September 4, 2025 • 40 mins
Co-Host Melissa Schipke (https://mountaintoppodcast.com/pitchafriend) By now, you know I'm on record with my firm belief that dating sites and apps are dead. About a month and a half ago I ran a Masterclass For Men detailing 40 different ways to use your smartphone and computer to meet women in IRL...NONE of which are dating sites and apps. Well, wouldn't you know it? There's a 41st. My new friend and first time guest Melissa Schipke stumbled upon a strange but fun idea for getting single people together while hanging out at an open mic night with BAD comedians! She told the owner of the venue it would be more entertaining if she and her friend just got up there and pitched their single friends to these guys. A few years later, Pitch-A-Friend is in dozens of cities spanning 22 countries...and growing. So what's the deal? Let's just say it's basically online dating in REVERSE. Instead of putting up a profile and hoping someone likes it, all the single people are ALREADY THERE in the room, and THEN your friend basically "wings" for you with a PowerPoint presentation. Now, I actually did my homework here and went to the most recent event here in San Antonio. At first I planned to be a "fly on the wall", but my waitress turned out to be pretty cute and VERY single...so I pitched her! Tune in for more on how THAT went, as well as all the details about Pitch-A-Friend...including why it's EXACTLY in line with what the "new normal" for meeting women is gonna look like. Obviously, GenZ is eating this stuff up. But wait a minute...what about Pitch-A-Friend in The Villages or Sun City, AZ. Ha! And by the way, there was room for a relevant Dead Milkmen reference in there, too. Nice. Gentlemen, download your free book Sticking Points Solved and much more (including that infamous Masterclass from last month) at https://mountaintoppodcast.com
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:04):
Alright gentlemen, welcome to yet another episode of the world famous Mountain TopPodcast.
As always, I am your host Scot McKay.
And have I ever got a topic for you.
You guys have heard me get on a soapbox around here about how I really want to find topicsthat are relevant to women and dating and being a better man and masculinity and stuff.
(00:25):
But after 550 episodes, including all the Snippets From The Summit and so forth, it'sharder and harder to do.
Well, my guest today.
Made that easy.
But before we talk about her, I want to make sure you guys know where the website is.
It's mountaintoppodcast.com.
The Mountain Top Summit on Facebook is where you'll find a thriving group of guys who arelooking to be better men and get better with women.
(00:47):
If you're not there guys, you need to come join us.
We're having a lot of fun all over social media.
Um, now including Substack um, you know, on X on YouTube everywhere.
I'm at Scot McKay except for Instagram
where I'm @realscotmckay because I wasn't the early adopter there.
I was everywhere else.
As I was mentioning, I'm just getting to know Melissa Schipke who is from Philadelphia.
(01:13):
We don't get a whole lot of people from Philadelphia around here, although I went tocollege there.
And she is the founder of something very interesting called Pitch-A-Friend.
And Melissa, first of all, welcome to the show.
I'm so glad you're here.
Hi.
Yeah.
uh
(01:34):
Let's first of all, talk about exactly what you got going on and let's, um, let's, let'shave you talk about it in your words, but I will preface it by saying, I actually went to
your event that you had locally here in San Antonio and had a blast.
So I am coming from a position of actually having experienced what you do and loving it.
So you've already got an ally, but you're the best person in the world to describe exactlywhat it, what Pitch-A-Friend is.
(01:58):
So please have at it.
Tell these guys.
Yeah.
to share with you what we're doing.
As I kind of chatted with you before when we briefed about stuff like this, this reallyhappened by accident.
I live here in Philadelphia.
I work a 9 to 5 job in tech.
I'm behind my computer all day.
And so I really started this as a way for myself to get out of the house and be moresocial, but then also kind of wanted to merge my love of PowerPoints and presentations and
(02:28):
also just having a fun time out at bars.
restaurants and places where folks...
these guys are falling in love with you already.
I'm not single anymore, uh it was, you know, it really just kind of came about verycasually with a brewery that I live locally to, where I pitched them the idea of this as a
way to generate foot traffic for them on some of their slower nights.
(02:51):
So the other kind of added benefit of it all is it helps, you know, small businesses andthe challenges that they're facing post COVID and bringing in business and having people
going out more regularly on a weeknight.
And really it just tried to create a fun environment where people were
talking to each other again because I noticed so many people don't talk to each other whenthey're out at bars.
(03:12):
And so the format of the event, essentially folks sign up in advance to pitch their singlefriends in a PowerPoint presentation at these bars or restaurants in front of a crowd of
people.
Yep.
Yeah.
So it's not your version of what you would put on your dating profile, or it's what yourfriends would say about you and what makes you great and what you're looking for.
And you get to come as the single person to kind of just be celebrated by your friends andhave the opportunity to potentially meet a love match or maybe a new friend or make some
(03:42):
new connections in a very kind of low pressure, not awkward way that we hear like normaltraditional dating at.
events are like a little bit awkward like the speed dating and having the scorecards forpeople.
This is very, very much so like think, you know, a house party with all your friends typevibe, just trying to really be positive and celebrating folks.
(04:05):
Yeah, you know, feeling like you're going to be scored and graded.
There's a lot of pressure.
Yeah.
I haven't been to a ton of dating specific events before, but the feedback we get frompeople is just even when they're nervous about the fact that they're putting uh the power
into their friends' hands and what they're going to say when they get up there, most folksrespond to us very positively at the end.
(04:30):
Or we get emails after too, just saying how much fun they had and how they weren'texpecting to have that much fun or hear the things that their friends even say about them.
So it's just like a nice
positive experience to have in what kind of feels like a not so positive dating spacetoday.
Yeah, you know, there's lots to talk about there, including the not so positive datingspace that you refer to.
(04:52):
um I'm on record as saying online dating is on the downtrend.
Dating apps, you know, they killed the golden goose.
Yeah, you hope so, right?
Exactly.
uh More on that in a second.
The online dating apps are bleeding money.
They're losing business.
(05:14):
People aren't going to buy into that anymore.
They're sick of being led to believe there's someone on the other end who I could date.
And yet I'm swiping, swiping, swiping, and nothing's happening.
I'm not getting any connections.
All I am is addicted to the process.
it, yeah, yeah, right.
And people are wise to it.
(05:35):
And even the "beautiful people" are meeting each other going, hey you don't look like yourpictures and you don't seem anything like you sounded in your profile because everything
was done by AI and everything was, was filtered, blah, blah, blah.
It's just very impersonal.
It's very impersonal to make an impression of someone based on a split second before youswipe left or right.
(05:55):
for sure.
This always was the problem with the online dating apps in particular.
And unfortunately, the online dating apps poisoned the pool for the long form sites andain't nobody got that kind of attention span anymore post COVID anyway.
Yeah.
And then there's that like, grass is always greener mentality too of like, well, what if,you know, I keep swiping, I get to something better or different or, you know, decision
(06:18):
paralysis.
yeah right and the women get all this apparent affection thrown their way but meanwhilethose guys were swiping at anything that would fog a mirror.
It's just it's fraught...the whole thing.
So along you come and I wish honestly I would have found out about your gig about twomonths ago because about a month and a half ago I actually ran
(06:40):
a masterclass for these guys saying, Hey, look, I'm, I may be burning my own ships hereproverbially, but I'm not going to talk about online dating anymore.
It's a losing battle.
That ship indeed has sunk.
If I burned it or not, it sunk on its own.
But what, what the deal is, you know, and I'm talking to these guys, I'm sure you're wellacquainted with everything I'm about to say, Melissa is that you still have a smartphone.
(07:05):
You still have a computer.
We still live in this age.
What are you going to do with your smartphone and your computer to actually meet someoneIRL?
And I had no fewer than 40 different ways to do that in my masterclass.
But the one thing I didn't have was Pitch-A-Friend because I hadn't heard of you yet.
(07:26):
Yeah, PowerPoint's the way to go.
I'm telling you, I mean, and this...
man, my masterclass is all about PowerPoint.
If these guys know that, I mean, you know, it's death by PowerPoint, but I keep it fun andI crack jokes.
My impression of what you're doing when I got there, my impression of especially thegenius of what you're doing.
And I want to hear the story about how you stumbled upon this.
(07:46):
I think that would be fascinating.
You're doing online dating kind of in reverse.
In other words, instead of me getting on a computer,
and figuring out who I might like to meet, hopefully meeting them.
You said everybody, look, y'all come and bring your computer.
And once we're all in the room together and then, Hey, you know what?
Your buddy that's genius too, by the way.
(08:08):
Cause if I pitch myself I sound like a douchebag.
If my friend pitches me, then I've got approval and people buy on the approval of others.
Right?
It's a sales principle.
Then my buddy gets up there and tells everybody why they should date me.
They put an online dating profile together for me out of PowerPoint basically And whilei'm sitting there and while the audience of real people in real time in real life is
(08:32):
sitting there, then we talk about what's you know, what's cool about me and and you knowthe bullet points and this that the other.
