A.J. & Big Justice
A.J. & Big Justice | |
|---|---|
| Born |
|
| Occupation | Social media personalities |
| Years active | 2022–present |
TikTok information | |
| Page | |
| Followers | 2.2 million |
| Likes | 66.1 million |
Last updated: October 31, 2024 | |
Andrew "A.J." Befumo and Eric Befumo (born 2012), known online as A.J. & Big Justice or as the Costco Guys, are American social media personalities. A father-and-son duo, they found popularity on TikTok in 2024 for their videos at the warehouse store Costco. Also that year, they gained more than two million followers on TikTok, signed with the management company Night, and released their debut single "We Bring the Boom".
Career
[edit]Andrew "A.J." Befumo,[1] who is of Italian descent, previously worked as a professional wrestler, under the name "the American Powerchild Eric Justice", starting when he was in college and throughout the 1990s until 2005.[2] His son, Eric, was named after his wrestling persona and born in 2012.[3] He also has a daughter, Ashley.[4] He created a family vlogging YouTube channel, All Befumo'd Up!, when Eric was three years old.[1] He and his family eventually moved from Colts Neck, New Jersey to Boca Raton, Florida.[5]
A.J. created a TikTok account in 2022 while working as the regional manager for a mortgage business, portraying the character of Mortgage Muscles, who would explain the housing market. His videos started to gain popularity after he began including his son, Eric, in them at his request, starting with a video of A.J. eating a hamburger in December 2022.[5] Their first video to go viral on the platform was of them looking for meatballs for Eric's mother, Erika, at the warehouse store Costco, which was posted in January 2024. In March of that year, they posted a video describing themselves as "Costco Guys", which, by July, had received over 47 million views.[4] They also began making videos of themselves rating products therein, either positively as a "boom" or negatively as a "doom".[6]
In May 2024, they signed with the talent management company Night and became full-time content creators, by which point they had also become popular on other social media platforms like Snapchat and the video-sharing service Cameo. Erika and Ashley, as well as a child social media personality named Christian Joseph—known online as the Rizzler—began making appearances in their videos by June 2024. Also by that month, they had more than one million followers on TikTok and were the subjects of various popular memes online.[4][7] They released a hip hop single, "We Bring the Boom", in July 2024, with lyrics based on their TikTok videos.[5] The song found success online and they released several remixes of it, including one featuring the Rizzler. Stereogum's Tom Breihan wrote of the song that it "sounds like a version of joke-rap as recorded by someone who hasn't heard any actual rap since like 1987" and that it was "pretty fun".[6]
Joe Tilleli of Gizmodo wrote of A.J. & Big Justice in August of that year, "If you've opened TikTok, Instagram, or X (formerly Twitter) even once this year, you probably know what a Costco Guy is."[8] The duo appeared alongside the Rizzler on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, where host Jimmy Fallon's lack of amusement with them during their interview was criticized. By then, they had accrued over two million followers on TikTok.[9] They were also parodied in a TikTok-focused sketch on Saturday Night Live, with A.J. & Big Justice being portrayed by Marcello Hernandez and Chloe Fineman, respectively.[10] They are set to wrestle at All Elite Wrestling's Full Gear against Q. T. Marshall in November 2024.[11]
References
[edit]- ^ a b Gularte, Alejandra (October 28, 2024). "A.J., Big Justice, and Rizzler Bring the BOOM! to Jimmy Fallon". Vulture. Retrieved October 30, 2024.
- ^ Gunzelman, Mike (October 1, 2024). "BOOM! Viral 'Costco Guys' Sign With AEW Wrestling For Upcoming Match". OutKick. Retrieved October 31, 2024.
- ^ Weedston, Lindsey (August 8, 2024). "'We're Costco Guys,' AKA A.J. And Big Justice, Are Making TikTok Wholesome". The Daily Dot. Retrieved October 30, 2024.
- ^ a b c Hale, James (June 11, 2024). "Millionaires: Meet TikTok's 'Costco guys'". Tubefilter. Retrieved October 30, 2024.
- ^ a b c Dickson, EJ (July 19, 2024). "Meet the Costco Guys, the Father-Son Duo Behind the Song of the Summer". Rolling Stone. Retrieved October 30, 2024.
- ^ a b Breihan, Tom (October 29, 2024). "A.J., Big Justice, & The Rizzler Rate 'Boom Clap' & Other 'Boom' Songs: Watch". Stereogum. Retrieved October 31, 2024.
- ^ Weedston, Lindsey (August 8, 2024). "'We're Costco Guys,' AKA A.J. And Big Justice, Are Making TikTok Wholesome". The Daily Dot. Retrieved October 31, 2024.
- ^ Tilleli, Joe (August 29, 2024). "We're Costco Guys: Of Course We Got the $20 Gift Card With Our 1-Year Gold Star Membership". Gizmodo. Retrieved October 30, 2024.
- ^ Evans, Greg (October 30, 2024). "Jimmy Fallon viewers call out host for awkward reaction to TikTok guests on his show". The Independent. Retrieved October 31, 2024.
- ^ Jones, Abby (October 20, 2024). "Billie Eilish Performs On 'SNL,' Appears In A TikTok Sketch". Stereogum. Retrieved October 31, 2024.
- ^ Dator, James (October 29, 2024). "The Coscto Guys are becoming AEW wrestlers for a night". SB Nation. Retrieved October 31, 2024.