Valentine’s Day has a long and storied history. From a pagan holiday celebrating fertility, to a day to celebrate any number of saints Valentine, to a multi-billion dollar industry today, Valentine’s Day has morphed and changed into the celebration of love we know today. 

The average consumer will spend a record $196.31 on Valentine’s Day in 2020, according to the National Retail Federation. This number is up 21% from the previous record set in 2019 of $161.96. Total spending this year is projected to be nearly $30 billion. 

At LSU, student couples will likely not be spending nearly $200 on the holiday, but that doesn’t mean they can’t celebrate. 

Three couples shared their Valentine’s Day plans with the Reveille:

Anthropology senior Courtney Kline met petroleum engineering senior Zach Powell on Bumble, a popular dating app where the woman has to message first. Kline and Powell have been dating for three weeks. Recently, Kline took Powell as her date to a sorority date event. As for their Valentine’s Day plans, Kline said the pair were going to try to make it to a basketball game. 

“If we don’t make it, then he’s taking me to a movie and I’m gonna cook for him,” Kline said. 

Graphic design sophomore Ben Gomez and theatre performance sophomore Rain Scott-Catoire have been together for five months after meeting on Tinder, another popular dating app based on geographic proximity. The app uses location to find profiles of people who meet the user’s preferred age and gender criteria. Users will then be presented with these profiles, and they can choose to either “swipe right” if they want to be matched or “swipe left” if not. 

It is becoming increasingly common for people to meet their significant others on dating apps. Tinder boasts over 1 million matches a day and 57 million users worldwide, according to their website. Studies from the Pew Research Center also indicate college-aged students also make up the largest portion of that demographic. 

Scott-Catoire said he didn’t actually have any pictures of him and Rain together, so Rain would have to fix that soon. 

The pair has a laid back evening planned for Friday. 

“We’re gonna cook dinner together and have a night in,” Scott-Catoire said. 

Mass communication sophomore Calista Rodal and computer science sophomore Bryce Lee met through a mutual friend before they started attending LSU. 

“We’ve been here at LSU for literally our whole relationship,” Rodal said. “We’ve been inseparable ever since.” 

For Valentine’s Day, the couple plans to go to dinner and then watch movies together. 

“We’re definitely an old married couple,” Rodal said.