It is a reversal Of the format of online dating and I think this is the time and the placefor it.
I'm not surprised at all that this is this this is in the zeitgeist
Write it right in the crosshairs of it for you.
(08:54):
Yeah, we started back in 2022 as myself and my friend Ariana here in Philadelphia andstarted the Philly chapter.
The response we got was just so positive around just being able to meet people that way.
So the format is we do the pitch portion of the evening first.
And then after that's over, we have what we call single mingle time, where we encourageyou to get up and talk to people.
(09:16):
The last slides, which are the ways to connect with the featured singles, are on arotation in the background.
So if you missed anybody's information,
or you have a other single friend that you're thinking of, you can snap a photo or go overand talk to that person.
And so people just didn't have that experience and being able to connect so kind ofauthentically with folks, because you're given a lot of information about them through the
(09:39):
pitches.
So you know things that you can go up and start conversation starters with them.
And so just makes it so much easier and less awkward to make those connections.
Yeah.
at the event that I attended.
I um was amazed also by your very strict rule.
You know, you're pretty easygoing, but you do slap a couple of guidelines on this.
(10:00):
And the one is this is not a roast.
This isn't a Dean Martin, Don Rickles kind of thing.
You know, it may be hilarious for you to get up there and talk about all the flaws andfoibles of this person and blast them a new one.
But this also is not, well, typically a standup comedy show.
comedians who do like love to do it.
We have a lot of people in comedy and improv that host the chapters for us.
(10:23):
But yeah, it's meant to be a positive experience.
We do...
you know, we definitely want people to tell the truth about their friends.
So they may say like, here are some of their red flags and things like that.
But it's always done in a really nice way that, you know, we don't want anyone to feel badabout the experience.
There's just, there's already so much hate in this world.
We wanted to have a positive experience with it.
(10:45):
I noticed the green flag, red flag format.
There was a standard procedure, you know, kind of a SOP that was a best practice, if youwill, that was presented to people to help make it easier.
But I think, I think that very much goes along with the spirit of the whole thing.
Not feeling like I'm going to get roasted or humiliated or called out makes people feelmore comfortable.
(11:08):
Making the presenter feel as if they would have to be a standup comedian
would dramatically reduce the number of people who are going to get up there.
And I did see how you have some stand up and improv people who run things in other citiesand that a lot of their their buddies, their cohorts at open mic night are often the ones
who do the pitching.
(11:28):
Yeah, we want to keep energy high and make sure people feel comfortable because we do havea lot of people who are very introverted, who just really love their friends, who really
want to pitch them.
And to me, like those presentations, like the ones done by the professional comedians are,you know, they're always great.
But the ones done by like the introverted friend that you know, like doesn't do a ton ofpublic speaking, I think are like the most genuine.
(11:50):
And also to like the crowds we see just want to support and they're like cheering on thosefolks as they're presenting to make them feel comfortable.
So it's just, it's just a very
beautiful experience.
Oh, and the world is starving for something social and positive because we're so sick oflooking at the headlines and everybody politically being pitted against each other.
you know, all of a sudden thoughts and prayers are this horrible thing.
(12:12):
I mean, you know, I mean, we're not like that in real life.
We're not racist.
We're not, um, you know, men going their own way and feminists who can't stand the othergender.
and, you know, we're not thinking about, you know, who I voted for when I talk to otherpeople.
In real life, people just want to live their best life and everybody wants to get along nomatter who they are.
(12:34):
It's fantastic and I think that you're putting forth that value effectively.
Yeah, and I think too, just getting people talking in real life again is a big piece ofit.
Because when people go out now and we hear it from the venues and the bars that we talk tothe owners, people don't talk to people outside of the circle of people that they're out
meeting.
And so it's created this really weird dynamic that if you are a single person and you'reout and you do see someone you want to approach, it's very difficult to do it.
(13:02):
I mean, when I was in my 20s, you could go out to a bar and like say hello to anybody.
Like that does not exist anymore.
Yeah.
You're not very old.
I'm almost 40, so.
Well, in the grand scheme, that was the century.
Yeah, yeah.
But COVID definitely accelerated that significantly there.
And then just what was going on with iPhones and everybody on technology all the time.
(13:26):
And then the dating apps really added that extra layer that pushed it over the edge.
Yeah, even before COVID you would see groups of, you know, Generation Z people all buriedin their smartphone sitting next to each other.
Like, what are you doing?
And then after COVID people were like, well, wait a minute.
You mean I can go out and be social again?
Do I have to go out and be social again?
(13:47):
This whole DoorDashing through life was actually kind of nice.
You know, I've been poisoned by social media into believing radical things now, but youknow, I really don't like people and this helped me feel good about that.
But
then we realized, Hey, you know what human beings are literally born to be social andwe're starving for it, but we were rusty, weren't we?
And then, you know, just lately, it seems like people are blossoming again, coming out oftheir shell and wanting to be social.
(14:13):
So when you do break the ice, like if you do have the cojones to go up to a huddle ofpeople who all know each other at a venue and say, Hey, how do you all know each other?
They'll look at you and go, my gosh, wow.
Someone friendly come join us.
And you're like,
flabbergasted at how friendly people are, but we fell into a habit of not being so social.
(14:34):
Yeah.
Yep.
Trying.
We're trying.
I mean, we still get during the mingling time, we still hear from people that are like,can there be more structure to this?
Or like, I'm not quite comfortable.
And ah it's different in every city, but I'm always like, OK, who do you want to talk to?
Let's go over to them.
And I try to get people feeling comfortable.
(14:56):
you know, know a lot of our event hosts are like that too, because while Arianna and Istarted it here in Philly, it grew so quickly that we then put up on our website for folks
who were interested in doing it in other cities and hosting through our training programand things like that.
um We ended up hearing from like 528 different cities across 22 countries that werelooking to have Pitch-A-Friends in their area.
(15:18):
And so it was nuts within, you know, to hear from these folks that...
Now I've gotten to speak with people around the world around like what is dating likethere and what, you know, what's the social setting and like in Ghana and like all in
Egypt.
I've literally spoken to somebody probably in like every, every country at this point.
Countries I didn't even know.
You know, I had to reference a map, but yeah, it's just been really wild.
(15:42):
And just to hear like, like culturally, there's definitely things that are different placeto place.
But at the basis, what we're seeing is people in every culture love their friends, lovetheir relationship with their friends.
People have single friends that they want to support.
then globally, they all hate the dating apps.
The experience on the dating apps is not great anywhere.
(16:04):
So it's kind of the right time for an event like this to emerge.
people are social, people are human, human nature is similar, uh, masculinity and, uh,femininity and attraction are similar.
It's like the language of love is universal, kind of like math.
Um, I think that's amazing.
And yet I attended your event and I noticed even afterwards armed with all of thesetalking points about seven different people in the room who were verified as single,
(16:36):
Mm-hmm.
people will still mostly socializing with the people they came with.
Yeah.
It's a slow movement, but we're definitely getting more and more and people are more andcomfortable.
I definitely think it depends too on the space setup.
And so we try all these different kind of venue sizes.
And there's really not any ideal, but we do notice if it's.
(16:57):
at a restaurant where it's like seated tables, people are less likely to move around asmuch.
And so we have different games and things that we kind of sprinkle in to encourage that uhas after we assess them.
Did they play, you mentioned Red Flag, Green Flag, did they play the Red Flag, Green Flaggame at your event?
Um, I don't know if they played a red flag, green flag game, but I know just, was afeature of, not every one of the PowerPoint presentations, most of them.
(17:22):
Yeah.
She did a couple other, she did a couple icebreakers.
Yeah, we do like an icebreaker with them with actual like red flags and green flags, oreverybody has one of each.
And then we put we put different things up on the screen.
And it's like, you know, hates cats.
And then everybody, you know, raises whether or not it's a red flag or green flag to themand texts their mom every morning, like, and you just kind of hear response.
(17:44):
did do that.
Yes
yeah, and so that's a fun thing too to just uh get a gauge as to like what the room islike and also for some people like they have strong feelings of like things that are green
flags for them that may be red flags for others and so I think it's also provides like anawareness piece to different people's different uh you know desires and compatibility.
(18:04):
That's true a red flag to somebody...
one person's red flag is someone else's green flag.
But you know, as you're talking admitting to one's own red flags is kind of like beingasked, what's your greatest weakness in a job interview?
You know, what are you gonna answer?
I'm too focused.
like to cook or, you know, uses AI DJ, like they're always usually kind of silly, butpeople have like strong preferences.
(18:25):
The one that I would say is most conflicting, like split all the time for red flag andgreen flag and different every time is whether or not they do pineapple on their pizza.
Oh, it's not if you voted for Trump or not.
No, that one's...
Depending on the area, pretty unanimous at our events.
That was interesting.
(18:49):
Yeah.
thing.
You can tell a lot about a person.
um Talk to us about how you stumbled upon this idea.
