Press

The New York Times

“Are you single?” the Manhattan-based matchmaker Maria Avgitidis asked a reporter mid-interview, plunging him into a dark place. “And you are 40? Do you ever feel like all the really good girls that you would want to marry are taken?”

Full disclosure: My answer to each of Ms. Avgitidis’s questions was “yes.” “That is where that panic comes from,” she said. “Like: ‘Why not me? What does he have?’ And then you realize that he is four years younger. And that is exactly where that panic comes from.”

Today

Speaking to TODAY.com, Avgitidis — the founder of the boutique matchmaking firm Agape Match — says she thinks of herself as a “big sister” to 46,000 Instagram followers (and even more on TikTok). In her weekly Instagram story segment called Ask a Matchmaker, she answers questions from followers with tart and memorable pieces of wisdom. Her devoted fans also call into her hotline, conducted over Zoom and converted into a podcast episode.

One day in March 2022, Dick called in to ask Avgitidis for tips about meeting women in real life, since he was having no luck on the apps. Avgitidis’ “great advice” left him energized to meet more people. What Dick never expected was that he had already made first impressions on women: Avgitidis’ followers, listening in on the Zoom call.

The Washington Post

Maria Avgitidis, founder of Agape Match, said her client base comprised busy professionals, especially in finance. In her experience, New Yorkers searching for a London date have largely been women desperate to search outside the city. “There is a crisis in New York,” she said — “a shortage of single, straight men.” New York women are also frustrated by the “stupid rules” of the city’s dating scene, she says, such as the strict observance of a three-day post-date interlude until the man calls his date.

fastcompany.com

“I ask my clients, ‘What does your day-to-day look like?’ And most of them say they go home, they go to work, they go to the gym,” said Maria Avgitidis, founder of Agape Match. “And as a result, they’re just going to be meeting the same kind of people over and over again.”

If you want to meet someone organically, increase the chances of it actually happening by going to places that open you up to meeting people with shared interests, such as the dog park, church groups or an acting class.

Esquire

“If it’s a new relationship,” advises Maria Avgitidis, fourth-generation matchmaker and date coach, “I don’t suggest dinner,” which she says is “way too pressurized.” Instead, she stresses fun, because, I suppose, no matter what happens, it will be fun. What kind of fun? “Ice-skating rinks, bowling alleys, something that would show a little bit of your creative or kooky side.”

edition.cnn.com

How could meeting a man in New York possibly be as difficult as landing an affordable apartment? New York matchmaker Maria Avgitidis, of Agape Match, says it’s infinitely harder. Just as in real estate, there’s a dearth of inventory. “In general, you have four single straight women to every single straight man,” Avgitidis explains.

rd.com

“Everyone wants someone who is approachable and smiling is the cheapest way to do that,” says Maria Avgitidis, CEO and head matchmaker at
Agape Match
in New York City. “Looking into the camera shows you’re ready to go and the eyes are the window into your soul.” Your picture should look like your best friend took it because you don’t want a photo that looks like you’re posing at a cheesy mall portrait studio.

newyork.cbslocal.com

This New York City based matchmaking service is run by fourth-generation matchmaker Maria Avgitidis. With the choice of paid client services or a free membership, each love seeker is asked to fill out a form which includes relationship status, age, if you want children and religion, among others. She does the work – if there’s a match, you’ll be contacted. Additionally, singles mixers are hosted throughout the year as well if you’d rather do your own matching.

harpersbazaar.com

Suffering from dating app fatigue? You curate the perfect profile and spend countless hours swiping, only to be left disappointed with a sore thumb and mental fatigue. So what if you let someone else take the reigns to vet potential matches for you? Agape Specializing in busy professionals (heavy on financial industries) seeking serious relationships, this New York-based boutique agency was founded by Maria Avgitidis—a 4th generation matchmaker.

Dating Advice

Animated and personable, Maria tells us that matchmaking is in her DNA, going back four generations in her family. The ability to see what people need and be a support system for singles is second nature to her. But the way this modern woman got into her life’s calling was more by coincidence than heritage. In her early 20s, she was at a wedding when a few single men came up to her with a hopeful plea.

Martha Stewart Weddings

“Be completely yourself,” says Maria Avgitidis, a fourth generation matchmaker and founder of Agape Match. Maybe you have dated around and tried on a number of different personalities. You’re dating the right person when you feel free to be all shades of yourself around them, especially vulnerable.

Dating Advice

An ideal matchmaking candidate is someone who places significant importance on their privacy and safety, who feels more comfortable at the hands of a love expert. If you’re the type of person who would pick a headhunter for your career, you’re perfect for matchmaking!

