Monday, March 29, 2010

‘Haul queens' shop to get rich

At 16, Blair Fowler is living the American dream. She has dropped out of school so she can spend more time shopping, showing off her finds on the internet and earning a fortune for doing it.

The brunette from north-west Tennessee is a “haul queen,” the most influential trend-setter in a new phenomenon where young women upload home-made videos showing their “haul” from their trips to the mall.

There are already more than 100,000 haul videos on YouTube. Last week new ones were being uploaded every 12 minutes.



Fowler is a pioneer. Her videos in which she and her older sister, Elle, shriek with joy and giggle as they unpack bags filled with blouses, jeans and lip-gloss have been viewed 75m times on YouTube.

Not only do the Fowler sisters split advertising revenues with YouTube, which can earn top haul queens £70,000 a year, they are also being showered with free clothing by companies hoping they will show their designs on-line. “But we only talk about stuff we might buy at the mall anyway,” said Fowler.

The siblings can provoke a shopping frenzy: a day after they praised a Guess watch, their fans snapped up every model and crashed the company’s website.

Should you wish, you can view all of Blair and Elle's YouTube videos here and here.

13 comments:

arbroath said...

Amazing.

That's one of those other sides of the internet that fascinates me-
- New ways for people to become famous or even only noted in whatever way possible
- New ways for people to earn money
- New ways to advertise
- And then this amazing mingling between getting noticed and earning cash with that...

Who would have thought of this some 25 years ago...?

arbroath said...

This is sign 1 of the end of the world...and I welcome it.

arbroath said...

the poor dad...

arbroath said...

I was gonna go on a rant and say this is stupid as hell but then I remenbered that I collect 1/6 Scale action figures and that sometimes I go on youtube and look at peoples collection. I suppose it's the same so to each its own right? Dropping out of school for that, however, is stupid no matter what! 

arbroath said...

Shallow. Shallow. Vein.

arbroath said...

I wonder how much of that salary she's saving? In 10 years, she'll be too old for that gig. Maybe she'll get a career in fashion merchandising or something, but my guess is she'll need to go back to school and/or some sort of college. She'd better be saving her $$$ for that!

arbroath said...

^ Ugh. I sound like their (grand)mother. I'll get my dentures and go.

arbroath said...

Deep! Deep! Artery! :)

arbroath said...

I guess she's well under way on a careerpath that has been blazed for her by the likes of Paris Hilton, very well feasable without any furter scholar education, college or official degree............

arbroath said...

cath, I'm totally with you.

arbroath said...

AUGH THE WORLD THE WORLD THE WORLD!!!!!!!!

arbroath said...

Don't worry. When they get a little too old for that schtick they can look forward to the glorious trophy-wife circuit. Divorced a few times by 40 with a few million in the kitty from the settlements. A nice penthhouse in the city and a summer house in the Hamptons. All for acting like a bunch of vain dumb bitches on the Interwebs.

If you're a dumb-ass 14 year old girl who spends her days watching Jersey Shore, what's not to like? They will all wanna be just like them. Of course, nearly every one of them will be disappointed when their lives don't turn out the same way.

arbroath said...

Blair didn't drop out of school. In fact, she's doing virtual high school from home and is on track to graduate and head to college before she even turns 18. These girls are a lot more intelligent than these articles paint them to be. They don't ever mention that they also run their own company. Also, most of their videos are about makeup and beauty tips, not hauls.