You don't take credit for having invented it.
You and your counterpart accident...
you call it a happy accident.
Yeah.
I hang out at this brewery, like I mentioned, that's down the street from my house and I'mclose with the owners there.
do some art projects.
(19:12):
I like, I have to get out of my house.
But what's super nice about it is it's a place where, you know,
you don't I don't have to text people to say, hey, I'm going to the brewery to hang out.
It's just you show up and whoever's there is there and it's an age range of like 25 to60s.
(19:32):
And just folks that just you know, communicates ...this very small brewery and just reallygreat kind of dynamic and community there.
And they used to do a comedy night and I was there one night for it.
And it wasn't very funny.
And I jokingly said to one of the owners that if they just let me do pitch decks of thesingle people in the area
I think I could get more laughs than the comedians that they were hiring to come in.
(19:56):
And they just kind of were like, let's do it, let's run with it.
My background, as I mentioned, is in tech.
I own a tech startup, so I used to pitch my business to a lot of investors back when Istarted it in 2014.
And so it's a different application of the pitch deck.
And I thought it'd be fun to do for just some of the single people I knew.
And the first event was just like me, my friend Ariana and another
(20:19):
friend just pitching the single people we knew who lived in the neighborhood.
ah And you couldn't sign up to it.
I was just you come to hear us pitch them and people resonated really well and they wantedto pitch their own friends.
And so that's when we put a sign-up together and we started doing that kind of monthlyvery casually...like literally they the way they paid us was they covered my beer tab for
(20:40):
the month.
It was nice.
Good arrangement.
did like once a month and then
Very quickly we started hearing from other venues across the city that wanted us to hostit there.
And that's kind of when I put my startup hat back on and built a bunch of backendinfrastructure and tech around it.
Yeah.
You know, it's amazing to think that you're in so many cities now and it's blown up insuch a short amount of time because, you you caught lightning in a bottle with this.
(21:09):
Really?
Yeah.
It's just been super awesome too to connect with folks that are just passionate aboutconnecting people around the world.
Our city organizers, they also have a huge range in their age.
It's anywhere from like early 20s to we have people in their 60s that host Pitch-A-Friendchapters.
We have, you know, a main host in every city.
(21:29):
Wait, well...
we have about 48 different cities right now and we're on-boarding like...
No, not yet.
would love.
Yeah.
We are in Phoenix in Arizona.
no, not yet.
But I would love to do a place like that.
Because we do 45 and Up events.
We had, uh actually here in Philly, an event we had which was a younger demographic in akind dive bar-ish place in South Philly.
(21:58):
There was a 67-year-old woman who signed up to pitch
her 67 year old friends and I emailed them in advance and I was like, just so know, thiscrowd is usually on the younger average age or in mid-20s and they're like, oh, it's okay.
And they came out and they did a practice run with two young people who they were sittingnear before the event because they were nervous about it.
(22:19):
But then they went up there and they totally crushed, oh my God, people were, it was somuch fun.
They were like, if you've got a divorced dad or a widowed uncle, they knew the audiencethey were talking to and they just, they had...it was amazing.
is amazing.
know, having gone to college in Philly at Temple, um I remember going to those venues forwhatever they were doing.
(22:44):
And it was part of the mystique.
I remember one time, I don't know if you're...
you're from Philly, so you probably remember the lore of a band called The Dead Milkmen.
Hmm, I'm from Jersey originally.
I've been in Philly for a while though.
Jersey and Philly.
There's the thing there.
Uh, The Dead Milkmen were like a uh punk band not to be taken seriously.
(23:07):
Okay.
They had, they had silly punk songs and they hit the national scene, but they were aPhilly band.
And I remember we went to see them and we were laughing 'cuz it was in somebody's basementdowntown, like in a, you know,
God knows how old this house...
If anybody has never been to the East Coast of the United States, it's the closest placeyou're ever going to get to like Europe in terms of God, how, old is this house?
(23:33):
It's like 17 something.
This place was built.
Right.
And, um, you know, you don't get that in Phoenix.
Right.
So this was a perfectly decent house, but no, we had to have it in their basement, whichwas a dirt floor with like an old furnace, like in A Christmas Story.
And there was literally a rat in the corner, like milling around.
And they were just blasting, you know, in this basement.
(23:56):
And that's just kind of always been a Philly thing.
We're going to go grunge on you.
Yeah.
It sounds like we got a wide range of amazing establishments.
We've done an event with the 76ers in the 76ers arena.
And so we've done all shapes and sizes of venues and places.
And it's just been really cool.
Yeah, your grandmother's basement, that's not.
Yeah.
(24:16):
That's that's great.
Yeah, you've done this is blown up.
You have a huge chapter in Austin, you said.
In Philadelphia, filling a stadium.
All over the world and it...
really big in Oslo, Norway.
So if you're ever in Oslo, Norway, that's I Yes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, I haven't, you know, I haven't been able to get out to the other chapters yet.
(24:40):
I'm planning kind of like a roadshow to go see them.
But yeah, it's it we have a whole community.
Yeah.
But I just had finding time, it's been tough lately.
But yeah, it's very cool to just have these awesome people hosting it in their differentareas and um seeing kind of the different partnerships that we've developed.
(25:01):
We do a Pitch-A-Pet program too, so we also work with local shelters and we will featurean available foster dog or pets.
For folks looking for that immediate companionship and love, we have that opportunity too.
Yeah, Green flags.
He's very affectionate.
Red flags, he still pees all over the carpet.
(25:22):
Yeah.
Very similar to humans, right?
Yeah, exactly.
Do you still have that first PowerPoint presentation from the very first pitch you everdid?
Yeah, yeah, we have all of them.
I would take the first slide and like blow it up and frame it in my office.
Yeah, like the first dollar bill you made it the, know, when you open a Greek restaurant.
Yeah.
(25:42):
Yeah.
I think the number is like over 4000 people have been pitched at between all our events sofar.
So it's just amazing to see.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Now have a confession to make.
I was going to be a fly on the wall.
I really, honestly...
I got to tell you Melissa, I was going to behave myself.
That was my plan.
(26:02):
uh Yeah.
I think I broke a rule.
I broke more than one.
Yeah.
And I told everybody...
you know, I'm just...
I told my waitress that I was, you know, just a journalist, you know, I was justresearching.
And she was so cute and charming that we hit it off.
And I said, I have a crazy idea.
(26:22):
I want to pitch you.
And she went...
at first, and I said, no, I'll be very nice to you.
And I went and I asked, I asked the person who was, who was moderating if I could do that.
Cause you know, I think she would have liked to have had a bigger turnout.
There were only seven people pitching.
So let's even it out.
I'll do the eighth one.
And so I paid her.
(26:43):
I was a good boy.
Paid my entry fee and...
You got a free beer too?
Oh, I wasn't drinking.
So she...
someone else can have my free beer.
And, you know, I didn't know this this woman.
She was very cute and she had been very sweet to me.
But all I knew about her was five minutes' worth of conversation.
(27:05):
So I didn't have a lifetime of experience.
And I did.
I broke the rule.
I went into standup comedy mode.
I probably shouldn't have.
But you know, at least I filled out the...
I was a good boy, though.
I don't know how, I don't know how bad she made this out, but I was a good boy.
I didn't pitch myself at all.
Oh, okay.
(27:26):
Yeah.
You have to be all self-conscious.
Um, but I didn't pitch myself.
I didn't say, Hey, mountaintoppodcast.com.
I didn't do any of that.
I played by the rules.
I was a good boy.
And I...
and I really liked the, the, the, the little gal who was the waitress and I really, youknow, we made friends.
So it was all very, very fun.
But I joked about how we'd already, you know,
(27:46):
I found out she was my soulmate and we'd already married and divorced.
So she's single again all within the last five minutes.
You know, that was the joke.
That was the and and But I didn't mortify her.
She was a good sport.
And she was also working while I'm pitching her after she came to...
But I really wanted in.
It's infectious.
That's that's the thing is I want to play.
(28:06):
I want to...
I don't want to sit on the sidelines.
I don't want to be on the bench.
I...
if you go to one of these events, guys
and you don't have a friend to pitch or they're not pitching you and you just go, you'regoing to want to get off the bench.
It's like being on a sports team.
You're not going to want to be the bench warmer.
You're going to want to go start for this team and play.
You're going to want to go pitch for the starting team.
(28:29):
It's fun.
Do you have repeat pitchers?
Sometimes, yeah, sometimes we have people.
And you know what's interesting?
We have a lot of people who are also single and they'll pitch each other, but then we alsohave a lot of folks that are like the married friends or we've had a lot of pregnant women
pitching because this is like the time, know, a single friend has done all of
(28:50):
No, the single friend has done all of that.
They've done the bachelor parties.
They've done the showers.
They've done...
bought all the gifts.
They've traveled for...
and like this is just something fun that those friends can do in return for the singlefriends that haven't, you know, maybe experienced that yet in life.
