No app-etite
Shutdown of Austin-based dating app stings gay and bisexual men
Austin-based Bumble is swiping left on its Chappy dating app for gay and bisexual men.
Effective February 28 — exactly two weeks after Valentine’s Day — Bumble is shutting down Chappy. In a statement provided February 18 to CultureMap, the company says executives at Bumble and its new majority owner, Blackstone Group Inc., concluded that integrating Chappy into Bumble “would provide the best long-term user experience.”
“We are deeply thankful for the teams that have operated Chappy,” the statement says, “and are welcoming many of them to Bumble to support our continued growth.”
Effective February 17, Chappy no longer displayed profiles after users swiped to find potential dates. Eleven days later, on February 28, all information about Chappy’s users will disappear from the app; none of the data will be shifted to Bumble.
Chappy users are being urged to sign up for the Bumble app, which is offering a free one-week premium subscription to Chappy devotees.
“All of Chappy’s stars (that’s you!) are welcome,” Chappy says on its FAQ page, “and you can rest assured that there’s already a huge community of gay men in Bumble looking for healthy, safe, and respectful connections in love, work, and life.”
Chappy was founded in 2017 in the United Kingdom. The app eventually came under Bumble’s ownership umbrella, and its offices moved to Austin. According to Queerty, Chappy had 610,000 registered users.
In a separate statement, Sam Dumas, co-founder of Chappy, says he’ll work with Bumble as an LGBTQ+ brand adviser “to help ensure a smooth transition and an even stronger future for our community.”
“Bumble and Chappy share similar missions: empowering their users and creating a stronger sense of belonging for all users, regardless of their identity,” Dumas says.
Last November, investment giant Blackstone agreed to buy a majority stake in Bumble’s parent company, MagicLab. The deal valued MagicLab at $3 billion. As part of the acquisition, Bumble founder Whitney Wolfe Herd became CEO of MagicLab. Herd started Bumble in 2014 as a female-focused dating app.
