hey,

you're so skinny, something that is

negative, even though it feels positive,

I wanted it just to be compliments. And

so it was essentially supposed to be the

girl's dressing room, the girl's

bathroom. When when young women go out

to nightclubs, there's this saying that

young women are so nice to each other in

the bathroom at a nightclub. And I

wanted to bring that to life. So I

started sketching that out to basically

rebuild myself. And long story short, um

eventually Bumble would become what it

was. You know, I met Andre and then I

mean I had known him but reconnected

with Andre.

One thing led to the next and Bumble was

born. So I think what people don't

realize they've I've had a lot of people

that maybe I went to college with.

They're like, "Oh my god, you've had

such a good career. You're so lucky.

You're so successful." I'm like, "It's

been pretty dark. It's been pretty

heavy."

Dark.

Is there a because I reflect on my

darkest times and I can typic typically

remember a worse day

a day when

you know I just couldn't see the light

at the end of the tunnel. What was your

darkest day throughout that period?

I have se several that are pretty

visceral and memorable,

but one that I think maybe is something

people can actually tangibly like put

themselves into this moment. Um, I mean

you can imagine there's lots of tough

moments along the way, but one was we

had worked so hard to build Bumble in

stealth mode starting from about

August

through call it November. So head down

four or five months of just like 24

hours a day back into the, you know, the

grind.

And it was really important to me not to

attach my name to it. I was so scared of

putting my name on it. I didn't want to

muddy it. I was like, you know, I'm in

the media as this like scandalous person

right now and I don't I don't want to be

known for I don't want I don't want this

to be about me. I want this to be about

what the product is and what the mission

is. I want women to go first in their

relationships. I want women to be

empowered. And I remember we had worked

so hard to keep my name out of it. I had

like a a pseudo email that I was using

to reach out to certain people that I

thought could, you know, maybe leak that

this was happening. And we were going to

launch in mid December. They had gone on

this investigative uh adventure of sorts

of following all my early employees and

ambassadors and they were going through

all the images and piecing together this

story about this new product that was

launching. And the headline said

something along the lines, maybe not

verbatim, but it was really hurtful. It

was like basically I'm summarizing how I

internalized it. Surprise, surprise.

Like the scorned woman from Tinder

launches her own dating app, but women

go first. And oh, I hear she really

likes bees. She's called it Bumble.

Like, it was so hurtful. And I just

sobbed. And I sobbed because there had

been so much work that went into coming

back, rising from the ashes, and pulling

myself back up. And to keep it in this

kind of self position away from me and

not make it about that, not make it

about that. You know, I women have a and

everyone, every gender, we all have an

opportunity and a I believe a human

right to start over. We all have the

right to start over. None of us should

be held hostage to a certain chapter in

our lives or a certain thing in our

lives. Like we should all be able to get

back up, right? If we're still

breathing, you have that right. And that

felt like my right to starting over on

my own terms was taken from me and it

was really violating. So, in my typical

fashion, I cried about it for a while

and then I pivoted. So, I called my

early team. I said, "We have a we have a

problem. whoever it was has

basically um leaked this information,

which is their job. I, you know, I don't

hold them against. It's not their fault,

but they basically have have told

everybody that we're doing this app and

that it's coming out and that I'm behind

it, but they're kind of missing the

point of what the product really is. Um,

I think they're misunderstanding why

we're starting this. I think for them it

read more of like in a a revenge novel,

right? Which was not the case. It was

about Marci then evolving into a

positive dating space. So I said, "Okay,

um, you're all jumping out of an

airplane tomorrow." And they're like,

"What do you mean I'm jumping out of an

airplane tomorrow?" And I said, "You

have to explain that it's just not that

scary to talk first on an app as a

woman. Like if if women can jump out of

an airplane, they can certainly send the

first message." And so we just pivoted

and we went and filmed this little

launch video of literally my first three

employees jumping out of an airplane.

And the whole tagline was um it was

something along the lines of like if we

can jump out of an airplane you can send

the first text and that was kind of how

we reframed the discussion and took you

know took control of the narrative.

That point about your right to kind of

reinvent yourself or not be defined by a

previous chapter I think is so

important. It's also why, you know, I've

got to be honest, like I don't like I

don't love talking about it like the

Tinder stuff because it it's it's a it's

a step in your journey. It's an

important contextual step.

Yeah, of course.

You know, it's it's inspired you in in

many ways in terms of your mission and

your vision and your and all of those

things. But, um I'm glad we could we

could fill that context. I when I asked

the um the question about your your

hardest your hardest moment in the

darkest times, I was reflecting on some

of the quotes I'd read about when you

were in that moment feeling like maybe

life wasn't worth living anymore.

Yeah.