New York Post

Avgitidis subscribes to the idea that three months is the time for the DTR (define the relationship) talk. “Three months is a tricky [stage],” she says. “If you don’t know what you are yet, this is when you need to figure it out.” She suggests Public at 210 Elizabeth St., which is a global cuisine restaurant in an old public school building. “It’s really intimate, somewhere you can [talk],” she says.

thrillist.com

“We match people on a multi-pillar scale. We look at their communication style, first and foremost. We look at their lifestyle and how they can improve their dating experience. For a lot of people it’s about showing them priorities, giving them feedback after dates, educating them on style.You can sign up on the website to either be a client or a member in our database. If you sign up to be considered as a client, we call you in for an interview and recommend the best program for you, whether that’s matchmaking or date coaching.”

Time Out New York

How it works: First Agape’s coaches meet clients and matches in person, then they plan first and second dates.
Why it works: Agape uses behavioral-economics principles, such as the Secretary Problem, to help people find love. If you conduct 10 interviews and have to hire or discard candidates along the way, there’s a very little chance you’ll pick the first interviewee and about a 40 percent chance you’ll pick the fifth or seventh. “This is why a lot of clients end up in relationships with their fourth or fifth match,” says Avgitidis.

ABC News

Since the company’s launch in January, Instant Chemistry has sold 200 kits worldwide, Gonzalez and Seabrooke said. Through partnerships with matchmaking services like Agape Match in New York and Singld Out in Los Angeles, they said their product has resulted in dozens of happy relationships.

ELLE

Maria Avgitidis, a matchmaker and dating coach based in New York City, says she uses OKCupid in a similar way. She edits clients’ profiles and advises them as they write messages—and maintains her own account to run queries. Avgitidis screens profiles based on age, race, and religion, and when she finds a suitable match, she writes to them. “I’ll say, ‘Hi, my name is Maria. I know this is really weird, but I’m a professional matchmaker—here’s my website. I think you’d be a really great match for one of my clients, and if you’re interested, I’d love to meet you for coffee.’”

New York Post

Maria Avgitidis, a matchmaker at New York City-based service Agape Match, says summer can be a perfect time to date. “Summer weather promotes more activities for socializing. Weekends are filled with weddings, barbecues, rooftop cocktail parties. There are more opportunities as a result to meet more ‘friend of a friend’ people and date them.”

Financial Times

Maria Avgitidis, founder of Agape Match, said her client base comprised busy professionals, especially in finance. In her experience, New Yorkers searching for a London date have largely been women desperate to search outside the city. “There is a crisis in New York,” she said — “a shortage of single, straight men.” New York women are also frustrated by the “stupid rules” of the city’s dating scene, she says, such as the strict observance of a three-day post-date interlude until the man calls his date.

The New York Times

Since stay-at-home orders took hold, Ms. Avgitidis has increased her coaching services. “Coaching is where we’ve become quite innovative,” she said. “People have questions on how to navigate dating during quarantine, and we’ve made ourselves available to answer those questions.” This happens through a free weekly webinar called “Ask a Matchmaker Live.”

Dating Advice

Bragging Rights: Awarded best matchmaking service in NYC by CBS News. Avgitidis is the founder and head matchmaker at Agape Match. Her goal is to find love solutions for all of her clients, so she commits personal attention to make sure she finds the right fit for everyone. Preferences and compatibility are measured on several levels so you’re happy with the result.

New York Post

Maria Avgitidis, 29, a matchmaker at Agape Match, says it’s a matter of economics. “Generally speaking, the more educated and higher-income someone is, the more likely they will marry — or at the very least enter a long-term relationship,” she says, drawing data from Freakonomics. “What does NYC have? A whole lot of educated and high-income folks.”

ELLE

When I turned to several licensed professionals for insight, including Maria Avgitidis, matchmaker and dating coach at agapematch.com, and Dr. Karen Sherman, psychologist and author of several relationship books, I pieced together a profile of my side of the coin.The typical dumpees: have low self-esteem, constantly need to be in a relationship, get jealous…

New York Post

Can’t come up with an attention-grabbing costume yourself? Just turn the tables, Avgitidis says. “If you see a lady or maybe a man in a sexy bumblebee costume, ask them, ‘Where did the inspiration for your outfit come from?’ if you’re shy — or, if you’re bolder, make a joke, like, ‘It’s a jungle out there. I saw three bumblebees on my way here… never thought I’d make it!’ ” she suggests. “If you can make someone laugh, you’re pretty much golden.”

The Washington Post

Maria Avgitidis, CEO of Agape Match, a matchmaking service based in New York, said this form of dating — and, more specifically, Tinder’s new Blind Date feature — does have the potential to encourage people to broaden their views on dating by meeting different people, many of whom are outside their usual “type.” This can be very positive if people are open to dating someone who might not necessarily be in their core attraction bubble,” she said. However, she added, it could also backfire, hurting people who are unmatched after their photos are seen.”

