Helping others confess their feelings a new service

"It’s still their feelings, but I’m responsible for making a version that uses warmer words," said Thao, 22, who owns "Love Confession," a service in which she writes love letters for tongue tied customers.

She was inspired to launch the service after one of her friends asked, "What if we have feelings for someone but are too shy to confess?"

After then consulting with her friend on how to proceed, Thao realized that many people had the same problem: They are not confident enough in their communicative ability, so they don’t dare express their feelings to their beloved.

Thao at her recording studio during a session recording a voice note for a customer in March, 2023. Photo courtesy of Thao

In July 2022, Thao posted an announcement on social media offering to write love letters and record love confessions audio files on behalf of her customers. Her post gained over 700 interactions and more than 130 comments after 12 hours. Orders fluxed in.

Thao explained that "Love Confession" is not a matchmaking service.

"I only help my customers deliver their feelings better with a sophisticated love letter or a customized audio file."

She charges each customer between VND70,000-160,000, depending on the means they choose.

Her original purpose was to help her customers avoid the pressure or embarrassment experienced when they confess their feelings to another.

After offering her services for more than a year, Thao noticed that her customers don’t only want to confess passionate love. Some have ordered letter that show the customer’s feelings to an ex-lover, to a close friend, or even to themselves.

"I’ve received many orders in which the recipients are the customer’s ex-boyfriend or ex-girlfriend," Thao noted. Thus, she decided to target this customer group as well.

When she first began offering this type of service, Thao had a lot of unserious interactions. Some suspected that she was just joking, some even confessed their feelings for her.

"It took me one or two months to prove that I was serious and gain trust from people," Thao recalled.

In addition to "Love Confession," Thao’s group has been running the "Negative Feelings Bin" project as well, which aims to heal young people mentally. Photo courtesy of Thao

Thao got more than 100 customers after one year. She claims that she doesn’t ask customers to leave positive reviews, but they are welcome to if they wish to do so.

Thao wants her service to be unique and as valuable as possible. She wants her customers to be able to heal when they reach her. "I stay up late, listen and give pieces of advice to those who reach out to me without officially ordering anything," she said.

A customer she still remembers well is one who wanted to express his love to his wife. As an introvert he was aiming to spice up his marriage and show his wife how grateful he was for her expecting their first child. Thao charged him VND250,000 for a letter and an audio file.

Recently, on March 8, a male student ordered Thao to help him send a love letter to his mom. Thao burst into tears when she read his feelings. He said that his father left him and his mother when he was born. During his adolescent years, he was rebellious and didn’t obey his mother.

Only after entering university did he realize his mother’s sacrifice and regret that he hadn’t appreciated his mother. For the first time in his life, via Thao’s service, he was able to send his mother a letter.

"I was fully booked that day, so initially I rejected his order. Still, he patiently texted me and expressed how determined he was to send his mother love, so eventually I accepted his order and finished his letter in the same afternoon," Thao said.

The day after, he told Thao:

"My mother was touched and cried a lot. Thank you for expressing things I have been holding back over the past 23 years."

Responses like that make Thao aware of how meaningful her service is.

Lately, an increasing number of customers are reaching out to Thao, however, to guarantee her service’s quality, Thao only processes three to four orders every week. She has two classmates responsible for completing customers' orders beside her.

Thao runs the "Love Confession" service and maintains her main job as a host at the same time. Photo courtesy of Thao

Nguyen Luan Son, a District 3, Ho Chi Minh City resident and former customer of Thao, claimed that he thought Thao was just joking when he first came across her post on social media. But after talking with his friends, he decided to reach out to her. Before that, Son had been rejected when he confessed his love twice. "I didn’t give up though. Thanks to Thao’s encouragement, I tried confessing once more. This time, my girlfriend finally accepted.

After a year of serving customers Thao said that what she gets in return is not profit but lessons about love. She realized that love is not a maths problem, which means there is no definitive answer and no right or wrong solutions.

"We should just love, and love. Even if our love is unfortunately given to a wrong person, we can still start again. Love is like a medicine, it heals every wound.