And so in that sense, it's, you know, it's not awkward to come to the event with friendsthat aren't single.
We have uh some of our chapters are run by married folks who just like to connect peopleand want to see people...
(29:13):
Yeah.
rub it in.
Like, I'm married and I'm happily married.
I'm never lonely.
So someday when you're like me, you know, yeah, that's, that's douchey.
yeah, so it's, you know, super fun to hear the perspective of like all the differentfriends and also to it's, you know, if you don't have a friend to pitch you, it's still
fun to come and hang out and mingle and potentially make a friend there that you know, youmay see at another event and get to a point where you're comfortable pitching each other
(29:39):
or if you do have a good friend, you can come and scope it out and see what the the whatdoes well, you know, in
things people include in their presentations that you see resonate well with others.
It also helps you have really fun conversations with your friends that you may not haveall the time.
Like I've had friends who've asked me to pitch them.
And I'm just like, okay, I would love to pitch you, but like you're a drinking buddy ofmine.
(30:01):
I don't know anything about like what you are looking for in a date or like goals.
And so then I get to sit down and have those conversations.
So it actually brings you closer to your friends that you're pitching to.
Cause now I know like what their life goals are.
I know their credit score.
I know like all the intimate details.
Because I was like, I need it all if I'm gonna pitch you well, I need to be able to sellit.
(30:24):
Yeah.
She's working on it.
Yeah.
That's, that's, that's TMI.
Alright.
Um, you know, uh, one thing that comes to mind is, you know, we were talking about thebaseball analogy, which is inevitable.
And, know, I'm, I'm searching for a joke to fit a punch line right here, but I actuallyformed a decent thought about it.
(30:47):
It is still public public speaking
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
guts, no matter who you are to Pitch-A-Friend.
And I think you've done a good job with it, but here's the punchline in search of a joke.
Have you ever seen a situation where there was a relief pitcher?
In other words, did someone get up there and they just, they couldn't even?
(31:08):
So someone, another friend had to come up and complete the presentation for them?
no, no, never.
No, I think we definitely have had um a handful of like no shows, which and it's not it'snot a huge...
In most of our chapters you pay like five or ten bucks to pitch, but you get a free drinkwhen you get...
it's really just to make sure you're going to show up and put a presentation together.
(31:28):
um You know, we do do some ticketed events, but most most of the time the events are freeto attend.
uh And we've had some where...
here in Philly where maybe like one person didn't show up and
our inkling is that they showed up and saw how packed it was and then got nervous andleft, so...
Well, if the pitcher shows up and the catcher isn't there, do they still pitch themanyway?
(31:52):
I would.
So usually they have a different friend, like a friend's late.
You sometimes it's like if they're stuck at work, they'll have a different friend pitch,do the pitch.
Like we've definitely had people who've, yeah, who've done the deck where they're like,they're like, I haven't seen this before.
So like, I'm just gonna like, kind of wing it with the slides.
Yeah.
Yeah, a lot of times people are really, you know, I think when it comes to, you know,
(32:15):
your friends, it's an easy presentation to give no matter what the slides are.
And we've had PowerPoints that are like white slide, black text, super small, barely readit.
You could tell they definitely are not looking for a good presentation, but the story theytell with it is just so amazing and moving.
And we've had people who've done like full professional, very, very nice lookingpresentations with animations and voting and different engagements and stuff in it.
(32:42):
People are very, very creative with it.
And so we've had people with their family there that'll have QR codes you can scan to likeget to baby pictures or friends handing out Taylor Swift friendship bracelets that have
their phone numbers on them.
Yeah, or people who are like my friends are really good baker and they bring some likebaked good examples and stuff.
(33:03):
yeah, so people are people sell it.
Yeah.
So we've had also friends who create like a
fake email address...
Well, not a fake one a real email address where they can pre-vet, so they say if you'reinterested the last slide of you can email you know BaddiesForBratty at gmail.com and uh
the friends will vet essentially the potential dates.
(33:25):
You know, so it's people are very creative and have a fun time with it.
Yeah.
We've had flight attendants do them in the full flight attendants, you know, keep yourhands in type...
We've had people sing their pitches so it's been really cool to the creativity.
what every flight attendant has to say when they're around me.
(33:47):
But yeah, you can definitely tell too like what industry people work in, you know, basedoff of, do they have like the slides set up?
Some people have like an agenda slide and it's just, it's a kind of a fun application ofit.
Yeah, we're all human, right?
Our personality is going to come out.
I have to say though, I did notice that the people who gave PowerPoint presentationsneeded to get the memo that you have to have bigger print because the people in the last
(34:10):
row can't read something this tiny.
Yeah.
And I got pretty good eyes from my age and I was still going, Oh, okay.
That's what they said.
Okay.
Yeah.
funny, there was a funny pitch once where the presentation was done really nice.
And then the last slide was all just like type eight and it filled the whole thing withtexts.
And he's like, these are all like the warnings.
(34:30):
And then he like skipped it.
It was like you couldn't even read it.
And then he's like, went to the last slide.
It was very funny.
there.
Yeah.
Alright.
right.
Well, this is, this is wonderful.
I'm so glad you and your business partner stumbled upon this happy, happy accident andthat it's growing so much.
And I understand completely why, um, you monetize this basically through the...
(34:51):
through the venues, cause there's no way you're getting rich off of people paying hardlyanything and getting a free drink to do this.
Yeah.
do it.
It's kind like a trivia night.
we're entertainers coming in.
We're managing the entertainment, so to speak.
em And just, yeah.
Yeah.
Make everybody happy and buy more.
Yeah.
I think it's brilliant.
I love it.
And I'm a huge fan.
Singles get more free opportunities.
(35:12):
Dating apps and dating events and being single, it can be very expensive for folks.
Oh yeah, that's just another thing.
So this is actually a cheap date.
Yep, and a great way too if you're just at a point too where you're trying to get outthere but you're not quite sure if you're comfortable yet, just you can come hang out with
a friend and make it very casual.
It doesn't have to be anything pressured.
(35:33):
You put the sticker on.
If you want to put the sticker on, that indicates if you're single.
Otherwise, you just, you don't have a sticker on and you're still free to get comfortabletalking to people.
Just another feather in your cap and why guys should check into this.
And you're in how many cities now?
We're in 46 because we have a couple of odds because we're transitioning.
We have city organizers.
Life gets busy.
They move, new jobs.
(35:54):
So we're transitioning a couple of cities right now.
And then we're launching in um like five new cities next week.
What are some of the key cities you have in the United States?
So these guys, you know, if they're there, they just hear right now, they should checkinto it.
Yeah, I we're in most major cities like LA, New York, DC.
(36:14):
We're also in San Diego, Phoenix, Raleigh.
Yep.
Yep.
We have like a bunch of chapters launching right now in Florida.
Like, we've had Tampa, our gentleman who runs Tampa Bay has been awesome.
He's been there from like, he's one of our early chapters.
(36:35):
We're also in a bunch of cities in Canada.
But yeah, you can check it out on our website.
We have the full list of active cities there.
And you can also vote for your city.
And that kind of pushes it up the leaderboard of areas we may come to next.
And if guys wanted to run a Pitch-A-Friend chapter for you, they can get in touch with youalso.
(36:55):
Cool.
about what it is to run the chapter.
And then we essentially kind of go through a vetting process.
And then we have a training process.
And then um it's for you to run in your area.
Is it heavy duty or pretty lightweight?
It's pretty lightweight.
Most of our studio organizers do it as something in addition to like their normal 9-to-5as a way to kind of get out and be social.
(37:18):
Yeah.
They're comfortable, create, and understand it's not a roast.
We're looking for people who are comfortable with social media and, you know, just want tobring a positive experience to single folks.
I love it.
think it's great.
I am so glad I discovered it and you, and I want to send these guys to your website.
Guys, it's Pitch-A-Friend with dashes pitch dash a dash friend.com some other bastard hasPitch-A-Friend.com and won't sell it to her.
(37:47):
So you know how that works.
But I made it easier than ever for you, of course, cause if you go tomountaintoppodcast.com front slash pitchafriend I'll teleport you magically over there.
And so if you want to participate,
First of all, see if your city's there.
And if not raise a ruckus, you know, get in Melissa's inbox about it and maybe even startyour own chapter and, um, guys, everybody's on the same page in this podcast studio about
(38:13):
online dating and apps being in the rear view mirror.
But you still have a smartphone.
You still have a computer.
What you're going to do to meet women in real life.
think Melissa's handed you a golden opportunity and Melissa, thank you so much for joiningus.
This has been just a great show.
Thank you.
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Yeah, yeah, I'm really glad we we made this work and um guys If you haven't been tomountaintoppodcast.com lately, go there check out our sponsors Jocko Willink's company
(38:39):
Origin in Maine, The Keyport and also Hero Soap.
Check out what they got.
