Bistro Huddy has never served a single customer.
But the fictional restaurant created by Drew Talbert has amassed 4.5 million followers and 252.9 million likes on TikTok.
After coming up with the idea for Bistro Huddy in 2020, Talbert — a longtime server — and his wife have been able to quit their jobs to focus on growing their online brand full time. In addition to creating POV skits about what it’s like to work in a restaurant, Talbert earns money by selling Bistro Huddy merch, Patreon subscriptions and creating brand-sponsored content.
“We put ourselves in a financial situation we could have only dreamed of five years ago,” Talbert said. “We went from month to month, barely scraping by, to now be[ing] able to save for retirement.”
From his nine streams of Bistro Huddy-related income, Talbert said he earns in the “upper six-figures range annually.” With the money he’s earned, he and his wife have been able to become homeowners.
In an increasingly fractured media landscape, social media influencers like Talbert are able to bypass traditional Hollywood and media gatekeepers to reach followers directly. Because of his large fan base, Talbert has been able to turn one series of skits into multiple business ventures.
A restaurant worker for 22 years, Talbert was also auditioning to be an actor and teaching at a local improv and sketch comedy school. While they were stuck at home during Covid-19 closures, his wife showed him sketch comedy videos on TikTok. Talbert decided to try to make some of his own.
One of his earliest videos that went viral was a skit about an encounter he had as a server — Talbert played the waiter, the female customer (using his wife’s clothes and wigs from his sketch comedy classes) and the customer’s child.
“Everyone’s looking for their niche,” Talbert said. “I was able to use my sketch comedy background that I’ve been working on for years. The writing, the acting, the characters — all these things kind of came together.”
He named his fake restaurant Bistro Huddy, after his son Hudson.
Talbert never returned to serving. His first brand partnership, which he secured early on, allowed him to replace his serving income. And since then, he said, Bistro Huddy has experienced relatively steady growth.
The writing-to-editing process, which Talbert does with his wife, takes about five or six hours, a relatively quick turnaround that Talbert credits to their experience in acting and social media. Still, he makes sure that his videos remain relatively simple.
“There’s an excitement about seeing just regular people that look like us,” Talbert said.
Originally, Talbert’s videos focused on what it was like to work as a server and deal with rude customers or an overbearing manager. And at a time with growing conversations around tipping culture, Talbert has made educational videos about how restaurant workers are paid and the low minimum wages servers earn.
Now, he said his followers also watch Bistro Huddy for the familiar storylines and drama about the staple cast of characters, including Terry the manager, Pickles the line cook, Amber the hostess and Clint the bartender.
The fan favorite, however, is Nicole, a sarcastic blond server who usually ends up getting her way. The account @nicoleserves, which Talbert created this year for Nicole, has 693,400 followers on TikTok. Talbert says Nicole is inspired by his wife, whom he met while they were both working at a barbecue restaurant.
“People see Nicole, and they picture this gorgeous blond — they don’t even see me anymore,” Talbert said. “People have now projected their own idea of what these characters would be in real life over me. I am just the conduit.”
Inspired by Talbert’s original series, fans have posted their own edits, imagining more storylines for the Bistro Huddy staff and turning the videos into cartoon animations. There’s even a Bistro Huddy Fandom wiki page that provides detailed biographical information.
In addition to the platform he’s building on TikTok, Talbert also has 1.55 million followers on YouTube and 768,000 followers on Instagram.
Fans often ask for Talbert to turn Bistro Huddy into a sitcom. While Talbert said there’s “potential” for that to happen and that he’s had conversations with literary agents and other people interested in further expanding his profile, he emphasized that he’s happy with the brand he’s built now.
“It doesn’t get much better than what’s going on right now,” he said. “We have full creative control. We’re at home with our kids.”
For now, he has one piece of advice for his followers.
“Tip your servers,” Talbert said.