TikTok Packaging Videos

Me rambling I guess...

Hello people of the internet! I’m Ross and I’m most likely about to bore you to death as I ramble away about TikTok packaging videos. No seriously. After checking this once I wrote it I can tell you that this newsletter is over 1900 words long. That’s roughly 8 minutes of read time. That’s almost like a chapter in a book.

In all fairness, fair warning here as this one will probably go into little details that very few of you will care about, but for those that do then it might be of some internet. Who knows. Shall I just write?

TikTok Packaging Videos…

Right, so you might be wondering why I’m doing an email on TikTok packaging videos, or you might have seen the TikTok video where I talked about it and now you want to read about it too. For those wondering, here it is:

@teddyevascentsJust talking about packaging videos 😅 #teddyevascents

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I didn’t even realise you could embed TikTok videos into an email so that’s cool!

Basically, we received an email yesterday that I kinda knew I’d eventually get that went like this:

So yeah… someone wants to return an order based purely off the fact that they didn’t get their order packed on TikTok.

Oh… I reallllly don’t want this to sound like I’m bitching or anything like that, but I’ll still just speak from the heart as that’s what I try and do.

To be honest, when I first read it I was kinda torn. On the one hand I totally felt for them. If they did happen to order purely because they just wanted the video and they didn’t get it, then yeah, I can see why they were annoyed and disappointed and no longer wanted their order.

I’ve told them that I’m more than happy for them to return the order and we’ll of course give a full refund.

Then on the other hand, I felt a bit… I donno… frustrated I guess? Partly because for the past 3 weeks we’ve had sickness and annual leave in the business to the points where we’ve lost 70 hours of work time between Jenny & Kath. That’s a LOT for us to lose. BUT… its part of running a business.

We give 6 weeks annual leave per year and sickness will always crop up from time to time. So it’s been a little bit of a battle to kinda catch our feet a bit and get on top of everything - which we now have. Basically, it meant that the videos kinda suffered a bit as I’m more needed in other areas too.

Then I felt a bit frustrated by the order note. Which went a little bit like this:

Which even if it was packed on TikTok it’s not like they’d be tagged and there’d be no mention of the friend who’s birthday it was.

I know they said they left comments on TikTok videos and I do try and do packing videos based off comments too, but putting stuff in the notes reallllly helps us too.

How we pick orders to pack on TikTok

So this is where it might get a little boring, but I thought I’d try my best to give you a little bit of an insight into how we even pick orders to be packed on TikTok. Please bear in mind that I am a HUGE overthinker and could probably talk about stuff like this for hours.

First things first, I don’t tend to get a lot of packing videos done in my time up the unit. Usually it’s around 3-4 but that depends on other videos I might do too.

Mainly because there are other things to do too.

Like yesterday I had to empty the rest of the sweet order for freebies, rip the cardboard up for the recycling, move all the boxes we ordered upstairs, design the card for the sub box, do the CLP for the pick n mix bags, design and print Salted Caramel sheets, wander around wondering what I was doing before I went onto something else…

And then of course, do some packing videos.

Don’t get me wrong, packing videos ARE NOT a chore, and I totally understand that part of the reason we are where we are is because of them.

Like for real. If you guys didn’t comment and engage and then order and ask for these videos then we wouldn’t be where we are. It’s as simple as that.

I have no idea why people still like watching me fill a box - hahahahahaha inappropriate joke - but I guess it’s my job to try and keep them interesting. Which, truth be told, it can be hard at times.

Anyway…

I’ve been doing packing videos now since… October 2020 apparently.

Jeeez.

I don’t even know how many I’ve done by now. Anyone wanna count them all?

But when your basic premise is “put wax melts in a box” it can be quite hard to keep them fresh and interesting.

Which is why I’ve always struggled doing a lot in one go. I just run out of things to say or do. Or my mind goes blank. Then I just don’t know what to do. I almost need the break to come back the next day and go again.

I’d rather put out 3 videos that has my best effort, than 6 that were half arsed.

Hence why I rarely do orders that just have “can you please pack on TikTok @justinbieber” - so sometimes it does come down to the order note.

Have you given me something that makes me go “ooooo I have an idea!” or have you ordered something I think is cool that I haven’t really shown… sometimes it’s purely pot luck.

