Lulu
Lulu is a New York–based private consumer social app, founded in 2010, that lets women read and post reviews of men they know based on romantic, personal, and sexual appeal, operating as a user-generated content social platform.
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2010
- HeadquartersNew York, United States
- Headcount11–50
- GTM typeB2C
- OfferingSoftware
What Lulu does
Lulu is a private consumer social application founded in 2010 and headquartered in New York, with a stated headcount band of 11–50 employees. Per its firmographic profile, the app is designed for women to read and create reviews of men they know, framed around romantic, personal, and sexual appeal — making it a UGC-driven social/reputation product rather than a dating app in the traditional matchmaking sense. The platform's content loop depends on a critical mass of female reviewers generating enough evaluations to make individual profiles discoverable and useful to other users.
The company has raised approximately $3.5 million in disclosed outside capital across two priced rounds in 2011 ($1M) and 2013 ($2.5M), with both rounds backed by Passion Capital and PROfounders Capital; a further 2013 transaction involving Kaszek is recorded with a disclosed value of $0. The most recent priced financing on record is therefore more than a decade old, and the canonical website URL (onlulu.com) as scraped currently displays unrelated third-party gambling content, which suggests either domain lapse, parking, or a data-integrity issue in the scraped source — a material concern for any diligence exercise. The company is still listed as operating, but no current product, revenue, or headcount data is available.
The input also contains substantial data about a separate entity — a print-on-demand publishing platform headquartered in Morrisville, North Carolina, holding a 2025 B Corp recertification. This appears to be Lulu Press / lulu.com (a distinct company that shares the Lulu brand) and is not the same business as the New York–based social app described in the firmographics. Where the two datasets conflict on foundational facts (founding year, geography, business model), the firmographic description consistent with the funding-round investors (Passion Capital, PROfounders Capital, Kaszek) governs the analysis below.
Lulu firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- Lulu
- Website
- https://onlulu.com
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2010
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 11–50 employees
- Short description
- Lulu is a New York–based private consumer social app, founded in 2010, that lets women read and post reviews of men they know based on romantic, personal, and sexual appeal, operating as a user-generated content social platform.
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
Where Lulu is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- New York
- HQ country
- United States
- HQ region
- North America
Offices1 record
Markets served
Lulu business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2C
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations
Revenue model
- Print-on-Demand Publishing: Lulu operates a print-on-demand publishing platform that generates revenue through book printing and distribution services, allowing authors to publish and sell their works without upfront inventory costs
Lulu product offering
Product offeringCore offering
Lulu is a private mobile app that allows women to anonymously read and create reviews of men they know based on romantic, personal, and sexual appeal. The platform is gated to female users and functions as a social reputation network where users can research individuals in their dating and social circles before engaging with them.
Product overview
Lulu is a print-on-demand publishing platform that enables authors and publishers to self-publish and sell books. The company operates a print-on-demand model that reduces waste, reflecting its commitment to sustainable and ethical operations.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Products and services
- Lulu Mobile App A private, women-only mobile application where users can anonymously read and publish reviews of men they know, evaluating them on romantic, personal, and sexual criteria. Used for social and dating vetting.
Companies that use Lulu
Customer profileIdeal customer profiles1 record
Lulu technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- No
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Feature1 record
Lulu partnerships and signals
Strategic signalScale indicators1 record
Recent moves3 records
Expansion highlights2 records
Lulu competitors and assessment
Company assessmentDirect peers
- Glassdoor: Anonymous employee review platform. Comparable because it shares the user-generated review of individuals mechanic that defined Lulu's product.
- Tinder: Mainstream dating app. Comparable as the dominant peer in the dating category Lulu addressed, with overlapping user base and similar mobile-app distribution.
- Peanut: Social network for women. Comparable because Peanut scaled the women-only social community concept that Lulu introduced in a different vertical.
- Coffee Meets Bagel: Dating app targeting women with curated matches. Comparable as a dating peer targeting Lulu's same demographic with differentiated positioning.
- The League: Selective dating app. Comparable as a dating-app competitor operating in the same women-targeted, curated-discovery segment.
- Bumble: Women-initiated dating and social app. Direct comparable because both target women-led social/dating discovery and Lulu pioneered the women-first framing that Bumble scaled into a public company.
- Yelp: Consumer review platform. Comparable because Lulu's core mechanic was user-generated reviews of people; Yelp is the canonical scaled peer in the 'reviews' category.
- Hinge: Dating app positioned around relationships and profiles. Comparable because Hinge and Lulu both occupy the relationship-discovery space, with overlapping female user demographics.
Broad incumbents
- Tripadvisor: Mass-market review platform. Comparable as a broad incumbent that scaled the user-generated review model Lulu applied to dating.
- Facebook Dating: Meta's integrated dating product. Comparable as an incumbent leveraging an existing social graph that competes with Lulu's social-discovery mechanic.
Market position
Strengths3 records
Weaknesses3 records
Competitive moat2 records
Key risks5 records
Key highlights3 records
Customer concentration
Lulu social profiles
Digital presenceLulu compliance and trust
Trust signalCompliance1 record
Lulu financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
Lulu leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Lulu funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds3 records
Investors3 records
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Lulu M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about Lulu
What does Lulu do?
Lulu is a private mobile app that allows women to anonymously read and create reviews of men they know based on romantic, personal, and sexual appeal. The platform is gated to female users and functions as a social reputation network where users can research individuals in their dating and social circles before engaging with them.
When was Lulu founded?
Lulu was founded in 2010. It employs 11 to 50 people.
Where is Lulu based?
Lulu is headquartered in New York, United States, in the North America region.
How does Lulu make money?
One revenue line is on record: print-on-Demand Publishing.
Who are Lulu's main competitors?
Direct peers on record are Glassdoor, Tinder, Peanut, Coffee Meets Bagel, The League, Bumble, Yelp and Hinge. Broad incumbents are Tripadvisor and Facebook Dating.
Does Lulu have an API?
No public API is recorded for Lulu.