Finding love in a field
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Why is finding love especially hard for farmers?
Early morning milking, late night calving. It can be hard for farmers to carve out time to find love. Well, that's where my next guest comes in. Matchmaker, Mairead Lockman. Mairead, good morning to you.
Good
morning. How do you become a matchmaker? What brought you into this line of work?
Look, I was single 10 years ago now and I realised how difficult it was to find love. So actually, in October, I am 10 years doing professional matchmaking. I've travelled all over Ireland. I meet clients in person, Dublin, Galway, Cork, Kilkenny, Mullingar, Limerick, you name it, for consultations. I get to know them, the type of person they'd like to meet and anything else that helps me to match them.
And before you were doing this as a job, I mean, were you one of those people who helped to set up Friends?
Yes. Yeah, I was the one that was like, I have a friend that's single. And especially when I came home from Australia, I started matching a lot of Irish people that I'd met in Australia. And according as they were coming home, I'd say, come on down to Mullingar for the night. I'd loads of single friends. And so some of them started getting married. Some of them started having babies. And then there was just a natural progression of, let's go and do this. Yeah, you're
good at this. You can spot people that are going to work well together.
How did Mairead transition from matchmaking friends to a professional career?
That's it. Well, look, I'm a chatterbox. My dad's actually here with me today, and he's a chatterbox, so I definitely got it off him. And I suppose just getting to know people and everything, I was like, why not just match them? Why not introduce them and see where the magic happens?
And what sort of success rate do you have?
Well, I've matched, first of all, about 12,000 people in the last 10 years. So a huge amount of people. I've hundreds of couples that are married, engaged, have had babies. Some people obviously don't get married. So we still have people that are living together long term. We were here last year and I bumped into a couple that I'd matched the previous year at the ploughing. And they'd gotten married in the meantime. Oh, wow. So I never know. I was out for a walk in Greystones there during the summer. I bumped into another couple that I'd only matched a couple of months previously. So, look, there's love all over Ireland.
Okay. I mean, they're talking about trying to boost the birth rate. Obviously, you're
one woman. If the government want to sponsor me, I have no problem.
Lots of people nowadays using the apps. They're all talking about the apps.
What is Mairead’s advice on using dating apps versus traditional methods?
But it doesn't work for everyone, is that
it? It doesn't work for everybody. Now, I do believe that any way you can meet someone is a great way to meet them. So I think you should, you know, throughout the net, try lots of different things. I think you should dip your toe in the water of the apps. Like, let's face it, it does work for some people. And some people have the personality for the apps. I also think do dating events. We're going to be running a little pop-up event. dating event down at the Whistling Donkey Bar later on today to introduce some people but my whole thing is like private matchmaking and you know we're down here today matching farmers we're having a bit of fun but I do this all year round I do a completely private service like you know people come to me
people that have maybe been widowed and unfortunately just don't know how to start back into dating.
Oh, it must be very daunting
to do that. It is very daunting because you have to remember, you know, online dating is only about 10 years old. So for anybody that, you know, maybe was in a relationship or was married for 20, 30 years before that and now they find themselves in a situation where they're widowed, perhaps they have children, they have... You know, the person that passed away, their whole family is obviously part of their life still and everything like that. It is very difficult to dip their toe back in the water. So, like, you know, it's great fun being a matchmaker where you still have a duty of care to their heart.
Okay, so how does the process operate?
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
Why is finding love especially hard for farmers?
0:00–1:08
2
How did Mairead transition from matchmaking friends to a professional career?
1:08–2:06
3
What is Mairead’s advice on using dating apps versus traditional methods?
2:06–3:38
4
How does the private matchmaking consultation process work?
3:38–5:13
5
What criteria does Mairead use to match clients?
5:13–6:13
6
What expectations do clients have before seeking a matchmaker?
6:13–7:36
7
Where can listeners meet Mairead for a live matchmaking event?
7:36–9:01
8
How does loneliness affect farmers and how can matchmaking help?
9:01–10:03