And that kind of thing. And it's hard

it's hard to um I think for a lot of

people I hope it's hard for them to

understand that mindset like getting to

that place. I hope it's hard for them to

understand. I hope they've never had to

experience it. But for someone that has

what what is that like? Are those are

those words real? That that that that

prospect of like maybe maybe life would

be better without me in it.

I most certainly felt that way at times

for sure. Leaving when I was going

through that chapter, I most certainly

had moments where I thought, well, this

is it. I mean, what what now? I

there's a whole persona that's been

created about me out there in the world.

How am I ever going to escape this? I'm

going to be suffocated by

a definition a group of strangers have

assigned to me and my tribe is gone.

I'm gone. I everything I can identify

with this,

you know, this startup world can feel

like a cult at times, right? And so that

all felt gone. And I told you earlier,

you disassociate from a a lot of the

life you once had, friends, family, you

lose connection with them when you're

trying to build something, right? And so

when you leave that thing you're

building, it's not like, okay, well, let

me just go home to grandma's house, that

doesn't feel like an option. You don't

feel like you can relate to anyone

anymore. And I just did not understand

what the point was anymore. But it was

right in that moment literally I want to

say like that was the same same piece of

the same storm

of feeling such a deep pain

in such a deep problem which the problem

to me was toxic internet and how toxic

it could be and how detrimental it could

be for your mental health that a

solution came and so I really channeled

that dark dark dark loathing and pain

and instead of drowning in it, I kind of

started swimming as fast as I could

for for air. And my air was go rebuild

yourself, right? And so

I think that that that's ultimately the

way I was able to reframe that. And

I think the internet can make you feel

very alone and very isolated and very

lonely and we start believing it as our

reality. Right? What the internet says

is not really what's in the park across

the street.

And I think that's important for people

to hear is that whatever you're feeling

based on what people are saying on the

internet or whatever you've read, turn

off the phone for a little bit and go

outside, right? Because I didn't do that

in that moment. And I think we have to

realize that it's not always our

reality.

Very powerful. This leads to to Bumble,

which is um which was a game changer in

its industry. It was the first of its

kind. It was the first of its kind in

many respects, including just the the

look and feel and messaging. That's

really, you know, as a marketeer, that's

the thing I I always respected. I mean,

I really respected the um the point of

women getting to go first because I'd

never seen that before. I've never seen

that done in the way that it's done on

Bumble. But from a marketing marketeers

mindset, I really respected how bold,

how clear, how much Bumble were um

willing to position themselves as the

antithesis, the the the opposite of

everything else that existed. It was

really willing to take to bring a new

concept and a new idea to the market.

Um, when you look back at the earliest

days of Bumble, like the first year, two

years of Bumble, now with the hindsight

of knowing how things all how the dots

connected, why did you win?

I'm not sure. Did we win? I still feel

like

Listen, how many customers did you have

over the years? Like,

we have a lot.

A lot.

We have a lot.

I know. And that's an interesting point

that it doesn't feel like you've won.

Oh, no. I Okay, so this is crazy. I in

my head still feel like we're

tiny. Genuinely, I'm not even just

saying that to you. Like the concept of

going public and all of these things in

my mind. I go to the office every day

and I'm like, "Okay, how are we going to

get off the ground?" Like literally, I

don't think you understand. I'm

genuinely

locked in a place of we have so much

more to do and we have so much more

growth to be had that I feel like it's a

reset every day. So I will say

how is it possible to be happy when

you're

you're never there.

But it's not that I'm never there in a

personal sense. It's not like I'm like

oh I don't feel like

validate. It's it's not that anymore.

It's that

there are still billions of people

around the world that have never heard

about Bumble. And there are still

millions and millions and millions of

women around the world right now in bad

relationships. toxic relationships where

they don't understand that they should,

can, and eventually will

go first in their life.

They can leave a bad relationship. They

can go into a good relationship. There

are women as we speak, you know, we're

all watching this unfold. It's

absolutely heartbreaking

just advocating to be able to have

simple freedoms,

just wanting to have the freedom to

exist in their society as an equal. So

when I go to the office every day and

saying, "Okay, how are we going to

launch?" We're 132 years away from

gender parody,

maybe 136. Okay? Either way, it's not

great. And so that's where I feel like I

don't have enough time in this lifetime

to achieve what I want to achieve.

Forget the personal accolades and I

don't care about that stuff. I am I am

personally on a personal level now.

Thank God. It's required a lot of, you

know, self-care, therapy, wonderful

husband, beautiful to healthy children.

Thank you, God. I am happy now, but I'm

not happy about where women are

globally. And that I feel unfulfilled

because until we really look around us

and say, women are not in these toxic,

terrible relationships and living in an

unequal playing field. I have got to go

to work. I got to like get back to the

office. And that's how I feel.

Pursuing that goal comes somewhat at the

expense of yourself in some in some

degree, right? Whether that's your, you

know, cuz life could be easier if you

just decided not to pursue that goal. It

could be easier.

