Mersey couple set up new event to show it’s Never Too Late to Date

By Janet Tansley

A husband and wife from Wirral have set up a new match-making event for people over 50 to prove it’s Never Too Late to Date!

Claire and Benn Carson, from Noctorum, want to offer men and women the chance to find love, companionship, or friendship, with the afternoon meet-up at Leasowe Castle Hotel on Sunday, November 13.

And it’s hoped it will become a monthly event.

Clare with Ron from the coffee morning group

Claire admits: “My biggest achievement would be to see someone get married.”

But she smiles: “We’d just like to let as many people as possible know about it and come and, you never know, maybe we can help people and change people’s lives.

“And, if they don’t find love, they can just have a bloody good afternoon!”

The pair decided to start Never Too Late to Date because they say many people are apprehensive of internet dating and prefer the openness of face-to-face meetings.

Friendship Coffee Morning first birthday breakfast

They have organised a singer to entertain at the informal event, and there’ll be a bar so people can relax and chat.

Mum-of-two Claire says: “Me and Benn met 15 years ago and it was still old-school then. You were in a nightclub and, if you met someone, great, if not you’d just wait till the next week.

“But now it’s very internet driven, and that terrifies people of a certain age – it terrifies me and I’m 40.

“Benn and I thought, what is there for older people?”

The couple had already created another event, the Friendship Coffee Morning, which was started in 2019 at Wallasey United Reformed Church.

In the first week 25 people attended – and now 70 people get together there every week on a Tuesday morning.

Friendship Coffee Morning Christmas Meal

“It’s got even bigger since Covid, and more men are coming now which I love,” says Claire who, with Benn, runs Levara Properties, a Wirral lettings company. “They meet and mingle and have coffee and cake, and chat.

“I started it because of a campaign to end loneliness. It was in the press about some people going three days without speaking to someone and I could cry to think there were people who didn’t see a soul or speak to anyone for so long – and this was before Covid.

“I remembered how, as a young mum with two young girls, I felt lonely. I used to go to a mums and tots group on a Thursday morning and it was the highlight of my week!

“I approached the local church who thought the coffee morning was a great idea, and now I get such joy from seeing the group thriving and people getting out an about.”

And it was that that planted the seed of another regular event.

Claire continues: “With the Friendship Coffee Morning we get people on their own, there’s a certain amount of widows, and men have come up to me and said ‘you never know I might meet a woman’.

“And a lot of women are looking for love too.

“It can be intimidating, the thought of going online to date and wondering who you’re talking to, and I have sympathy with older people who might find this daunting.

Never Too Late to Date

“With Never Too Late to Date we just hope, like the coffee morning, people will come and chat. Maybe a group of women will come and meet a group of men and arrange to meet the following week, who knows?

“Are we not all looking for someone to share our lives with?

“I get so much satisfaction from seeing people come together, to laugh and chat. I just want people to be happy, live nice lives, and meet someone and not be lonely.”

* Never Too Late to Date is at Leasowe Castle Hotel, Leasowe Road, Moreton, on Sunday, November 13, from 2pm-6pm. Tickets are £10 each available from Eventbrite. For more information call Claire on 07817 087933.