Playing the dating game..

Just how much are you prepared to invest in a relationship? It’s an interesting question given how much of an influence it can have on your life, especially if you’re talking about that investment being a financial one.

Dating agencies have very much entered the mainstream in recent years, no longer considered the domain of the desperate, but rather an efficient method of meeting likeminded people for a public who don’t have the time to devote to the traditional, scattergun approach of dating.

Some companies shout from rooftops about their advanced software that pairs up suitable partners from a vast database. Berkeley International takes a far more personal, bespoke approach.

Mairead Molloy, dislikes the term ‘matchmaker’ but armed with her not so little black book, she matches up ‘the rich and famous’ or at least wealthy professionals who can afford the £8,000 joining fee to the world’s most exclusive introduction agency.

“We match the rich and famous, people of a certain calibre and they want to meet somebody like that, affluent and professional.” She says.

Mairead conducts in-depth interviews with all of her clients to assess their personality and what they are looking for in a potential partner and then selects a suitable date.

Within minutes of meeting Mairead at Portman Square’s plush private members club, Home House, I can understand why she’s so well suited to her role. Mairead is friendly, open and inquisitive, disarmingly so. I find myself reeling off my life story without any hint of caution, until I’m not sure who is interviewing who.

Berkeley International is also unique in that it doesn’t use photographs of members, instead members place themselves completely in Mairead’s hands.

Mairead describes her members as the ‘cash rich, time poor’ who want to meet the right kind of person. In some cases, clients have a far more specific idea of who they would like to meet, having spotted someone they would like an introduction to.

In these cases - sometimes an anonymous face at a function or even a well-known personality on television - it’s Mairead’s job to get in touch and see if the person in question would be interested in meeting her client. More dating headhunter than introduction agency. So why does a celebrity require Mairead’s help meeting new people?

“Because they just don’t meet them in their circle and sometimes they just want to meet someone new.”
Mairead’s charm and enthusiasm has also led to a US TV show, Smith and Molloy. Mairead found the tables turned when she went to interview a prospective client who later revealed herself to be a television producer.

Mairead was to be part of a double act, solving relationship issues with American Brent Smith, but their relationship soured fairly quickly, “he thought he was ‘Hitch’, we didn’t get on”.

Mairead fell into her role by accident, having sold her hotel in Cannes, where she now lives, she came back to the UK to study psychology and agreed to run the company for a year.

Berkeley International have clients in London, New York, Los Angeles, Cannes and have recently opened an office in Moscow.

All of her clients may have wealth in common, but do clients of differing nationalities have different expectations from meeting someone new?

“People have this obsession about age in England, in France, it’s love. You go with how you feel, with your heart, in England you go with your list.

“America is a nightmare! Size Zero, black clothes, skinny. Forget it if you’re fat and single in America, that’s a bit of a generalisation. It’s okay if you’re a bloke in America because they are not as many as the women, so they know they’re in high demand. The French are romantic and they just want to find love.
“The English and the Irish just like lists, calculated slightly, very methodical, ‘I have to have that sort of a car and that sort of a lifestyle’, because that’s what society has trained us to be.”

Berkeley International

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