The new web app matches students with potential partners and helps them find companionship
By GRACIELA TIU — features@theaggie.org
Date Drop, a compatibility-based matchmaking platform, has recently launched at UC Davis and is now available to students. Run by The Relationship Company, the web application is now free for all UC Davis students, providing weekly curated matches every Tuesday. Students confirm their UC Davis email, fill out a 10-minute questionnaire about who they are and what they want in a relationship and from there, they begin to receive their weekly matches.
“We’ve built a world that atomizes people — despite all our connectivity, people are lonelier than ever,” Henry Weng, founder of The Relationship Company and Date Drop, said. “Our mission is to push against that. We want to build systems that help people find meaningful relationships, because the people in your life are really the most important variable.”
Date Drop is the company’s first product, founded by Weng in 2025 under the original name, “Senior Scramble.” Weng described the motivation behind the first launch, noting how subsequent interest from other grade levels led him to create a more polished version of the platform.
“I noticed this sentiment among seniors at Stanford wanting to meet people and invest in relationships during their last year — there was this feeling of, ‘I’ve been here four years, and there are still so many people I’ve never crossed paths with.’ So I built a pretty scrappy matchmaking form.”
Months after its upgrade from “Senior Scramble” to “Date Drop,” the web app is now live at multiple universities, with each campus having its own account. For UC Davis, the official website is ucd.trydatedrop.com and the Instagram handle is @ucddatedrop.
Weng detailed how Date Drop reaches students at a particularly impactful time in their lives and helps them take advantage of the college experience.
“Date Drop is for college students looking for meaningful relationships — over 90% of our users say they’re interested in something long-term,” Weng said. “College is a unique window: you’re surrounded by people your age, figuring out who you are, all within a mile radius. But somehow, it’s still hard to meet the right people. That felt like a problem worth solving.”
Weng noted that, while other dating apps may feel designed to keep you on the app, he specifically designed Date Drop to get users off the platform and give them opportunities to make deeper connections.
“Honestly, I wouldn’t even describe us as a dating app,” Weng said. “There’s no swiping, no browsing and no profiles to scroll through. You fill out a compatibility questionnaire, opt in each week, and receive one match via email every Tuesday. Right now I’m really focused on match quality. That’s the core, and I want to get it right before layering things on top.”
Davis Consulting Group (DCG), the student consulting organization on campus, has partnered with Date Drop and is supporting the platform through its launch process. Lucas Casazza, DCG’s project manager and a fourth-year managerial economics major, outlined how the organization typically works with external partners.
“Davis Consulting Group usually takes on about three clients every quarter,” Casazza said. “We have a vice president [VP] of engagement who’s in charge of coordination and discovering these clients, and ultimately drafting the SOWs [Statements of Work] for the work we’ll be doing. Each quarter we rotate clients, and our VP of engagement found this client. They asked us to develop a detailed marketing plan and execution timeline leading up to their Valentine’s launch, which the campaign centered around.”
Members of DCG have the unique opportunity to provide their insights and help shape the student-centered experience of Date Drop. Keira Manning, a senior consultant at DCG and a third-year communication major, described the organization’s collaborative process with Weng and The Relationship Company.
“We have all been working together on a lot of the groundwork since over winter break, including meeting with the client directly,” Manning said. “I have been tasked with conducting competitor analysis, identifying campus hotspots, gathering emails, crafting campaign ideas and marketing strategies, such as our ‘dating scene’ interview video and supporting the team in any way I can. We have all been very hands-on with this project.”
Through this partnership, DCG members get professional opportunities to dive into the world of marketing, engagement analysis and other consulting tasks, even in their undergraduate careers. Manning discussed the team’s early evaluations of the platform and their objectives for future months.
“We share insights on how to best approach the UC Davis student body, craft marketing campaigns and analyze engagement metrics and key success indicators to inform future improvements,” Manning said. “Hopefully, by the end of the quarter, we will have around 6,000 students signed up — the more students, the more accurate the matching. We have already reached a great number within the first few days after launching.”
With many UC Davis students choosing to go into consulting after they graduate, DCG gives students the chance to gain experience in a field with few undergraduate opportunities. Casazza highlighted how beneficial this project, along with other DCG projects, have been in his professional career.
“It re-emphasized what consulting is for me — it comes in many shapes and forms, and this is one of them,” Casazza said. “We’ve been doing a lot of marketing work, which isn’t traditional consulting, but it’s allowed us to get into the UC Davis community and learn about dating trends and preferences.”
Though the project happens outside of the classroom, Manning has learned a lot of skills and lessons through her work with Date Drop.
“In consulting, I have found that double-and triple-checking your work, asking the right questions early and being responsive are essential to delivering results that not only meet but exceed client expectations,” Manning said. “As a full-time student, balancing this project alongside academics also reinforced the value of time management and commitment, whether that meant late-night strategy calls or in-person outreach on campus.”
Amidst a period of dating apps seemingly focused on hookup culture, Date Drop is attempting to bring back the origins of online dating and provide organic matchmaking. Through and beyond the app’s launch period, collaborators on the project stress the ultimate goal of matching students with genuine connections.
“Success means people finding meaningful connections,” Weng said. “One of my close friends actually found his partner through Date Drop, and I’ve heard from people who made friends, started dating or even just found someone to study with. Hearing that something we built changed the trajectory of someone’s life is always the most rewarding part.”
Weng shared the importance of ensuring that their platform successfully reflects the wants and needs of the UC Davis community.
“Working with student-led groups just makes sense,” Weng said. “They understand the campus, they know what resonates and they’re genuinely invested in the outcome. UC Davis Date Drop is a campus experience — it should be shaped by the people who actually live it.”
Written by: Graciela Tiu — features@theaggie.org
