Exclusive Interview: Joey Gizzi and Steven Lannum Talk AreYouKiddingTV, Building Their Brand, and More

Joey Gizzi and Steven Lannum are the creative geniuses behind AreYouKiddingTV, a brand that has taken the internet by storm. Since meeting at Elon University in 2014, the pair have amassed over nine million followers (and growing) with their comedic and unique sign videos. We know you’ve seen them! Pop Culturalist was lucky enough to speak with Joey and Steven about AreYouKiddingTV, the secret to their success, how they’ve built their brand, and more.

PC: You both started making videos during college, but it ultimately died down until the pandemic happened. How did this partnership reform? What’s played the biggest role in your success now?
Joey: We met in college and we started making these videos for fun. It was something that we did on the weekends. We would post them to YouTube for a very small audience. Once we graduated, we had maybe 20,000 subscribers. We knew it was more of a hobby than something that we would take seriously. We graduated. Steven went back up to Boston. I stayed in North Carolina.

For two years, we lived our post-grad life. I started doing wedding films and music videos.

Steven: I got a marketing job.

Joey: But 2020 rolled around, and it was the beginning of COVID when we started hearing about TikTok. It was very new to us.

Then randomly one day, we were like, “We have all these old videos. Why not re-edit them to vertical and see what happens?” We started doing that. One of them got a lot of views and we were like, “Let’s keep doing it.” Then all of a sudden, we started seeing crazy views and followers. After a couple of months of that, we started running out of those old videos. We were like, “I guess we should start meeting up again.”

Steven: We started visiting some colleges. The sign format is what really stuck and got the most views. It turned into our brand. Before, we were doing these classic pranks, but the sign format was original and something that had never been done before. We’ve been doing it ever since.

PC: When you both started creating content again, you were juggling full-time jobs and living in separate states. How challenging was it to find the resources and time to create content while also building and evolving this brand?
Steven: It was definitely tough. We were definitely keeping very busy. Basically, any free time that we had, we would either be editing or visiting different places to film. We were also filming during COVID and schools had pretty strict mask policies. We found ways to make sure everyone felt comfortable as we made those videos during that time. Things are back to normal now, but it definitely kept us busy trying to grow this on the side while also balancing our full-time jobs.

PC: You’ve created so many unique challenges. What’s been the most surprising thing that’s happened in one of your videos? How are you able to keep such a straight face?
Joey: There are a few times when I think we did break. One time we asked someone to bring us their cat in exchange for this high-end litter box. It was a sponsored video. They brought us a dissection cat out of the freezer from the science building. We both broke. We were both like, “What is that?” We get asked this a lot. It’s just something that we’re used to. The sunglasses help and we just try to zone out. If you’re paying too much attention to what’s going on, sometimes you will laugh. If something funny is going on, we’ll just try and think about something else and zone out a bit. Then you can laugh when you watch the footage back.

Steven: There are times we’ve been editing and I’ll see something happen and I’ll be like, “I don’t remember that at all.”

PC: You’ve worked with so many incredible brands like Dr. Pepper, United Airlines, and Brooks Brothers. How do you evaluate what brands you want to be associated with? Are there future brands that you’re interested in collaborating with?
Joey: That’s a good question. We find that our sign format makes it really easy to integrate different brands and products. But it’s important that we’re comfortable working with the brands that we’re getting sponsorship requests from. Everyone that we’ve worked with has been really accommodating and lenient about how we go about making the video. They’ve given us creative control for the most part. We haven’t had any bad experiences with brands so far.

Steven: We also have management that works with us now that handles that aspect. It’s nice to have them there to coach us and let us know if we should or shouldn’t pursue something.

Joey: They’re really great about being like, “This is a great idea,” or “This maybe isn’t the best idea.” We really value their opinions.

Steven: We’re always thinking of brands that we might want to reach out to.

PC: What is that process like figuring out what challenges you’ll have people take part in? How has that evolved over time?
Steven: I don’t know where the ideas come from. Every day we’ll have certain situations come to us and we’ll write it down in our notes and then we’ll meet up. We’ll talk about the different ideas that we thought of and which ones might go well and what we want to pursue.

As we’ve been talking about, it’s a sign format. We’ll figure out: What haven’t we done yet? How can we make this bigger and better than the last one? What’s something that will get a lot of funny reactions from the people walking by? Because we know that’s what will end up doing well on our pages.

The ideas are all very, very different, but they all revolve around that format.

Joey: We also have a few different types of videos that we like to do. Some of them are more passive and shorter like our What’s Different videos. That idea is very simple. We tweak something about our appearance, signage, or what’s going on around us. We hope that somebody recognizes our videos enough to point out that difference.

Whereas other videos, we’re asking people to run around campus and bring us a bucket of something. There are a lot of different variations that we like to try and mix up. It’s not always too hectic or frantic, and it’s not always too laid back and not as exciting.

But if a particular video does really well, we’ll ask ourselves, “How can we do this again but tweak it a bit so that it’s the same idea that everybody loved but a little different?”

PC: Your story really drives home the idea that success doesn’t happen overnight. What’s one thing that you both know now that you wish you knew when you started this brand?
Joey: Looking back, I really enjoyed making videos in college. For those two years post-college when we weren’t making them and we were living our normal lives, it was kind of sad. I knew it was a hobby, but I always wished it could be something more. It worked out in the end. But I would remind myself that if you’re passionate about something, don’t let it go. Stay consistent. Even if it’s not perfect, go get your work out there, and don’t give up because you’re not seeing success right away.

Steven: Also the more that you do something, the better it’s going to get. If you go back to our first-ever sign video, it was take the dollar. We stood there. The camera quality wasn’t as good. But if you compare it to what we’re doing now, we’ve got the format down and we’re making it better each time. It’s about that consistency.

Make sure to follow AreYouKiddingTV on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok.

Photo Credit: Austin Lord