If you want to partake of anything from our sponsors, please use the coupon codemountain10 and uh, you'll get 10% off, of course.
Also guys download the free book Sticking Points Solved.
When you do that, you'll be on my daily email list.
(39:00):
61,000 people strong.
You should be on it if you're not already.
And I give you free daily advice on how to be a better man and to get the right woman inyour life.
Also, some of you haven't gotten on the phone with me yet for 25 to 30 minutes.
I want to know who you guys are out there, hear your feedback on the show.
And if it makes sense to put a coaching plan together to take you from good to great,well, we can talk about that too.
(39:22):
But either way, I'm always happy to talk to you.
All of that in there All of that and more is there for you at mountaintoppodcast.comalways.
And until I talk to you again real soon, this is Scot McKay from X & Y Communications inSant Antonio, TX.
Be good out there
Alright gentlemen, welcome to yet another episode of the world famous Mountain TopPodcast.
As always, I am your host Scot McKay.
And have I ever got a topic for you.
You guys have heard me get on a soapbox around here about how I really want to find topicsthat are relevant to women and dating and being a better man and masculinity and stuff.
(00:25):
But after 550 episodes, including all the Snippets From The Summit and so forth, it'sharder and harder to do.
Well, my guest today.
Made that easy.
But before we talk about her, I want to make sure you guys know where the website is.
It's mountaintoppodcast.com.
The Mountain Top Summit on Facebook is where you'll find a thriving group of guys who arelooking to be better men and get better with women.
(00:47):
If you're not there guys, you need to come join us.
We're having a lot of fun all over social media.
Um, now including Substack um, you know, on X on YouTube everywhere.
I'm at Scot McKay except for Instagram
where I'm @realscotmckay because I wasn't the early adopter there.
I was everywhere else.
As I was mentioning, I'm just getting to know Melissa Schipke who is from Philadelphia.
(01:13):
We don't get a whole lot of people from Philadelphia around here, although I went tocollege there.
And she is the founder of something very interesting called Pitch-A-Friend.
And Melissa, first of all, welcome to the show.
I'm so glad you're here.
Hi.
Yeah.
uh
(01:34):
Let's first of all, talk about exactly what you got going on and let's, um, let's, let'shave you talk about it in your words, but I will preface it by saying, I actually went to
your event that you had locally here in San Antonio and had a blast.
So I am coming from a position of actually having experienced what you do and loving it.
So you've already got an ally, but you're the best person in the world to describe exactlywhat it, what Pitch-A-Friend is.
(01:58):
So please have at it.
Tell these guys.
Yeah.
to share with you what we're doing.
As I kind of chatted with you before when we briefed about stuff like this, this reallyhappened by accident.
I live here in Philadelphia.
I work a 9 to 5 job in tech.
I'm behind my computer all day.
And so I really started this as a way for myself to get out of the house and be moresocial, but then also kind of wanted to merge my love of PowerPoints and presentations and
(02:28):
also just having a fun time out at bars.
restaurants and places where folks...
these guys are falling in love with you already.
I'm not single anymore, uh it was, you know, it really just kind of came about verycasually with a brewery that I live locally to, where I pitched them the idea of this as a
way to generate foot traffic for them on some of their slower nights.
(02:51):
So the other kind of added benefit of it all is it helps, you know, small businesses andthe challenges that they're facing post COVID and bringing in business and having people
going out more regularly on a weeknight.
And really it just tried to create a fun environment where people were
talking to each other again because I noticed so many people don't talk to each other whenthey're out at bars.
(03:12):
And so the format of the event, essentially folks sign up in advance to pitch their singlefriends in a PowerPoint presentation at these bars or restaurants in front of a crowd of
people.
Yep.
Yeah.
So it's not your version of what you would put on your dating profile, or it's what yourfriends would say about you and what makes you great and what you're looking for.
And you get to come as the single person to kind of just be celebrated by your friends andhave the opportunity to potentially meet a love match or maybe a new friend or make some
(03:42):
new connections in a very kind of low pressure, not awkward way that we hear like normaltraditional dating at.
events are like a little bit awkward like the speed dating and having the scorecards forpeople.
This is very, very much so like think, you know, a house party with all your friends typevibe, just trying to really be positive and celebrating folks.
(04:05):
Yeah, you know, feeling like you're going to be scored and graded.
There's a lot of pressure.
Yeah.
I haven't been to a ton of dating specific events before, but the feedback we get frompeople is just even when they're nervous about the fact that they're putting uh the power
into their friends' hands and what they're going to say when they get up there, most folksrespond to us very positively at the end.
(04:30):
Or we get emails after too, just saying how much fun they had and how they weren'texpecting to have that much fun or hear the things that their friends even say about them.
So it's just like a nice
positive experience to have in what kind of feels like a not so positive dating spacetoday.
Yeah, you know, there's lots to talk about there, including the not so positive datingspace that you refer to.
(04:52):
um I'm on record as saying online dating is on the downtrend.
Dating apps, you know, they killed the golden goose.
Yeah, you hope so, right?
Exactly.
uh More on that in a second.
The online dating apps are bleeding money.
They're losing business.
(05:14):
People aren't going to buy into that anymore.
They're sick of being led to believe there's someone on the other end who I could date.
And yet I'm swiping, swiping, swiping, and nothing's happening.
I'm not getting any connections.
All I am is addicted to the process.
it, yeah, yeah, right.
And people are wise to it.
(05:35):
And even the "beautiful people" are meeting each other going, hey you don't look like yourpictures and you don't seem anything like you sounded in your profile because everything
was done by AI and everything was, was filtered, blah, blah, blah.
It's just very impersonal.
It's very impersonal to make an impression of someone based on a split second before youswipe left or right.
(05:55):
for sure.
This always was the problem with the online dating apps in particular.
And unfortunately, the online dating apps poisoned the pool for the long form sites andain't nobody got that kind of attention span anymore post COVID anyway.
Yeah.
And then there's that like, grass is always greener mentality too of like, well, what if,you know, I keep swiping, I get to something better or different or, you know, decision
(06:18):
paralysis.
yeah right and the women get all this apparent affection thrown their way but meanwhilethose guys were swiping at anything that would fog a mirror.
It's just it's fraught...the whole thing.
So along you come and I wish honestly I would have found out about your gig about twomonths ago because about a month and a half ago I actually ran
(06:40):
a masterclass for these guys saying, Hey, look, I'm, I may be burning my own ships hereproverbially, but I'm not going to talk about online dating anymore.
It's a losing battle.
That ship indeed has sunk.
If I burned it or not, it sunk on its own.
But what, what the deal is, you know, and I'm talking to these guys, I'm sure you're wellacquainted with everything I'm about to say, Melissa is that you still have a smartphone.
(07:05):
You still have a computer.
We still live in this age.
What are you going to do with your smartphone and your computer to actually meet someoneIRL?
And I had no fewer than 40 different ways to do that in my masterclass.
But the one thing I didn't have was Pitch-A-Friend because I hadn't heard of you yet.
(07:26):
Yeah, PowerPoint's the way to go.
I'm telling you, I mean, and this...
man, my masterclass is all about PowerPoint.
If these guys know that, I mean, you know, it's death by PowerPoint, but I keep it fun andI crack jokes.
My impression of what you're doing when I got there, my impression of especially thegenius of what you're doing.
And I want to hear the story about how you stumbled upon this.
(07:46):
I think that would be fascinating.
You're doing online dating kind of in reverse.
In other words, instead of me getting on a computer,
and figuring out who I might like to meet, hopefully meeting them.
You said everybody, look, y'all come and bring your computer.
And once we're all in the room together and then, Hey, you know what?
Your buddy that's genius too, by the way.
(08:08):
Cause if I pitch myself I sound like a douchebag.
If my friend pitches me, then I've got approval and people buy on the approval of others.
Right?
It's a sales principle.
Then my buddy gets up there and tells everybody why they should date me.
They put an online dating profile together for me out of PowerPoint basically And whilei'm sitting there and while the audience of real people in real time in real life is
(08:32):
sitting there, then we talk about what's you know, what's cool about me and and you knowthe bullet points and this that the other.
It is a reversal Of the format of online dating and I think this is the time and the placefor it.
I'm not surprised at all that this is this this is in the zeitgeist
Write it right in the crosshairs of it for you.
(08:54):
Yeah, we started back in 2022 as myself and my friend Ariana here in Philadelphia andstarted the Philly chapter.
The response we got was just so positive around just being able to meet people that way.
So the format is we do the pitch portion of the evening first.
And then after that's over, we have what we call single mingle time, where we encourageyou to get up and talk to people.
(09:16):
The last slides, which are the ways to connect with the featured singles, are on arotation in the background.
So if you missed anybody's information,
or you have a other single friend that you're thinking of, you can snap a photo or go overand talk to that person.
And so people just didn't have that experience and being able to connect so kind ofauthentically with folks, because you're given a lot of information about them through the
(09:39):
pitches.