Yeah. I could probably be drinking pin

coladas on the beach somewhere, right?

So, and I always I always think about

this, you know, the the pursuit of this

of a goal versus like, you know,

self-preservation and and taking care of

yourself. And you seem like someone that

is somewhat willing to sacrifice

themsself to a degree, sacrifice

something to fulfill a goal that might

even hurt yourself in your own life in a

sense of like psychological harm or

balance or you know, it's definitely

sleep.

Yeah. No, this is this is probably the

biggest uh this is the this is the

balancing act we all talk about, right?

But

you can't do it all every single day.

Why not go to the beach, you know? Why

not go and have a pinina colada? And

you want to go have a pan on the beach?

If we ask you the same, okay?

There's got to be like a a group therapy

for like why why why won't we go have a

peanut colada on the beach? Um,

I don't know. I just I feel very

passionate about what I'm doing. And

when I stop feeling passionate, I'll go

have a pinina colada and then I'll go do

something different. But this is

it feels like my life's work. And I I

try to be a good mom and I try to be a

good wife and I try to be a good to

myself and take those times. And I think

anyone that sits around and tells you

like, "Oh, it's all about balance." I

mean, maybe they're right. Maybe they've

got some secret that I don't know about,

but my god, I don't I don't I don't

think any day is fully balanced, right?

I don't think any of us go to sleep

every night feeling like, "Wow, I just

got a 10 out of 10 on every single

category today." I think you just do

your best. And for me, I get joy out of

pushing this brand forward. I get joy

out of the women that come up to me and

tell me that they were in an abusive

marriage for 20 years and read a story

about Bumble and left their spouse and

got on Bumble and are happy in healthy

relationships. Like that's what this is

all about for me.

It looked like that question made you a

bit emotional.

Yeah, I am emotional about it because

I'm kind of doing this for my

17-year-old self also, right? I don't

want another generation of

me at 17. I don't want another

generation of that. I don't want another

generation of young women that felt

unworthy and felt

lesser than and felt like they needed a

man to tell them what to do. And I just

don't I don't want to see that as this

next wave of 17-year-olds. So,

I also don't want to see all these women

suffering from domestic and emotional

abuse across the world. So, you know,

there's lots of ways and a lot of people

around the world that are doing a lot to

fix this, but I don't have those skill

sets. I don't have, you know, maybe I

don't know how to do what they know how

to do, and I know how to do this. So, I

feel like I better just lean in while I

can. And plus, I I'm definitely old for

the Gen Z people out there, but I'm 33,

so I feel like, you know, I might have a

little bit more in me somewhere.

If you're old, I'm old. So, I thought

we're I just turned 30.

So,

wait, you're three years younger than

me? That's like

Yeah, I just turned 30.

It's like five decades younger than me.

No, it's not. We're in the same We're in

the same school.

Well, happy birthday whenever it was.

Yeah, it was about a couple of weeks

ago.

Well, happy birthday.

You want to tissue?

No, I'm okay.

You sure?

Yeah.

That for me that answer really answers a

lot of questions because it shows where

the driver is coming from and that's the

reason why the pin coladas seem like a

lower priority than the mission. Going

back to the question which I kind of

took us off on a tangent away from um

about why you think Bumble won

um or was successful was able to break

through into that very small category of

dating apps or dating sites where

there's really only like a handful of

real players.

Why? Why? Because I know you know I have

to say something. I know that the other

dating apps because I was sometimes in

the room tried to launch dating apps of

themselves. So they they took their

existing network, they tried to launch a

new dating app into it and it didn't

work.

I've seen it happen over and over again.

I know Michelle

Yeah.

from Peanut. She's one of the people I

used to work with when we were doing the

marketing at Purdue.

Oh, really?

Yeah. She's I I think what she's done is

awesome.

Yeah. I love Peanut. It's It's great.

But but I but I know it's not

easy and I know it's not chance and I

know it's not luck because I've seen I

can't tell you at Social Chain how many

times we had dating apps come to us and

say, "Can you do our marketing?" maybe

200 times.

There's 5,000 dating apps in the app

store.

It's impossible. It's impossible. It's

impossible to start a new one because of

the network effects and all of those

things.

It's impossible.

Impossible.

So why you how you? How

every other dating product until Bumble

had been solving for the wrong side of

the coin. They've been thinking about

men. That's all. They woke up in the

morning and thought about how to make a

dating app good for guys and they had it

backwards.

Why are you solving for men when this is

all about what women need and what women

want? No one was asking women, you think

women want to get abused on the

internet? Think again. Like, find me a

woman that enjoys being harassed on a

dating app. Not one.

But for some reason, that problem didn't

strike anyone as a problem.

So,

it's not that hard to say, "Wait a

second. This is a double-sided

marketplace.

This product can't survive without