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Dating is rarely a fairy tale, especially if you’re one of the many experiencing dating app burnout. But Hinge, the Match Group-owned dating app, still believes in romance, as seen in its latest project that updates literary love stories for a Gen Z audience.
Today (May 12), Hinge launched the second installment of its “No Ordinary Love” campaign, which debuted last year and depicts real romances that began on the dating app. In this new chapter, the brand enlisted contemporary writers to bring to life tales of early dating from five couples who met on Hinge.
The modern love stories will run as a five-part weekly series on newsletter platform Substack and as a limited-edition hardcover book, produced by Dazed’s in-house agency, Dazed Studio. Starting in June, the brand will distribute the anthology at in-person book clubs in New York and London.
Writers Jen Winston, William Rayfet Hunter, Hunter Harris, Tomasz Jedrowski, and Upasna Barath penned the stories, which alternate between both partners’ perspectives.
Hinge first branched out into literature last year, publishing a zine of real-life romantic stories written by authors including Roxane Gay and John Paul Brammer. Gay has returned to write the foreword introducing the Substack series.
The brand is tapping into the soaring popularity of books and literature among Gen Z, fueled by channels like TikTok’s #BookTok community. Research from Nielsen BookData also revealed that Gen Z favors print books, which accounted for 80% of purchases from November 2021 to 2022.
Hinge’s campaign will extend through partnerships with creators on Substack and #BookTok, as well as out-of-home ads in New York and London.
“We want to complement Substack’s community of writers and readers with honest, authentic perspectives on love from exciting literary voices,” Jackie Jantos, president and chief marketing officer at Hinge, said in a statement. “By flipping between both partners’ perspectives, these real love stories highlight the misreads, overthinking, and unspoken harmony of early dating.
Hinge’s project continues its efforts to explore storytelling that reaches Gen Z. Under its “Designed to be Deleted” platform, which debuted in 2018, its ads have lately pivoted to capture the messy and serendipitous realities of modern dating.
“Dating is really hard, and someone’s story, with all the twists and turns, can be really humanizing and give people some hope,” Jantos told ADWEEK in March. “Ultimately, the authenticity and truth of those stories are what people connect with.”
Amid reports of falling dating app usage, particularly among younger audiences, Hinge and rivals including Bumble and Tinder have been ramping up marketing aimed at Gen Z. So far, Hinge has been bucking the downturn: its 2024 revenue rise of 39% outpaced growth at owner Match Group, which saw a 3% revenue increase, and of another brand in the Match portfolio, Tinder, which posted flat revenues in 2024.
