Avid Life now also runs a website for sugar daddies seeking young women and a site where viewers vote on whether an applicant is hot or not.Īs for Morgenstern, he is now running a business incubator that invests in health and wellness companies and nutrition counselling. Morgenstern would not share details of the deal. In 2007, Avid Life Media acquired Ashley Madison as its first purchase. He noted this firestarter mentality is true for most entrepreneurs. He was noticed later in the parking lot opening the car door for his spouse.Īs the business grew, he realized he was a “firestarter” and not the best person to attend to the ongoing day-to-day business matters, so decided to sell off Ashley Madison and move on to new endeavours. He admitted to capitalizing on the human condition, and proudly declared faithfulness to his wife as his chosen lifestyle. People said a cheaters website wouldn’t be successful in their community – but it always was. “They were lonely.”Īs Ashley Madison expanded into new countries, the local reaction was always the same. “Seventy per cent of the guys would try to engage her in a chat,” he said. In addition, something he discovered while listening in on training calls with his receptionist, was that men would quickly move from offering registration details to chatting up the woman. Many were seeking validation that they are still attractive. Nonetheless, the reasons people came to the web site were varied. “They told us ‘Good for you for calling it what it is’.” “But we got more emails and letters from people commending us for the site,” he said. His high-profile activities also generated angry emails and letters from people accusing him of promoting marriage infidelity. Subscribers jumped to 550,000 in the summer of 2002, from just 60,000 the previous January. So he kept booking these ads and enjoyed the press when they were pulled or rejected. He soon discovered if he booked mainstream media ads, he generated press, which generated money. In the early days, he paid $200 a day for a Toronto Star classified ad directing people to his site. “Sometimes opportunity knocks and sometimes it leans on the doorbell,” he quipped. However, the Internet was just taking off so the service quickly shifted to being a completely online experience. in Toronto and another on Robert Speck Parkway in Mississauga - locations chosen because of the local demand and the population density. “We were operating only four to six months and already we had positive cash flow.” “I think we spent about $10,00 at the time,” he recalled. He had a lot of business ventures on the go, but Ashley Madison demanded attention. “One thing I discovered in my research is that people did not want to go to a place called ,” he said. He came up with the title “Ashley Madison” by stringing together two popular baby names that flowed nicely and sounded like an advertising agency. He took out an ad asking “Are you having an affair? Have you had an affair?” and offered to pay people $50 to talk to him one-on-one about why they cheat.Īrmed with that research he opened a dating service in 2002 where people signed up the old-fashioned way – they came into an office, paid their money and registered with a profile. Morgenstern said the seed for Ashley Madison was planted in his head when he read an article about the dating site Lavalife, which stated that one third of its registrants were married. This comment underlined another business principle that Morgenstern said has served him well – to always have several different business pots boiling. "That’s just Darren - always coming up with another idea.” “I think of him like a crazy scientist,” she said.
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