SINGAPORE: Candice Gallagher is a woman on a mission—to put the fun back into dating in Singapore. The founder of “SinglePore,” a company that organizes events for singles ready for authentic, real-world connections, is letting two worlds collide: her passion for marketing and her search for a partner.
The 37-year-old Ms Gallagher is originally from the UK but lived in Singapore for five years, although she’s since moved back to London. She was first introduced to TISG readers way back in 2022 by way of her TikTok account Candilicious, where she often talked about her dating experiences in the Little Red Dot.
Since then, her social media following has grown to more than 150,000, and she’s quit her day job in fintech to focus on old-school but high-tech matchmaking. The company, after all, has an algorithm that uses relationship science to find participants’ most compatible matches. The rest is up to chemistry.
In May 2024, she generated a lot of buzz when she hosted the first SinglePore event, to which thousands of people responded.
Most recently, Ms Gallagher’s company held Singapore’s first-ever singles matchmaking bar crawl at Quayside Isle on Saturday (Mar 28), which, based on online evidence, appears to have been a success.
@candilicious.asia And we’re off! The SinglePore dating event at Quayside Isle has officially started! 80 guests. 100% single. Lots of chances for sparks to fly. 🥰 #SinglePore #datingevent #Candilicious #QuaysideIsleSG #sabiobythesea #greenwoodfishmarket #miska #commonmancoffeeroaster
Ms Gallagher, who sat down with The Independent Singapore (TISG) for an interview, told us that 80 people showed up, and the weather cooperated.
“It was great fun… lots of conversations happening,” she said, adding that she was happy about the cloud cover, as “nobody wants to be on a date sweating” profusely.
Since the bar crawl, which matched attendees with three potential partners, she’s gotten the chance to play matchmaker as some have messaged her to say there were others they weren’t matched with but who caught their eye, and they were hoping to make a connection.
She added that the feedback has been positive so far. While she’s here, she’ll be hosting a few other events this month for people from the ages of 24 to 45 (interested? Check them out here.)
Ms Gallagher is doing her bit to help Singapore’s singles enjoy the meeting and matching process; some online have even teased her about singlehandedly raising Singapore’s fertility rate.
It’s not that that’s her goal, however. She just wants people to enjoy themselves in what can, at times, be a stressful process.
“Everyone is tired of dating apps, the endless swiping, the inbox chat graveyard, the staggered conversations where one person says ‘hi’ on a Sunday and get a reply on a Wednesday, and you don’t speak for 10 days,” she told TISG.
She added that although people are tired of facing rejection on dating apps, they don’t realize that they actually have more chances of finding success at a dating event.
“One, everybody is single. Two, most people go by themselves, and everyone is there to meet other people, which means they’re more open to being approached and to approaching other people. The third thing is, there’s no substitute to what you feel with connection and chemistry in real life,” Ms Gallagher said.
She recalled that even in her own romantic history, she’s gone out with men with whom she wouldn’t have matched on a dating app, “but because I met them in real life, I was attracted to their energy, their conversation and their ability to make me laugh.”
As to why it’s important to make dating fun again, she said, “I like to think of it as love and levity. You’re trying to find someone that you enjoy spending time with, and the experience of finding someone should also be fun.”/TISG
Read also: Thousands of SG people signed up for ‘Single-pore’ dating event started by expat on TikTok