Internet Dating Site Caters to Bashful Farmers

By Darrell Smith

When farmers hanker to find that special someone to share their lives, it can be, well, like hunting for a needle in a haystack.

Just ask Jerry Miller, the founder of FarmersOnly.com, a year- old online dating service that caters to farmers, ranchers and others in rural regions who just can’t find a connection.

"The other sites have a lot of members, but you can’t relate to most of them," he said by telephone.

Mr. Miller’s online dating service is one tiny dot in what is estimated to be a $490 million segment in the United States, where familiar names such as Yahoo Personals, Match.com and eHarmony cast a long shadow. So popular has this segment become that some market researchers say it’s oversaturated, diluting the potential revenue for the 850 or so dating sites on the Internet.

"There used to be a stigma, and there still is," says Joe Tracy, the publisher of Oregon-based Online Dating Magazine and the Online Dating Industry Journal, a blog on the industry. "But now everybody knows somebody (who met online)."

Online Dating Magazine estimates there are more than 100,000 marriages a year as a result of people meeting on an online dating service.

FarmersOnly.com began as a favor to one of Mr. Miller’s farmer friends who was frustrated by the dating scene and ready to give up. She worked all day at the farm, didn’t see any prospects in her small town, and had decided that the city slickers she’d met online were duds.

"They don’t have a clue," she would tell him.

Mr. Miller is married, but he could relate. He was reared near a dairy farm in Mack, Ohio (pop. 5,837), before he met a city girl and moved to Cleveland.

As a partner in a Cleveland-area public relations firm that represents 4,000 farms and ranches nationwide, Mr. Miller found that his friend wasn’t alone. Her predicament prompted him to scour the Internet for dating sites geared to farmers. Not one popped up.

He did what any cyber-matchmaker would do. He started a Web site for rural singles in the United States and Canada and the people who love them – or at least would like to meet them – and FarmersOnly.com was born.

Since its launch, the site billed as online dating for "down-to- earth singles" has grown to more than 50,000 members.

They’re folks such as Green-AcresDude, a 50-year-old whose profile said he has spent most of his life in the Midwest and wants to return to life on the farm; saintsofthesoul, a 44-year-old woman from Sparks, Nev., a "city gal dreaming of settling down in the country"; and deltadon, a 60-year-old from Oroville, Calif.

"He looks likes the Marlboro man, but you read the profile and he plays tennis three times a week," said Mr. Miller, who has tried and failed to get a few of his members to talk with the media about why they choose his site.

"Anyone can do online dating, especially those who are shy," Mr. Tracy said. "It allows you to filter through until you find someone that’s more compatible. It removes the anxiety."

Ninety million single Americans are being courted by online dating sites, according to market researcher Marketdata Enterprises in Tampa, Fla. This huge population explains why FarmersOnly.com and other niche sites have popped up.

Among other specialty players in the segment are:

Golfmates.com: Like to golf and want to meet a partner at the 19th hole?

Militaryfriends.com: If you want to meet a man or a woman in uniform.

Greenfriends.com: For those dedicated to protecting the environment who haven’t found a green love link.

Equestriancupid.com: Meet up with a honey for horseback riding.

Is it possible that the market could top out? Marketdata, in its 2006 report on the U.S. dating services market, says it might already have done so. The research firm said the market has become saturated and revenue growth fell sharply as the novelty faded.

Already, the e-matchmakers have seen their first crop of divorces since the segment’s 2001 ascent into the mainstream. As concern grows that the sites expose people to con artists or other unscrupulous individuals, lawmakers in at least four states have sought to require dating services to state whether they perform background checks on members.