TIME Magazine

Maria Avgitidis, the CEO of Agape Match in New York City and the host of the podcast Ask a Matchmaker, agrees. She argues that the current financial challenges faced by singles can create opportunities for them to figure out their compatibility with potential partners when it comes to financial attitudes and lifestyles.

“How do you spend your money? What do you splurge on? Where do you want to live? These are questions that people are asking more and more,” she says. “You want to be aligned because financial stress is the number one reason why people divorce.”

 

VICE

Maria Avgitidis, who founded Agape Match six years ago, says the rise of Tinder “oversaturated the market,” driving younger clients to her offices. “All of a sudden we had men under 34. They’re like, ‘I’m sexed out. I can’t do this anymore. With more apps suggesting matches based on users’ social media networks, bumping into colleagues or employers is a growing problem. Avgitidis says her clients, 80 percent of whom are “Goldman guys,” don’t want to risk running into their bosses online.

Los Angeles Times

Maria Avgitidis, chief executive of matchmaking company Agape Match, posted a survey in her Instagram stories in May asking her thousands of followers — mostly single women between the ages of 18 and 45 — if they would publicly share their vaccine status, if they would filter for vaccine status, if they would lie about getting vaccinated to increase the chances for more matches, and if they thought a person’s vaccine status reflected their political beliefs. On politics, 66% of respondents said yes, they did see a connection.

Asking a match what they think about vaccines is “a really easy way to learn about someone’s values,” she said.

 

The NY Times

Ms. Avgitidis, 38, says she has set up more than 5,000 first dates through her matchmaking company, Agape Match, based in New York. “My job is to take off rose-colored glasses and be like, ‘Hello, you’re confused,’” she said, “If you’re still in a situation-ship after three months, he’s wasting your time.”

Ms. Avgitidis describes her business — which derives its name from the Greek word for a selfless, spiritual love — as a decidedly old-school alternative to dating apps. “I set people up for a living just like my grandmother!” is how she describes herself in her Instagram bio. In addition to trying to find matches for her clients, her Dating Refresh Program provides personal styling and professional photography for an optimized online dating profile. On her podcast, Ask a Matchmaker, Ms. Avgitidis offered the ‘Tucci Theory’, which posits that men who appreciate the actor Stanley Tucci are attentive lovers.

Women's Health

Find out how he likes to spend his time and cash. Similar tastes in these areas are crucial, says Maria Avgitidis, founder of Agape Match. Ask: “What do you like to do on your days off? What’s a worthy splurge?” Set the first date 17 to 23 days after initiating contact with him. This specific window gives you the optimal online courting time before meeting, found a study in the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication.

The New York Times

What are the things we do today that will seem embarrassing or otherwise regrettable to our future selves — the stuff that will make us cringe when we look back on how we lived our lives in the early 2020s?

More than 30 people from academia, fashion, media, the arts and business weighed in, as did a certain infamous chatbot. One day, perhaps very soon, many of these prognosticators said, we will blush to recall how we fished for likes on social media or shared our most private thoughts (and pics) with strangers.

Elite Daily

Maria Avgitidis, CEO of matchmaking service Agape Match, says it’s best not to get involved. She recently weighed in on this subject during a Q&A session on her Instagram Story in which a follower discovered she was the other woman and wanted to know whether she should tell the wife. That post garnered 15,000 views and shares, as well as hundreds of DMs. Clearly, it’s a loaded question.

“I genuinely believe that if someone has done this, it’s not your position to bear the burden of telling their girlfriend,” she explains, adding that your safety should come first.

New York Post

As NYC singles scramble to refresh their profiles and get back out there, one matchmaker has become the go-to for dating app success. Thirty-seven-year-old Maria Avgitidis (a k a @realmatchmakermaria) is a fourth-generation, New York-based Greek-American relationship guru who has established herself as the queen of dating-profile critiques on TikTok, where she has more than 55,000 followers. To date, 4,000 singles have sent their profiles to Avgitidis’ company, Agape Match, for help, and she currently has a waiting list of around 200 people.

“They’re seeking ways to optimize their profile for the person they’re hoping to attract,” said Avgitidis of her clients, who pay as much as $200 for her profile guidance. “I also point out things that help repel people you’re just not interested in meeting.”

Betty Confidential

I think the reason why “Friends With Benefits” (FWB) relationships don’t last is because some “couples” enjoy the sex, and do it too often, thus confusing at least one party in the relationship into lust/love. If the other party is on the road to FWB, and the other is driving a FWB to a relationship, someone is bound to get hurt… and that someone is the driver.

Sparkology

Men know the rules. If you cannot afford to date, you shouldn’t be dating. Since I’m sure I’ll get plenty of flack for this, let me just say I have an economics background, so, while some may say I’m anti- feminist, I say shut up– I’m more feminist then you’ll ever know.

