|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
When Jessica Simon began making candles out of her Mississippi home, it was nothing more than a hobby. But after going viral on TikTok, and selling her products on TikTok shop, it became a full-time job for both her and her husband, allowing them to build a 2,100-square-foot warehouse in her hometown of Foley.
Now that thriving business employing four total full-time employees and four part-time employees is in jeopardy as the U.S. Supreme Court prepares to consider a federal law forcing TikTok’s parent company ByteDance to either sell the social media platform to an American company or face a total ban on the application within the U.S.
Simon is the founder of Mississippi Candle Company, which maintains that name despite Simon and her family moving back home to Alabama to operate their business.
“We started our business making candles as a hobby in my kitchen,” Simon said. “We’d put all my supplies on a little cart and roll it into the spare bedroom to make candles.”
Simon then pivoted to selling the products wholesale, but Covid-19 shut down many of her clients, so she had to pivot again.
“I was scrolling one night on TikTok and saw another small business said they had made $20,000 in two weeks on TikTok shop, so I said ‘OK, that’s probably where I need to be.’ The very next video was an ad to open a TikTok shop, so I did,” Simon said. “We posted consistently, went live, did all the things you’re supposed to do. Within a week and a half, we had a video hit one million views.”
Mississippi Candle Company is not alone. According to a study performed by Oxford Economics in collaboration with TikTok, some 78,000 businesses in Alabama actively use TikTok. The study found that in 2023, small business use of TikTok in Alabama as an advertisement and marketing platform contributed $260 million to GDP and supported 2,800 jobs. SMB activity also generated around $57 million in federal, state, and local tax revenue in the state. Of small businesses surveyed in Alabama, 45 percent of 60 say that TikTok is critical to their business.
The U.S. Supreme Court has decided to hear oral arguments in the lawsuit challenging the law on Jan. 10, just days before the law is set to take effect on Jan. 19. The U.S. Court of Appeals ruled against TikTok, stating that national security concerns outweigh the company’s First Amendment rights.
Simon said she had plans to expand the business further, but those plans have been on pause until the fate of TikTok is decided.
“It has been an emotional roller coaster,” Simon said. “My husband has a lot of faith in what will happen next. I am a little more worried. It doesn’t just affect our lives, but our employees … If it weren’t for this threat of a ban, we would have plans to be building a second warehouse and hiring more people; but because this is a true threat, we don’t plan on following through until there’s a solution.”
A TikTok ban wouldn’t be so consequential financially for Adam Rotenberry, who is more focused on sharing his political beliefs on the app than making money, but he said losing that connection would still hurt.
“A few weeks after Biden took office, I posted [a video] that talked about how I looked like the epitome of a right-winger even though I was the furtherest thing from it,” Rotenberry said. “And it took off. It blew my mind. In one day, I went from 200 followers to 30,000. I was like, ‘Wow, this hit something. I should talk about my beliefs more because I have always been on the left politically …
“I never set out to become an influencer or whatever you wanna call it. I’m just a dude with a regular blue collar job. And in deep red Alabama, it’s very easy to feel like you’re on an island. But once, that first video went viral and I expanded talking about what I believed in—human rights and being a decent person—I found so many other like-minded people stuck on that same island,” Rotenberry stated.
In our country that has been harshly divided politically, the ban of TikTok has actually found bipartisan support from lawmakers hoping to show toughness on China.
“I just find it ridiculous that the left and the right can’t agree on one single issue except that TikTok must go,” Rotenberry said. “That’s the thing that brings bipartisanship back?”
Rotenberry said that if TikTok does go away, there will be other ways for his followers to connect with him on other platforms.
That won’t be so easy for Mississippi Candle Company. Simon said the company has sold more than 27,000 products on TikTok shop. While on Etsy, one of the most popular eCommerce platforms for small businesses, only seven sales have been made.
