In Dallas, two groups of trendy women wait anxiously in a boutique filled with designer brands of denim, shirts, handbags and swimsuits. The boutique, Sheke, accurately portrays the chic Dallas mothers and couture-loving young women, each there to find a perfect match. Jodi Cutler, Dallas City Manager for Mommy Mixer, suddenly silences the crowd and instructs the women to form a circle in alphabetical order and then proceed by taking one minute to describe themselves and what exactly they are looking for.

“Wow! This is like speed dating,” 20-year-old SMU student Lizzy Malin said.

Mommy Mixer is a growing trend among help-seeking mothers and job-hunting babysitters. In 22 cities around the country, Mommy Mixer organizes social gatherings for these two groups of women to meet, interact and start symbiotic relationships. Mothers register online to reserve a spot at a mixer and pay a $100 fee to attend. Sitters simply send in a resume and indicate which event they would like to attend. On the day of the mixer, moms receive a booklet with information on each of the women looking for babysitting jobs. After brief introductions, in which the moms jot down notes in their booklets, the women are free to mingle and get to know one other.

Mommy Mixer was founded in Austin, Texas in 2003 by Mary Sullivan Cooper. As a student at the University of Texas, Cooper was bombarded with requests for babysitting services from local families. Seeing the distress of many parents, Cooper was inspired to find an easier way for college students and families to coordinate their efforts. She saw Mommy Mixer as an opportunity for mothers to meet a group of potential sitters, interact with them face-to-face and find a suitable match. Cutler said the most appealing part of the mixers is personal interactions.

“You’re getting to meet someone before they walk into your home,” she said. “If you know someone is not going to work out and they are in your home, what are you going to do? It is just a great opportunity to meet face-to-face and get an idea of the babysitter, and even for the sitters to get an idea of the moms.”

The method seems to be working well. Dallas Campus Representatives for Mommy Mixer, Alyssa Wolf and Samantha Thomas, said after attending a Mommy Mixer, they received multiple babysitting requests a week, both by email and phone. Wolf and Thomas later applied for the position of Campus Representative and are responsible for recruiting young women, particularly sorority girls, in the Dallas area. To do so, they deliver boxes of treats to sorority houses, send emails, and create Mommy Mixer groups on the social networking Website, Facebook.

Malin, a SMU junior Finance major, heard about Mommy Mixer through Facebook. She did not know what to expect at first, but was pleased with the expediency and organization.

“It’s hard sometimes to find babysitting jobs, and it is nice to be able to size up the mothers or the parents before-hand,” she said. “Otherwise, it’s more of a blind date than a speed date.”

Many mothers are equally as satisfied. For Michelle Chesney, the mixer at Sheke was her third experience with Mommy Mixer. She had found a great sitter at a previous mixer who had since graduated from college and moved away. Chesney was hoping to find yet another impressive sitter at this particular gathering.

Gemi Voss, a mother of four, looks for trustworthiness, dependability and maturity in a babysitter. She looks for someone who she feels comfortable with and who is able to conquer all the tasks at hand when watching over young children. Voss says for many mothers, finding a sitter who fits their own expectations can be very difficult.

“Unless you have a lot of friends with high school and college age kids, how do you find a good babysitter?” Voss said. “Mommy Mixer is great because you can meet a variety of potential sitters and you have all their credentials right there in your hand.”

Mommy Mixer does not advertise, but instead depends on media attention and word of mouth. Reagan Melton first heard about it from a local Dallas TV news station. She said she kept the information in the back of her mind until she remembered it and decided to give Mommy Mixer a try. She was pleased with her experience and said the best part was having a big book of potential babysitters.

“It’s nice to see what availability is and to actually see everyone face-to-face, Melton said. “I wasn’t expecting to have so many options.”

Alyssa Fiedelman heard about Mommy Mixer from a friend. The experience was more than she was expecting and she said she would recommend it to others.

“The women were fantastic and I have all their contact information. I don’t know who to call right now! I have a lot of options,” she said. “It was worth the investment.”

Mommy Mixer is a nation-wide movement that is growing every year. Branches are placed in cities with college campuses. The largest branch is in Austin, with Dallas coming in second. Cutler says the reason for this is because the organization has put in the most time and effort into these two cities. Local businesses willingly offer their services and often provide discounts for Mommy Mixer attendees. Cutler says retail stores have proved more successful than coffee shops or restaurants.

“They usually offer on their own,” she said. “It benefits them as well just to get new people in the store. It works out great.”