Pappas Post

Following in her Greek grandmother’s footsteps, Maria Avgitidis is taking the age-old art of matchmaking into the 21st century. She uses the Internet, social media and her networking skills to help singles find their perfect match.

PopSugar

There’s only one way to find closure and heal your bruised heart and ego after you’ve been ghosted, and that is time,” Maria Avgitidis, founder and matchmaker at Agape Match, told POPSUGAR. “It will take about three months to heal if you got ghosted after dating someone for a few months. Confronting them seems like a good idea, but this coward didn’t even want to give you a warranted explanation. They’re not going to give you what you need through confrontation.

 

Thrive Global

“Meeting people ‘in the wild’ makes conversations more organic and easygoing,” Maria Avgitidis, founder of Agape Match, a matchmaking service based in NYC, told Business Insider in an email. Avgitidis said that meeting in person provides an opportunity for exploration, curiosity, and a different kind of sexual tension. “More significantly, you’re not hiding behind a screen and turning a soulmate into a pen pal,” she said.

Dating XP

AGAPE Match is a professional matchmaking service for New Yorkers. Founded by Maria Avgitidis, Agape is a team of professional matchmakers whose expertise, experience, and charisma will assist you in your quest for a fun and healthy relationship. They take extensive notes after the first few matches to learn more about their client’s dating personality. By compiling a dating personality profile, they can find the right person for their clients.

Refinery29

The search for Jewish love is not exclusive to online dating either. Maria Avgitidis, founder and CEO of Agape Match in New York City, remembers a client who said “she only wanted Jewish men because they’re really great providers.” Other non-Jewish clients who were looking for Jewish partners were doing so, she says, outside of “a gold-digging perspective:” “They just want a mentsh.”

Popsugar

Now is a great time to make sure your dating profiles are in tip-top shape. I recently had a consultation with Agape Match‘s Erika Ettin, co-host of the podcast So, We Met Online…, who gave me some profile tips like, “Saying you value integrity is boring. Talk about your favorite food instead.” She also suggested no more than four photos so they have enough to get excited about you but not enough to nitpick the things they don’t like. With a profile glow up and a new perspective on chat openers, Erika has me primed to do some of my best work.

Elite Daily

“Video chatting is an excellent resource to help connect with someone emotionally and physically, even though you’re not together IRL, through body language, adds Maria Avgitidis, CEO of matchmaking service Agape Match,

Avgitidis also adds that you can learn a lot about someone in their own environment through video chat, which is especially valuable in the beginning stages of dating someone new.

The Story Exchange

Maria Avgitidis, founder of Agape Match, works with male professional athletes and Fortune 500 CEOs. She recently started a virtual coaching program for women starting at $350 for five sessions over three weeks, and she also launched a private Facebook group for members to attend events, including a watch party for the new Netflix dating reality show, “Too Hot to Handle.”

Forbes

Agape Match CEO Maria Avgitidis advises her Gen Z clients to be both intentional and accurate in their profiles. “Gen Z is so much more woke” than her millennial and Gen X clients, she says. “They’re much more open about communicating their beliefs and values before a number is exchanged to get offline.” Additionally, she adds “Gen Z will be the quickest to call you out on your overuse of filters or flattering angles.”

Elite Daily

At school, you see people on their good days and their bad days,” Maria Avgitidis, dating expert, professional matchmaker, and CEO of Agape Match, tells Elite Daily. “You can learn their micro-behaviors and decide if this person is someone you enjoy being around.” Without that physical advantage, it’s easier to build someone up in your mind and then feel disappointed when they don’t meet your expectations offline.

TIME Magazine

Maria Avgitidis, the CEO of Agape Match in New York, sees this trend less as an indicator of some sort of evolution for men and more likely another sign of how the pandemic has changed people’s priorities.

“Every single woman is ready for the right guy if he comes along,” Avgitidis said. “The only difference here, which is a 2021-2022 situation, is that more women are willing to walk away from partners that are not worth their time. If he’s going to gaslight me, if he’s going to be avoidant, if he’s not going to be emotionally mature, I’m going to just move away.”

Denver ABC 7

“Being vaccinated might be the new 6’ tall, so you know, would a 5’4” women date a man who’s 5’8” or 5’9,” of course she would, I want to hope she would. Would she date someone who’s not vaccinated? Well right now, she would, but six months down the line, or a year down the line, why is he not vaccinated yet? Was it his choice not to be vaccinated?” said Maria Avgitidis, a professional matchmaker and CEO of Agape Match. Avgitidis says she could see dating apps adding emojis in the future to highlight you’ve been vaccinated, like they have for things now like, “do you want to have kids?”