How a Tinder Hack Led to Thousands of Women Becoming Friends Around the World

Guest blog post by Aine Mulloy, Founder and CMO of Girl Crew

Ah, Tinder. We’ve all heard of it. Some love it. Some hate it. And some love to hate it. Many
see it as the beginning of the end of traditional romance, and a precursor to a dating-on-
demand culture. Others see an opportunity to turns the status quo on its head. One of those
who saw such a chance, was Elva Carri.

Bored at home one Friday night, Elva had an urge to leave the couch and go out dancing.
Unfortunately, her friends and family were otherwise engaged, and after briefly toying with
the idea of heading out solo, Carri decided to turn to the internet. Rather than try any of the
usual social media platforms, she turned to Tinder.

After changing her gender settings on the app, she created a pink text graphic explaining her
predicament and began reaching out to others on the dating site. While this might seem a
little bizarre, overnight Elva had matched with a hundred local women. Clearly, she was on
to something. Quickly realising that Tinder would be an ineffective way of messaging
multiple people to plan a night out, she moved the group to a secret Facebook group. This
allowed everyone to chat to together, in one space, and get to know each other. The group
loved the idea and a night out was soon planned.

From these small beginnings GirlCrew began to grow. And Elva was joined by myself and
Pamela Newenham as co-founders. More and more members came across the graphic on
Tinder and wanted to join. The small group of 100 was booming, so a new hub was formed -
GirlCrew Dublin. Here women from all over the city were able to come together to chat,
share advice, and meet up. It wasn’t long before word spread and women from all over the
world were getting in touch looking for crews in their area. And the network boomed.
Suddenly there were groups popping up everywhere. From London, Glasgow, Sydney,
Christchurch, Toronto, Vancouver, New York, San Francisco and Seattle just to name a few.
And in 2016, GirlCrew launched its own app for iOS and Android.
Being fun-loving ladies, there have been lots of brilliant moments along the way. One such
example is when GirlCrew Dublin played a city-wide Tinder prank. Members from all over the
city changed their Tinder profiles to Mary Robinson, the first female president of Ireland. As
these things often are, it was picked up by Reddit, and then the media. It wasn’t long before
GirlCrew was outed as the source. This press coverage saw another surge in membership.
 

Another story we love is when two members from different countries happened to be
travelling in Japan at the same time and they met for beers. There have been holidays to
Morocco, hiking in California, and wine tours in Australia.

As membership has grown the variety of events has increased, and the topics being
discussed also widened. With new groups being created to accommodate these. Covering everything from travel to entrepreneurship, from blogging to parenting these forums are a way for people from all over the world to connect over shared passions. The perfect spot to go to if you need advice on crafting your CV, putting shelves up, or perfecting that winged-
eyeliner.

Now at more than 100,000 members, GirlCrew is a community for women, by women. An
online space where women can come together to chat, network, and share support online
and also meet offline. Whether you’re looking for a tip on local restaurants, want career or
entrepreneurship advice, are searching for the best buggy or want to go out dancing - you’ll
find it all in GirlCrew.