Yahoo News Meet the Viral Grandmas Finding Fame on TikTok with Their Cooking Videos
Social media sensations Lynn Davis, Barbara "Babs" Costello and Vicky Bennison share what it is like to be internet celebrities in their 60s and 70s
pastagrannies/Tiktok, brunchwithbabs/Tiktok, cookingwithlynja/Tiktok
Pasta Grannies, Babs Costello and Lynn DavisThe latest wave of TikTok stars aren't just influencers, they're grand-fluencers.
60-plus-year-olds seem to be taking the internet by a storm and finding stardom on social media. These lovable, online celebrities are teaching practical advice, too — they're opening up their kitchens and sharing their tried and true recipes.
One common theme with grand-fluencers is their families’s encouragement to post videos online. Lynn Davis of @cookingwithlynja tells PEOPLE that she had “no idea” what TikTok was before her son Tim started posting videos of her there.
It started in the beginning of the pandemic when Tim, a videographer, asked her to participate in a casual, month-long project to record a video every day. But, as the lockdown continued, the mother-son duo continued to create cooking videos for YouTube and eventually TikTok with Tim behind the camera and Lynn, 74, taking centerstage.
“He's the one who writes the script. He's the one who does the videography. He does all the editing. So, he really is the genius behind Cooking with Lynja. I just show up,” says Lynn, who has four children and two grandchildren.
A few months after starting to share the comically-edited videos, the former software engineer’s zany bacon, egg and cheese recipe video blew up online.
“He called me up and he said, ‘Oh, Mom, the bacon, egg and cheese video got like 300,000 views.’ I said, ‘Oh, no, you have to be kidding me,’” she recalls, now having 15.3 million followers on TikTok. “But then it just started growing after that.”
Barbara "Babs" Costello, who has a combined 5.7 million followers on TikTok and Instagram, tells PEOPLE that her daughter Elizabeth persistently asked her to make a TikTok.
"After I said 'no' 150 times I finally decided, 'You know what? One and done, I'll make her happy and then it'll be over,'” says Costello, 74, a mother of four and grandmother of nine. “And I had no idea it was going to lead to this."
“This” looks like a cookbook called Celebrate with Babs, Pop-Tarts boxes with Costello’s face on it and being an ambassador for Talbots.
For the “Cooking with Lynja” star and the "Brunch with Babs" blogger, their social media stardom has also brought their families closer. Lynn calls it a “big family affair” — and both women say that their children, husbands and other loved ones are integral to the success of their platforms.
Unlike Costello and Lynn, Pasta Grannies creator Vicky Bennison does not share videos of herself cooking. Instead, the grandmother of one share stories of other grandmas who practice classic Italian pasta making techniques.
“The cornerstone of Italian cooking is 'Nana's cooking,' but we only ever hear the chefs talking about, ‘Oh, their nana is their inspiration,’” explains Bennison, 64, who published a cookbook with the same name as her handle. “I thought it's time we actually put these older women center stage and celebrate their experience.”
Bennison and her team (she even has “granny finder” whose job it is to find the Italian women) travel throughout Italy to share the stories and recipes with more than 3 million followers across social media platforms. Between recording 90-year-old Caterina from Sicily making tagliatelle to 98-year-old Marietta from Calabria prepping pasta and meatballs, the team stays busy traveling around Italy to record these stories and recipes.
Bennison, Lynn and Costello all receive praise from followers saying that they find comfort in the culinary content.
"There are so many comments where people tell me 'you remind me of my mom' or 'you remind me of my grandma,'" says Costello. "For whatever reason, I've struck a chord somewhere and it wasn't something you could ever plan. It happened organically."
The social media stars rave about this new phase of lives. Bennison even says she has the “best job in the world.”
“It's a joy to wake up and know you're going to have a good day,” Lynn adds. “It is a lovely change in my life, definitely.”
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