Sometimes I have an idea for a video, like I’m in Poundstretcher and think “fuck it, it would be cool to do one here and get the freebies here” and then I just need an open order with a request. Or a comment on TikTok asking for it.

Sometimes people just get them because I happen to be up the unit and then happen to go on TikTok and happen to see someone say something and leave their order number.

Don’t get me wrong, sometimes the request might be unfeasible. Like if someone says “can you pack this while skydiving” then… no… I can’t 😂

Or sometimes people ask for something inappropriate… like make as many Peach jokes as you can, or make it as rude as you can… get naked for me… things like that. Which is a little bit hard to do when Jenny and Kath are there and TikTok literally remove my videos for the slightest “rude” thing at times.

So you might get different videos when it’s just me and Rachel vs when I’m there with Kath and Jenny.

Then eventually the orders need to get sent.

I know people say they don’t mind waiting, but we don’t want orders just sat there waiting for me to then do a video. Besides, I have to make sure there’s work there for Kathryn and it would feel silly if she built up a pile of 20 TikTok ones and then had nothing to do.

If you really want a boring as fuck peak behind the scenes then Kath will usually set aside the TikTok requests and then carry on with the other orders, and then I’ll try and go through them and go “oooo I’ll do that one… that one… oh and that one” and then hand the rest back.

Sometimes I’ll even amend people’s order notes and put something like “Ross: leave for me” in the order so Kath knows I want it. After all, me and Rachel still read all the order notes as they come up on Shopify.

Sometimes people might even email me something and I go for it.

Like honesty, I wing 98% of this business so you just never know.

Someone literally commented “you should do a period box” and just like that we’re doing one.

Or we had this one on Twitter…

Ross @ Teddy Eva Scents @TeddyEvaScents

Umm… fuck it yeah we could 😂

Ron @funb1988

@TeddyEvaScents Wimbledon is coming up you planing on a tennis box (both nsfw and family friendly) love to see some tennis ball pun cockshells

Like when you think about it… it’s probably a very weird way to run a business. Just randomly going off comments and literally making actual business because of it.

Is this proper boring to you all yet?

My point is… I honestly try my best to get as many orders packed on TikTok as I can, and you lot often REALLY help in making them interesting or entertaining. Honestly, the TikTok account is only as fun as you guys make it.

But yeah… Sometimes I think a video will be good and it just flops anyway.

Sometimes it goes the other way.

Sure, I could blame the “algorithm” for not pushing out my content. But truth be told, if a video ever flops then I just hold my hand up and say maybe that one wasn’t very good. You have to take “risks” at times and just do whatever you fancy doing, and sometimes those risks don’t work out.

I do think people need to stop blaming TikTok sometimes.

Sure, they can be dicks. But at the end of the day they want people to see good videos. So they’ll likely try to push good videos out. If I just said “RIGHT THEN! Hey Sarah, you ordered these melts. Here they are in the box. And thank you for the order” no one would give a shit because it would be proper boring.

“Like this newsletter you mean?”

Haha very funny.

Or I might go through the effort of packing one in Folly Farm and it doesn’t really do that well. To be fair, we’ve done two “we packed an order at…” videos and neither of them have done that well. Especially on YouTube. But welcome to the world of putting out content.

But again, I feel like after doing this for so long - both TikTok, Instagram, the newsletter etc - I kinda have a gauge for what’s “good” and what’s not. Especially when I feel like the people who enjoy the videos probably have a similar sense of humour as me.

I literally have videos ready for a duck sex toy and the return of the corn on the cob vibrator. The videos make me laugh because I’m slightly weird. Maybe you are too.

Like I totally understand that this newsletter is going to be shit for many people.

Someone won’t even read past the “this newsletter is over 1900 words long” and I don’t blame them.

Most people might sit there and go “fuck me he wrote all this just because someone wanted to return an order?”

I know… a tad excessive, right?

So my head is saying “Ross this is a shit one you shouldn’t have bothered”.

But, sometimes I’m WAY off. Like if you’re still reading this then you might be enjoying it?

Did I think a video of me talking about Isabelle’s fucking lunchbox would end up in the bloody Sun? Of course not. In fairness, a newsletter on that would probably be more interesting.

But yeah…

Was any of that worth reading?

I’m super sorry if that was boring… I’d probably talk about it all better on a live stream to be honest. But there we go.

I guess I just wanted to talk about this.

Thank you for reading and I hope all is well.

Much love,

Ross & Rachel x