So you know things that you can go up and start conversation starters with them.
And so just makes it so much easier and less awkward to make those connections.
Yeah.
at the event that I attended.
I um was amazed also by your very strict rule.
You know, you're pretty easygoing, but you do slap a couple of guidelines on this.
(10:00):
And the one is this is not a roast.
This isn't a Dean Martin, Don Rickles kind of thing.
You know, it may be hilarious for you to get up there and talk about all the flaws andfoibles of this person and blast them a new one.
But this also is not, well, typically a standup comedy show.
comedians who do like love to do it.
We have a lot of people in comedy and improv that host the chapters for us.
(10:23):
But yeah, it's meant to be a positive experience.
We do...
you know, we definitely want people to tell the truth about their friends.
So they may say like, here are some of their red flags and things like that.
But it's always done in a really nice way that, you know, we don't want anyone to feel badabout the experience.
There's just, there's already so much hate in this world.
We wanted to have a positive experience with it.
(10:45):
I noticed the green flag, red flag format.
There was a standard procedure, you know, kind of a SOP that was a best practice, if youwill, that was presented to people to help make it easier.
But I think, I think that very much goes along with the spirit of the whole thing.
Not feeling like I'm going to get roasted or humiliated or called out makes people feelmore comfortable.
(11:08):
Making the presenter feel as if they would have to be a standup comedian
would dramatically reduce the number of people who are going to get up there.
And I did see how you have some stand up and improv people who run things in other citiesand that a lot of their their buddies, their cohorts at open mic night are often the ones
who do the pitching.
(11:28):
Yeah, we want to keep energy high and make sure people feel comfortable because we do havea lot of people who are very introverted, who just really love their friends, who really
want to pitch them.
And to me, like those presentations, like the ones done by the professional comedians are,you know, they're always great.
But the ones done by like the introverted friend that you know, like doesn't do a ton ofpublic speaking, I think are like the most genuine.
(11:50):
And also to like the crowds we see just want to support and they're like cheering on thosefolks as they're presenting to make them feel comfortable.
So it's just, it's just a very
beautiful experience.
Oh, and the world is starving for something social and positive because we're so sick oflooking at the headlines and everybody politically being pitted against each other.
you know, all of a sudden thoughts and prayers are this horrible thing.
(12:12):
I mean, you know, I mean, we're not like that in real life.
We're not racist.
We're not, um, you know, men going their own way and feminists who can't stand the othergender.
and, you know, we're not thinking about, you know, who I voted for when I talk to otherpeople.
In real life, people just want to live their best life and everybody wants to get along nomatter who they are.
(12:34):
It's fantastic and I think that you're putting forth that value effectively.
Yeah, and I think too, just getting people talking in real life again is a big piece ofit.
Because when people go out now and we hear it from the venues and the bars that we talk tothe owners, people don't talk to people outside of the circle of people that they're out
meeting.
And so it's created this really weird dynamic that if you are a single person and you'reout and you do see someone you want to approach, it's very difficult to do it.
(13:02):
I mean, when I was in my 20s, you could go out to a bar and like say hello to anybody.
Like that does not exist anymore.
Yeah.
You're not very old.
I'm almost 40, so.
Well, in the grand scheme, that was the century.
Yeah, yeah.
But COVID definitely accelerated that significantly there.
And then just what was going on with iPhones and everybody on technology all the time.
(13:26):
And then the dating apps really added that extra layer that pushed it over the edge.
Yeah, even before COVID you would see groups of, you know, Generation Z people all buriedin their smartphone sitting next to each other.
Like, what are you doing?
And then after COVID people were like, well, wait a minute.
You mean I can go out and be social again?
Do I have to go out and be social again?
(13:47):
This whole DoorDashing through life was actually kind of nice.
You know, I've been poisoned by social media into believing radical things now, but youknow, I really don't like people and this helped me feel good about that.
But
then we realized, Hey, you know what human beings are literally born to be social andwe're starving for it, but we were rusty, weren't we?
And then, you know, just lately, it seems like people are blossoming again, coming out oftheir shell and wanting to be social.
(14:13):
So when you do break the ice, like if you do have the cojones to go up to a huddle ofpeople who all know each other at a venue and say, Hey, how do you all know each other?
They'll look at you and go, my gosh, wow.
Someone friendly come join us.
And you're like,
flabbergasted at how friendly people are, but we fell into a habit of not being so social.
(14:34):
Yeah.
Yep.
Trying.
We're trying.
I mean, we still get during the mingling time, we still hear from people that are like,can there be more structure to this?
Or like, I'm not quite comfortable.
And ah it's different in every city, but I'm always like, OK, who do you want to talk to?
Let's go over to them.
And I try to get people feeling comfortable.
(14:56):
you know, know a lot of our event hosts are like that too, because while Arianna and Istarted it here in Philly, it grew so quickly that we then put up on our website for folks
who were interested in doing it in other cities and hosting through our training programand things like that.
um We ended up hearing from like 528 different cities across 22 countries that werelooking to have Pitch-A-Friends in their area.
(15:18):
And so it was nuts within, you know, to hear from these folks that...
Now I've gotten to speak with people around the world around like what is dating likethere and what, you know, what's the social setting and like in Ghana and like all in
Egypt.
I've literally spoken to somebody probably in like every, every country at this point.
Countries I didn't even know.
You know, I had to reference a map, but yeah, it's just been really wild.
(15:42):
And just to hear like, like culturally, there's definitely things that are different placeto place.
But at the basis, what we're seeing is people in every culture love their friends, lovetheir relationship with their friends.
People have single friends that they want to support.
then globally, they all hate the dating apps.
The experience on the dating apps is not great anywhere.
(16:04):
So it's kind of the right time for an event like this to emerge.
people are social, people are human, human nature is similar, uh, masculinity and, uh,femininity and attraction are similar.
It's like the language of love is universal, kind of like math.
Um, I think that's amazing.
And yet I attended your event and I noticed even afterwards armed with all of thesetalking points about seven different people in the room who were verified as single,
(16:36):
Mm-hmm.
people will still mostly socializing with the people they came with.
Yeah.
It's a slow movement, but we're definitely getting more and more and people are more andcomfortable.
I definitely think it depends too on the space setup.
And so we try all these different kind of venue sizes.
And there's really not any ideal, but we do notice if it's.
(16:57):
at a restaurant where it's like seated tables, people are less likely to move around asmuch.
And so we have different games and things that we kind of sprinkle in to encourage that uhas after we assess them.
Did they play, you mentioned Red Flag, Green Flag, did they play the Red Flag, Green Flaggame at your event?
Um, I don't know if they played a red flag, green flag game, but I know just, was afeature of, not every one of the PowerPoint presentations, most of them.
(17:22):
Yeah.
She did a couple other, she did a couple icebreakers.
Yeah, we do like an icebreaker with them with actual like red flags and green flags, oreverybody has one of each.
And then we put we put different things up on the screen.
And it's like, you know, hates cats.
And then everybody, you know, raises whether or not it's a red flag or green flag to themand texts their mom every morning, like, and you just kind of hear response.
(17:44):
did do that.
Yes
yeah, and so that's a fun thing too to just uh get a gauge as to like what the room islike and also for some people like they have strong feelings of like things that are green
flags for them that may be red flags for others and so I think it's also provides like anawareness piece to different people's different uh you know desires and compatibility.
(18:04):
That's true a red flag to somebody...
one person's red flag is someone else's green flag.
But you know, as you're talking admitting to one's own red flags is kind of like beingasked, what's your greatest weakness in a job interview?
You know, what are you gonna answer?
I'm too focused.
like to cook or, you know, uses AI DJ, like they're always usually kind of silly, butpeople have like strong preferences.
(18:25):
The one that I would say is most conflicting, like split all the time for red flag andgreen flag and different every time is whether or not they do pineapple on their pizza.
Oh, it's not if you voted for Trump or not.
No, that one's...
Depending on the area, pretty unanimous at our events.
That was interesting.
(18:49):
Yeah.
thing.
You can tell a lot about a person.
um Talk to us about how you stumbled upon this idea.
You don't take credit for having invented it.
You and your counterpart accident...
you call it a happy accident.
Yeah.
I hang out at this brewery, like I mentioned, that's down the street from my house and I'mclose with the owners there.
do some art projects.
(19:12):
I like, I have to get out of my house.
But what's super nice about it is it's a place where, you know,
you don't I don't have to text people to say, hey, I'm going to the brewery to hang out.
It's just you show up and whoever's there is there and it's an age range of like 25 to60s.
(19:32):
And just folks that just you know, communicates ...this very small brewery and just reallygreat kind of dynamic and community there.
And they used to do a comedy night and I was there one night for it.
And it wasn't very funny.
And I jokingly said to one of the owners that if they just let me do pitch decks of thesingle people in the area
I think I could get more laughs than the comedians that they were hiring to come in.
