Spark Networks

On March 4th, 2010 Spark Networks reported quarter 4 earnings for 2009 and their year end results (which was on Dec. 31, 2009). Revenue for the fourth quarter was $11.1 million which was a decrease of 16% from the same quarter last year. Spark Networks reported a lost for this quarter of $9.6 million and for the full year, a net loss of $6.4 million. Total revenue for 2009 was $45.4 million; in 2008 it was $53.7 million. CEO Adam Berger is quoted in the press release about this the losses:

It’s no surprise to anyone following us this past year that 2009 was extremely challenging for us as revenue declined by 21% with nearly half of the decline coming from our highly profitable Jewish Networks segment ... We accelerated our cost cutting program to offset the revenue decline but were unable to overcome the $8.9 million contribution1 decline and ended up suffering a $5.7 million decline in Adjusted EBITDA

Average paying subscribers for Spark Networks was 168,646 for quarter 4 2009 which is a 5 percent decrease when compared to quarter 4 in 2008. For the full year, average paying subscribers was 166,267. This is down 11 percent from 186,957 in 2008.

While Jewish Networks revenue fell 11 percent to $7.1 million, their subscribers grew by 4 percent to 90,567 in quarter 4. Average paying subscribers for General Market Networks (Spark.com and others) was 9,594. This is a decrease of 58 percent when compared to the fourth quarter of 2008. The Other Affinity Networks (MingleMatch) had better subscriber news and posted a 4 percent increase in subscribers to 67,725 during quarter 4 2009.

While Spark Networks continues to struggle, their balance sheet shows as of December 31, 2009 cash and cash equivalents of $6.2 million with no outstanding debt.

For the full 2009 Q4 release visit Spark Networks News Room.

Related Story: Spark Networks Third Quarter 2009 Financials

In 2005 Great Hill Partners bought about 25 percent stake in Spark Networks. Just recently we learned that the PE firm offered to take Spark Networks private and buy all the shares it does not own. This would cost them about $64 million USD. Spark Networks announced their intentions to evaluate the acquisition proposal.

Spark Networks stock in 2008 was worth about $131 million. Since then they have struggled and seen their value drop to about $84 million. Spark Networks flagship dating site AmericanSingles.com during this time saw a huge drop in membership numbers (it has since been renamed Spark.com). Other dating sites they own like JDate.com have remained strong though.

Great Hill Partners stated that if they took Spark Networks private, the company could then focus on long term growth without worrying about pleasing stock holders with short term profits.

For the full story read Gigaom.

Since Zoosk received $30 million in funding in December (see Story), their dating site traffic has increased by 3 times according to Compete's estimate. In the graph below it shows that in August of 2009 unique visitors had just crossed the 500,000 mark for Zoosk. In January of this year they had reached 2.7 million unique visitors.

It looks like Zoosk is spending at least some of the money they raised on advertising to increase traffic to their dating site. In an interview with Online Personals Watch, Alex Mehr, CEO Of Zoosk also mentions that their dating site has just reached 50 million members. Just 5 months ago Zoosk members numbered around 40 million. That is a lot of growth, which goes to show how using Facebook and its users to spread information about the dating site has really worked for them.

For more information on this dating site, read our Zoosk review.

In response to this Story about BeautifulPeople.com booting 5,000 members off their dating site for gaining weight, Spark.com has decided to offer a free one month subscription to all 5,000 members. Adam Berger, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Spark Networks, said he was disappointed by the public actions BeautifulPeople has taken and decided to make this offer to show that all singles are welcome at Spark.com.

To claim this offer, the rejected BeautifulPeople.com members need to sign up for a free profile at Spark.com. They then need to email their Spark username and the rejection notice they received from BeautifulPeople.com to getignited AT spark DOT com. In 24 hours or less you will then receive a free one month subscription.

To find out more about this dating site, check out our review of Spark.com.

 

Ever since Zoosk received the additional $30 million in funding (see Story) they have received a lot of publicity. Even the famed Reuters Media division took notice and wrote this article. It gives a good overview and history of the company in which we have discussed before here on this site.

The article does mentioned a couple of new pieces of information about Zoosk member demographics. According to Reuters sources, about 65 percent of Zoosk's 40 million user base is under the age of 30. 24 percent of Zooskers are in their 30's and only 11 percent are over 40. This shows how popular social networking sites are for young adults. The Zoosk dating application can be found on Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Hi5, and Friendster. The more traditional dating sites, like Match.com and eHarmony, usually attract older singles who are looking for long term relationships, and not necessarily the quick hook-up that Zoosk provides.

If you would like to find out more about this Facebook Dating Application, you can read our Zoosk review.

I found that missing press release I mentioned in a previous post about the new Spark.com dating site (see Story).

A quick read through doesn't really reveal any additional information. It does confirm what we assumed in the previous post that Spark is made up of the members from AmericanSingles.com and Date.ca. Spark Networks hope that the new clean and easy to navigate interface of Spark.com will give it a more global appeal. The release also mentions the new features of Spark.com (when compared to the old dating sites). These features are the free Color Code Personality Test, the Keyword Search and the "Who's Searching for You?" feature. While these features are new at Spark, they can be found on another Spark Networks brand of dating sites called Mingle Match.

To find out more about this dating site and the new features listed here, you can check out our review of Spark.com.