Maple Match Dating App Launches to Help Connect Americans with Canadians

Though the US Presidential Election is over, the nation remains deeply divided along party lines. Many Americans have made jokes about moving to Canada in the past, but this week, the Canadian immigration website’s server broke down because of all the traffic from unhappy American voters.

Enter Maple Match, a dating app which matches Americans and Canadians for potential romance. The company took an opportunity to make lemonade out of political lemons.

Maple Match was beta testing its service earlier this year, and this month seized the opportunity to launch its new app to help Americans feeling less than happy with their country’s choices. The app's tagline is “make dating great again,” similar to the slogan for President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign.

Maple Match’s technology is straightforward. It offers the same photo-based profile that Tinder does, but there is no swiping. You indicate your citizenship and your desired citizenship, and then you can look through potential matches and start messaging whomever you like.

In order to more accurately determine matches, Maple Match offers “surveys” or short questionnaires on different subjects, including politics, beliefs, and personal habits, which offers a little more insight into potential dates than you might get with other apps. (Most daters aren’t vocal about their political choices, but having permission for political expression is one reason Maple Match appeals to certain daters.)

Some questions include whether or not you support same-sex marriage, or whether or not you would date someone who considers himself to be “very conservative.” The more you offer answers to questions, the more Maple Match is able to accurately match for you.

Joe Goldman, the man who founded the app, had wanted to find a way to connect Americans with Canadians. He grew up in Houston, where many Canadian expats reside. He saw his opportunity when Donald Trump entered the race and began gaining support. On Tuesday, the app was flooded with new members.

Assuming many Americans might want to leave for Canada in the wake of such a divided election, he started beta testing the app in May of this year. On Nov. 5, the app launched publicly and immediately there were thousands of Canadians and Americans using it, Goldman said. The day after the election, its user base had doubled.

“We did not expect this,” Goldman told Canada’s Global News, “as I don’t think many people were expecting a Trump victory.”

As of Thursday, Maple Match was ranked the 67th social networking app in the iTunes Store. The app is only available via iOS.

"I have to emphasize—the coolest part is not the 'Trump Effect,'" Goldman said to website DCInno. "The coolest part for me was that I really wanted to do this for a long time, but now that Trump's a thing I felt like I could do this."