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20 | NU ASIAN
PHOTOS COURTESY OF JT TRAN
JT Tran is the founder and CEO of ABCs of Attraction, which offers pickup courses for men.
uch an image damages Asian men’s chances in the dating arena, Tran says, and it’s his job to help. With this philosophy, the selfproclaimed “Asian Playboy” is on a mission to see everyday Asian men become their own heroes – by training them through boot camps run by his company, ABCs of Attraction. Tran, based in Los Angeles, was voted the Best Asian Dating Coach for four consecutive years at the World Pickup Artist Summit. But, Tran says, “This was never intended to be a business.” In fact, his current field has little to do with the college degree in aerospace engineering he obtained from the Florida Institute of Technology. Following graduation, Tran moved to California and took up a six-figure salary job as a rocket scientist. He lived beside the beach, began surfing and drove around in a luxury car. Yet, as ideal as his life was, one component was missing: the dream girl. Despite trying mixers, happy hours, blind dates and even speed dating, no girl wanted to date him. “Even eHarmony rejected me because I was too cerebral and analytical,” Tran says, laughing. “I realized I sucked with women. That was my turning point. No one liked me.” That was nearly a decade ago. Today, Tran is the founder of ABCs of Attraction, a company that aims to equip Asian men with self-confidence and the practical ability to attract women they desire. Selfdescribed as the “Asian dating coach,” Tran explains the teaching method as an all-encompassing, holistic approach that deals with how men think, act and speak. “These boot camps are three days and three nights and they suck,” Tran says. “What we’re doing is essentially pushing these guys to grow and become the men they were supposed to be.” Tran remembers delving into the party scene four to six nights a week while still holding a 9-to-5 job as an aerospace engineer. His explorations, both adventures and misadventures, went into his blog, one that evolved to gain a large following of Asian-Americans. “It wasn’t simply all braggadocio,” Tran says. “Essentially, I had the first Asian-American dating blog from the male perspective.” Given his results-oriented mind as an engineer, Tran studied the psychology behind dating and bases the programs of ABCs of Attraction on psychological studies. He implemented the methods in the real world and documented his results. “I put myself out there and was not afraid that I was going those issues. I’d have good nights, and I’d have just humiliating nights,” Tran said. The blog also gave Tran his first unofficial client: a Chinese-Canadian mother who was worried about her oftbullied son. Given the vast need for a practical and active solution for the struggles that Asian men were facing, Tran found an increasing number of opportunities to be a spokesperson on the issue. “People started coming to me because no one dared to ask the question of how