This Week in Gossip #44
Mouldy cheese from scammer YouTubers, a strange Jamie Foxx story, and a Broadway (alleged) cheating scandal!
MrBeast and Logan Paul’s Lunchables Rip-off Chock Full of Mould, Lazy Exploitation
Wow, did you hear that MrBeast and Logan Paul are exploitative scammers who target their very young fanbases to make millions while inflicting as much misery on others as possible? I’m shocked, I tell you. Okay, it’s no surprise to anyone who’s been paying attention that two of the worst people on YouTube have no care or skill when it comes to not being evil. This is what they do and it’s worked well for them so why stop now? After all, Logan Paul filmed a dead body for views and it still didn’t kill his career. But both MrBeast (real name Jimmy Donaldson, no relation) and Paul are in a weird place professionally right now. Donaldson’s name is in tatters between the health and safety failures of his Amazon show and his channel’s increasingly well documented instances of cruelty, lies, and straight-up grossness. And Paul’s in the midst of some major lawsuits over his flagging energy drink company Prime. When the two decided to team up with fellow YouTuber KSI to release a brand of Lunchables rip-offs called Lunchly, it was met with immediate disdain. Now, it’s getting even worse.
There have been multiple reports that Lunchly products have been found with mould on them. One YouTuber, baker and TV presenter Rosanna Pansino (who’s been on a delightful anti-MrBeast campaign for a while now), opened a pack on-camera and found mould all over the cheese. Remember, Lunchly is being sold by these goons as a “healthier” alternative to Lunchables, but they can’t even overcome the “don’t actively hurt your customers through shoddy production” bump in the road. Pansino also debunked that health claim, noting that the data doesn’t back it up and that the products are functionally identical to Lunchables. She pointed out that the seals on the boxes were clearly cheaply done, so it’s no wonder that mould developed. It’s almost as if they rushed through a cost-cutting deal to get something on the shelves as quickly as possible without a second thought.
The whole Lunchly debacle is one of the most transparently desperate things Donaldson and Paul have ever done. It’s a cash-in designed to coax young children into getting their parents to give them money, and all for something that might end up hurting them. We’ve already seen reports that Prime is bad for the kids it’s marketed to. Donaldson’s chocolate line Feastables is critically reviled and claims it’s made without slave labour (a major issue in the chocolate business) are suspect. It’s not listed as an ethical brand by Slave Free Chocolate.
Donaldson, Paul, and KSI’s entire shtick relies on creating an overinflated sense of demand for their bullsh*t products. This is how Donaldson became a megastar: by offering cash incentives and big prizes to people if they subscribed to his channel. When he launched Feastables, he offered entry into a prize draw if fans went to supermarkets and cleaned up the shelves so his bars would be more prominent. And again, his fanbase is largely tweens and literal children. Prime was a major seller at first but there’s no organic demand for it. That’s partly why they’re being sued. They made big promises to a bottler company they contracted about said demand but it simply didn’t exist. Lunchly is just another way for them to offload some extra bottles and bars. It’s a level of cynicism that even I’m a bit shocked by.
I’ve no idea how well Lunchly is selling or if we’ll see any verifiable sales numbers. At the very least, I imagine the FDA will have a few things to say. Until then, I’m just waiting for their proper downfall. Come on, we’ve earned this.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Gossip Reading Club to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.