Tech

I tried a dating service that matches couples based on body odor — and the results were surprising

Madison Malone Kircher

2016-03-24T14:52:56Z

As a single 24-year-old living in Manhattan, I'm no stranger to the dating scene. I've tried everything from apps like Bumble and Tinder, to maintaining eye contact for too long with cute people on the subway.

So when I read about Smell Dating, a new dating website which matches people entirely based on body odor, I decided to give it a try. The service cost $25 and was only available to 100 people living in the New York City area.

Everything would be anonymous and participants weren't allowed to include any personal information like sexual orientation. My only guide would be my sense of smell.

“It’s about trusting subconscious intuition and not falling back on inevitable preconceptions and prejudices,” Smell Dating creator Tega Brain told BuzzFeed when the website launched in February.

After wearing the same shirt for 72 hours straight, I'd then swap shirts with 10 other people in the hopes I would find some of their scents appealing. Mostly, I was just hoping that none of the shirts would make me gag. I was excited to try the service, if a little dubious.

The whole process took over a month to complete, but by the end I was pleasantly surprised by the results.

About two weeks after I applied online, my Smell Dating kit arrived at my apartment.

For more info on applying head here.

Inside, there were instructions, a plain white t-shirt, and an envelope to mail back my shirt after wearing it for three days straight.

As per the instructions, I needed to wear the shirt at all times for the three days. I was allowed to shower, but perfume and deodorant were a going to be a no-go for the next 72 hours.

Here's a closer look at the shirt in the bag. The entire experiment was anonymous, so participants were assigned a number. I got 55.

Over the next three days, I wore the shirt without taking it off, day and night. For the sake of my coworkers, I showered once during the experiment and skipped my usual sweaty spin class.

At the end of three days, I peeled off the shirt and put it back in the Ziploc bag. Then I placed that bag in the pre-stamped envelope Smell Dating sent me and popped the shirt in the mail.

A week later, I received another envelope from Smell Dating. This one had ten tiny plastic bags inside. Each bag held a piece of someone else's t-shirt for me to sniff and determine if I thought their scent was date worthy.

So I got to work. Some of the shirts smelled appealing to me, particularly one that reminded me of my favorite bar of soap.

Not all the shirts were winners though. When I opened this bag, I found that the shirt was damp and growing mold.

Needless to say, it didn't inspire that "swipe right" feeling.

From there, I typed in the user-specific URL that Smell Dating had provided along with the 10 shirt scraps. The website let me choose who I was interested in connecting with.

Like any good middle school love note, my options were "yes," "no," and "maybe."

Another week later, I received two emails from Smell Dating. I had matched with two people.

While I was initially skeptical about the service's totally anonymous policy, I was pleasantly surprised by where my nose led me. Even though I had no idea whose shirts I sniffed, the two people I matched with were women, which would have been my gender preference if Smell Dating had let me choose.

Now all that's left to do is fire off some emails to my matches. Who knows what could happen!

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