(19:56):
And they just kind of were like, let's do it, let's run with it.
My background, as I mentioned, is in tech.
I own a tech startup, so I used to pitch my business to a lot of investors back when Istarted it in 2014.
And so it's a different application of the pitch deck.
And I thought it'd be fun to do for just some of the single people I knew.
And the first event was just like me, my friend Ariana and another
(20:19):
friend just pitching the single people we knew who lived in the neighborhood.
ah And you couldn't sign up to it.
I was just you come to hear us pitch them and people resonated really well and they wantedto pitch their own friends.
And so that's when we put a sign-up together and we started doing that kind of monthlyvery casually...like literally they the way they paid us was they covered my beer tab for
(20:40):
the month.
It was nice.
Good arrangement.
did like once a month and then
Very quickly we started hearing from other venues across the city that wanted us to hostit there.
And that's kind of when I put my startup hat back on and built a bunch of backendinfrastructure and tech around it.
Yeah.
You know, it's amazing to think that you're in so many cities now and it's blown up insuch a short amount of time because, you you caught lightning in a bottle with this.
(21:09):
Really?
Yeah.
It's just been super awesome too to connect with folks that are just passionate aboutconnecting people around the world.
Our city organizers, they also have a huge range in their age.
It's anywhere from like early 20s to we have people in their 60s that host Pitch-A-Friendchapters.
We have, you know, a main host in every city.
(21:29):
Wait, well...
we have about 48 different cities right now and we're on-boarding like...
No, not yet.
would love.
Yeah.
We are in Phoenix in Arizona.
no, not yet.
But I would love to do a place like that.
Because we do 45 and Up events.
We had, uh actually here in Philly, an event we had which was a younger demographic in akind dive bar-ish place in South Philly.
(21:58):
There was a 67-year-old woman who signed up to pitch
her 67 year old friends and I emailed them in advance and I was like, just so know, thiscrowd is usually on the younger average age or in mid-20s and they're like, oh, it's okay.
And they came out and they did a practice run with two young people who they were sittingnear before the event because they were nervous about it.
(22:19):
But then they went up there and they totally crushed, oh my God, people were, it was somuch fun.
They were like, if you've got a divorced dad or a widowed uncle, they knew the audiencethey were talking to and they just, they had...it was amazing.
is amazing.
know, having gone to college in Philly at Temple, um I remember going to those venues forwhatever they were doing.
(22:44):
And it was part of the mystique.
I remember one time, I don't know if you're...
you're from Philly, so you probably remember the lore of a band called The Dead Milkmen.
Hmm, I'm from Jersey originally.
I've been in Philly for a while though.
Jersey and Philly.
There's the thing there.
Uh, The Dead Milkmen were like a uh punk band not to be taken seriously.
(23:07):
Okay.
They had, they had silly punk songs and they hit the national scene, but they were aPhilly band.
And I remember we went to see them and we were laughing 'cuz it was in somebody's basementdowntown, like in a, you know,
God knows how old this house...
If anybody has never been to the East Coast of the United States, it's the closest placeyou're ever going to get to like Europe in terms of God, how, old is this house?
(23:33):
It's like 17 something.
This place was built.
Right.
And, um, you know, you don't get that in Phoenix.
Right.
So this was a perfectly decent house, but no, we had to have it in their basement, whichwas a dirt floor with like an old furnace, like in A Christmas Story.
And there was literally a rat in the corner, like milling around.
And they were just blasting, you know, in this basement.
(23:56):
And that's just kind of always been a Philly thing.
We're going to go grunge on you.
Yeah.
It sounds like we got a wide range of amazing establishments.
We've done an event with the 76ers in the 76ers arena.
And so we've done all shapes and sizes of venues and places.
And it's just been really cool.
Yeah, your grandmother's basement, that's not.
Yeah.
(24:16):
That's that's great.
Yeah, you've done this is blown up.
You have a huge chapter in Austin, you said.
In Philadelphia, filling a stadium.
All over the world and it...
really big in Oslo, Norway.
So if you're ever in Oslo, Norway, that's I Yes.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, I haven't, you know, I haven't been able to get out to the other chapters yet.
(24:40):
I'm planning kind of like a roadshow to go see them.
But yeah, it's it we have a whole community.
Yeah.
But I just had finding time, it's been tough lately.
But yeah, it's very cool to just have these awesome people hosting it in their differentareas and um seeing kind of the different partnerships that we've developed.
(25:01):
We do a Pitch-A-Pet program too, so we also work with local shelters and we will featurean available foster dog or pets.
For folks looking for that immediate companionship and love, we have that opportunity too.
Yeah, Green flags.
He's very affectionate.
Red flags, he still pees all over the carpet.
(25:22):
Yeah.
Very similar to humans, right?
Yeah, exactly.
Do you still have that first PowerPoint presentation from the very first pitch you everdid?
Yeah, yeah, we have all of them.
I would take the first slide and like blow it up and frame it in my office.
Yeah, like the first dollar bill you made it the, know, when you open a Greek restaurant.
Yeah.
(25:42):
Yeah.
I think the number is like over 4000 people have been pitched at between all our events sofar.
So it's just amazing to see.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Now have a confession to make.
I was going to be a fly on the wall.
I really, honestly...
I got to tell you Melissa, I was going to behave myself.
That was my plan.
(26:02):
uh Yeah.
I think I broke a rule.
I broke more than one.
Yeah.
And I told everybody...
you know, I'm just...
I told my waitress that I was, you know, just a journalist, you know, I was justresearching.
And she was so cute and charming that we hit it off.
And I said, I have a crazy idea.
(26:22):
I want to pitch you.
And she went...
at first, and I said, no, I'll be very nice to you.
And I went and I asked, I asked the person who was, who was moderating if I could do that.
Cause you know, I think she would have liked to have had a bigger turnout.
There were only seven people pitching.
So let's even it out.
I'll do the eighth one.
And so I paid her.
(26:43):
I was a good boy.
Paid my entry fee and...
You got a free beer too?
Oh, I wasn't drinking.
So she...
someone else can have my free beer.
And, you know, I didn't know this this woman.
She was very cute and she had been very sweet to me.
But all I knew about her was five minutes' worth of conversation.
(27:05):
So I didn't have a lifetime of experience.
And I did.
I broke the rule.
I went into standup comedy mode.
I probably shouldn't have.
But you know, at least I filled out the...
I was a good boy, though.
I don't know how, I don't know how bad she made this out, but I was a good boy.
I didn't pitch myself at all.
Oh, okay.
(27:26):
Yeah.
You have to be all self-conscious.
Um, but I didn't pitch myself.
I didn't say, Hey, mountaintoppodcast.com.
I didn't do any of that.
I played by the rules.
I was a good boy.
And I...
and I really liked the, the, the, the little gal who was the waitress and I really, youknow, we made friends.
So it was all very, very fun.
But I joked about how we'd already, you know,
(27:46):
I found out she was my soulmate and we'd already married and divorced.
So she's single again all within the last five minutes.
You know, that was the joke.
That was the and and But I didn't mortify her.
She was a good sport.
And she was also working while I'm pitching her after she came to...
But I really wanted in.
It's infectious.
That's that's the thing is I want to play.
(28:06):
I want to...
I don't want to sit on the sidelines.
I don't want to be on the bench.
I...
if you go to one of these events, guys
and you don't have a friend to pitch or they're not pitching you and you just go, you'regoing to want to get off the bench.
It's like being on a sports team.
You're not going to want to be the bench warmer.
You're going to want to go start for this team and play.
You're going to want to go pitch for the starting team.
(28:29):
It's fun.
Do you have repeat pitchers?
Sometimes, yeah, sometimes we have people.
And you know what's interesting?
We have a lot of people who are also single and they'll pitch each other, but then we alsohave a lot of folks that are like the married friends or we've had a lot of pregnant women
pitching because this is like the time, know, a single friend has done all of
(28:50):
No, the single friend has done all of that.
They've done the bachelor parties.
They've done the showers.
They've done...
bought all the gifts.
They've traveled for...
and like this is just something fun that those friends can do in return for the singlefriends that haven't, you know, maybe experienced that yet in life.
And so in that sense, it's, you know, it's not awkward to come to the event with friendsthat aren't single.
We have uh some of our chapters are run by married folks who just like to connect peopleand want to see people...
(29:13):
Yeah.
rub it in.
Like, I'm married and I'm happily married.
I'm never lonely.
So someday when you're like me, you know, yeah, that's, that's douchey.
yeah, so it's, you know, super fun to hear the perspective of like all the differentfriends and also to it's, you know, if you don't have a friend to pitch you, it's still
fun to come and hang out and mingle and potentially make a friend there that you know, youmay see at another event and get to a point where you're comfortable pitching each other
(29:39):
or if you do have a good friend, you can come and scope it out and see what the the whatdoes well, you know, in
things people include in their presentations that you see resonate well with others.
It also helps you have really fun conversations with your friends that you may not haveall the time.
Like I've had friends who've asked me to pitch them.
And I'm just like, okay, I would love to pitch you, but like you're a drinking buddy ofmine.
(30:01):
I don't know anything about like what you are looking for in a date or like goals.
And so then I get to sit down and have those conversations.
So it actually brings you closer to your friends that you're pitching to.
Cause now I know like what their life goals are.
I know their credit score.
I know like all the intimate details.
Because I was like, I need it all if I'm gonna pitch you well, I need to be able to sellit.
(30:24):
Yeah.
She's working on it.
Yeah.
That's, that's, that's TMI.
Alright.
Um, you know, uh, one thing that comes to mind is, you know, we were talking about thebaseball analogy, which is inevitable.
And, know, I'm, I'm searching for a joke to fit a punch line right here, but I actuallyformed a decent thought about it.
(30:47):
It is still public public speaking
Mm-hmm.
Yeah.
guts, no matter who you are to Pitch-A-Friend.
And I think you've done a good job with it, but here's the punchline in search of a joke.
Have you ever seen a situation where there was a relief pitcher?
In other words, did someone get up there and they just, they couldn't even?
(31:08):
So someone, another friend had to come up and complete the presentation for them?
no, no, never.
No, I think we definitely have had um a handful of like no shows, which and it's not it'snot a huge...
In most of our chapters you pay like five or ten bucks to pitch, but you get a free drinkwhen you get...
it's really just to make sure you're going to show up and put a presentation together.
(31:28):
um You know, we do do some ticketed events, but most most of the time the events are freeto attend.
uh And we've had some where...
here in Philly where maybe like one person didn't show up and
our inkling is that they showed up and saw how packed it was and then got nervous andleft, so...
Well, if the pitcher shows up and the catcher isn't there, do they still pitch themanyway?
(31:52):
I would.
So usually they have a different friend, like a friend's late.
You sometimes it's like if they're stuck at work, they'll have a different friend pitch,do the pitch.
Like we've definitely had people who've, yeah, who've done the deck where they're like,they're like, I haven't seen this before.
So like, I'm just gonna like, kind of wing it with the slides.
Yeah.
Yeah, a lot of times people are really, you know, I think when it comes to, you know,
(32:15):
your friends, it's an easy presentation to give no matter what the slides are.
And we've had PowerPoints that are like white slide, black text, super small, barely readit.
You could tell they definitely are not looking for a good presentation, but the story theytell with it is just so amazing and moving.
And we've had people who've done like full professional, very, very nice lookingpresentations with animations and voting and different engagements and stuff in it.
(32:42):
People are very, very creative with it.
And so we've had people with their family there that'll have QR codes you can scan to likeget to baby pictures or friends handing out Taylor Swift friendship bracelets that have
their phone numbers on them.
Yeah, or people who are like my friends are really good baker and they bring some likebaked good examples and stuff.
(33:03):
yeah, so people are people sell it.
Yeah.
So we've had also friends who create like a
fake email address...
Well, not a fake one a real email address where they can pre-vet, so they say if you'reinterested the last slide of you can email you know BaddiesForBratty at gmail.com and uh
the friends will vet essentially the potential dates.
(33:25):
You know, so it's people are very creative and have a fun time with it.
Yeah.
We've had flight attendants do them in the full flight attendants, you know, keep yourhands in type...
We've had people sing their pitches so it's been really cool to the creativity.
what every flight attendant has to say when they're around me.
(33:47):
But yeah, you can definitely tell too like what industry people work in, you know, basedoff of, do they have like the slides set up?
Some people have like an agenda slide and it's just, it's a kind of a fun application ofit.
Yeah, we're all human, right?
Our personality is going to come out.
I have to say though, I did notice that the people who gave PowerPoint presentationsneeded to get the memo that you have to have bigger print because the people in the last
(34:10):
row can't read something this tiny.
Yeah.
And I got pretty good eyes from my age and I was still going, Oh, okay.
That's what they said.
Okay.
Yeah.
funny, there was a funny pitch once where the presentation was done really nice.
And then the last slide was all just like type eight and it filled the whole thing withtexts.
And he's like, these are all like the warnings.
(34:30):
And then he like skipped it.
It was like you couldn't even read it.
And then he's like, went to the last slide.
It was very funny.
there.
Yeah.
Alright.
right.
Well, this is, this is wonderful.
I'm so glad you and your business partner stumbled upon this happy, happy accident andthat it's growing so much.
And I understand completely why, um, you monetize this basically through the...
(34:51):
through the venues, cause there's no way you're getting rich off of people paying hardlyanything and getting a free drink to do this.
Yeah.
do it.
It's kind like a trivia night.
we're entertainers coming in.
We're managing the entertainment, so to speak.
em And just, yeah.
Yeah.
Make everybody happy and buy more.
Yeah.
I think it's brilliant.
I love it.
And I'm a huge fan.
Singles get more free opportunities.
(35:12):
Dating apps and dating events and being single, it can be very expensive for folks.
Oh yeah, that's just another thing.
So this is actually a cheap date.
Yep, and a great way too if you're just at a point too where you're trying to get outthere but you're not quite sure if you're comfortable yet, just you can come hang out with
a friend and make it very casual.
It doesn't have to be anything pressured.
(35:33):
You put the sticker on.
If you want to put the sticker on, that indicates if you're single.
Otherwise, you just, you don't have a sticker on and you're still free to get comfortabletalking to people.
Just another feather in your cap and why guys should check into this.
And you're in how many cities now?
We're in 46 because we have a couple of odds because we're transitioning.
We have city organizers.
Life gets busy.
They move, new jobs.
(35:54):
So we're transitioning a couple of cities right now.
And then we're launching in um like five new cities next week.
What are some of the key cities you have in the United States?
So these guys, you know, if they're there, they just hear right now, they should checkinto it.
Yeah, I we're in most major cities like LA, New York, DC.
(36:14):
We're also in San Diego, Phoenix, Raleigh.
Yep.
Yep.
We have like a bunch of chapters launching right now in Florida.
Like, we've had Tampa, our gentleman who runs Tampa Bay has been awesome.
He's been there from like, he's one of our early chapters.
(36:35):
We're also in a bunch of cities in Canada.
But yeah, you can check it out on our website.
We have the full list of active cities there.
And you can also vote for your city.
And that kind of pushes it up the leaderboard of areas we may come to next.
And if guys wanted to run a Pitch-A-Friend chapter for you, they can get in touch with youalso.
(36:55):
Cool.
about what it is to run the chapter.
And then we essentially kind of go through a vetting process.
And then we have a training process.
And then um it's for you to run in your area.
Is it heavy duty or pretty lightweight?
It's pretty lightweight.
Most of our studio organizers do it as something in addition to like their normal 9-to-5as a way to kind of get out and be social.
(37:18):
Yeah.
They're comfortable, create, and understand it's not a roast.
We're looking for people who are comfortable with social media and, you know, just want tobring a positive experience to single folks.
I love it.
think it's great.
I am so glad I discovered it and you, and I want to send these guys to your website.
Guys, it's Pitch-A-Friend with dashes pitch dash a dash friend.com some other bastard hasPitch-A-Friend.com and won't sell it to her.
(37:47):
So you know how that works.
But I made it easier than ever for you, of course, cause if you go tomountaintoppodcast.com front slash pitchafriend I'll teleport you magically over there.
And so if you want to participate,
First of all, see if your city's there.
And if not raise a ruckus, you know, get in Melissa's inbox about it and maybe even startyour own chapter and, um, guys, everybody's on the same page in this podcast studio about
(38:13):
online dating and apps being in the rear view mirror.
But you still have a smartphone.
You still have a computer.
What you're going to do to meet women in real life.
think Melissa's handed you a golden opportunity and Melissa, thank you so much for joiningus.
This has been just a great show.
Thank you.
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Yeah, yeah, I'm really glad we we made this work and um guys If you haven't been tomountaintoppodcast.com lately, go there check out our sponsors Jocko Willink's company
(38:39):
Origin in Maine, The Keyport and also Hero Soap.
Check out what they got.
If you want to partake of anything from our sponsors, please use the coupon codemountain10 and uh, you'll get 10% off, of course.
Also guys download the free book Sticking Points Solved.
When you do that, you'll be on my daily email list.
(39:00):
61,000 people strong.
You should be on it if you're not already.
And I give you free daily advice on how to be a better man and to get the right woman inyour life.
Also, some of you haven't gotten on the phone with me yet for 25 to 30 minutes.
I want to know who you guys are out there, hear your feedback on the show.
And if it makes sense to put a coaching plan together to take you from good to great,well, we can talk about that too.
(39:22):
But either way, I'm always happy to talk to you.
All of that in there All of that and more is there for you at mountaintoppodcast.comalways.
And until I talk to you again real soon, this is Scot McKay from X & Y Communications inSant Antonio, TX.
Be good out there
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