Blanca Ulloa’s son Callaghan Garrish, 3, jumps into a bounce house before it is deflated and stored in Goodyear on June 10, 2022. Jump Into Bliss allows Ulloa to run a business and care for her son full time (Photo by Troy Hill/Cronkite News)
Allie Dziewulski waits to clean a bounce house as it inflates at the Jump Into Bliss storage facility in Goodyear on June 10, 2022. The business began to take off in January 2021 after one of his TikTok videos went viral. (Photo by Troy Hill/Cronkite News)
Blanca Ulloa, left, and Allie Dziewulski prepare to inflate a bounce house in their storage unit in Goodyear on June 10, 2022. They founded Jump Into Bliss just before the pandemic was declared in March 2020. (Photo by Troy Hill/Cronkite News)
Blanca Ulloa, left, and Allie Dziewulski stand in front of one of the Jump Into Bliss bounce houses at a warehouse in Goodyear on June 10, 2022. They say the pink bounce house is especially popular for bachelorette parties. (Photo by Troy Hill/Cronkite News)
PHOENIX – The COVID-19 pandemic has been a challenge for small businesses that previously relied solely on face-to-face interactions. But thanks to a different kind of viral experience, two Valley companies are not only surviving, they’re thriving.
His secret? TikTok, the social media app that hosts short-form videos ranging from 15 seconds to 10 minutes.
Blanca Ulloa and Allie Dziewulski founded their event rental company Goodyear in March 2020, just before the pandemic was declared. Jump Into Bliss focuses on bounce houses for high-end events for children and adults, such as weddings and bachelorette parties.
With the stay orders in place, Ulloa and Dziewulski didn’t have much to do but engage with social media, and after a few months, they focused their marketing strategy on social media, including TikTok. They started by experimenting with various trends in the app.
“When we started, our opinions were one to 100 if we were lucky,” Ulloa said. “Then one day we woke up and had a video with a million views.”
That video: 30 seconds time lapse of the creation of a bounce house — went viral four months after Ulloa and Dziewulski started on TikTok.
#whitebouncehouse #arizonasmallbusiness #foryoupage #rarestética #jumpintoblissevents
At the beginning of the pandemic, they had almost no business, but after the video, inquiries came in daily. They are now fully booked until October 2023.
TikTok helps the party business take off
After encouragement from her friends and family, Jessica Camacho started Decor by Jess, a small party decoration business in 2019. It’s all in the family: her husband and sisters are the only other employees in the business. Glendale.
Camacho jumped into social media and tried marketing on Facebook, OfferUp and Instagram, where he had moderate success. It wasn’t until the pandemic hit that Camacho turned to TikTok, which he credits for the success of the business during the pandemic.
“Some of my videos went viral, so I think that helped a lot. TikTok helped a lot,” Camacho said.
#arizonapartydecor #always #fyp #AZfyp #party decoration
♬ original sound – latishoroficial
The videos that he has posted are usually fast-paced highlight reels or time-lapses of decorations that his company has created. It also leverages popular trends and platform audio. According to one of Camacho’s TikToks, Decor by Jess now has to turn customers away.
Camacho said other businesses, such as the Naughty Tacos food truck, which he started posting around the same time, have seen similar success on the platform.
“I think their accounts have grown and it’s helped their business,” he said. “I’ve seen that happen a lot.”
Social media use grew amid the pandemic
Social media use has become more common across all demographics, said Liesel Sharabi, an assistant professor at Arizona State University’s Hugh Downs School of Human Communication who primarily studies the social uses of technology. .
“This is especially true during the pandemic because people spent a lot of time at home,” Sharabi said. “They felt isolated. They were on their phones and their computers. We saw that a lot of people really trusted social media; it’s their main way of communicating with people who couldn’t see them face-to-face on a daily basis.”
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With this increased use of social media, especially during the pandemic, Sharabi said it offered many businesses some “really unique marketing opportunities.”
Seconds Application businessTikTok had 1.2 billion users in the last quarter of 2021 and is expected to reach 1.8 billion by the end of 2022.
West Valley resident Kelsey Sidowski found Jump Into Bliss on TikTok. Looking to rent a bounce house for her son’s 10th birthday, she researched his other social media accounts to determine if the business was legitimate.
“I think legitimate businesses have more than just a TikTok,” Sidowski said. “I think going a little deeper just to see Instagram and Facebook, or anything like that, is definitely better than just a random TikTok video.”
Sidowski said he has worked with other companies he found on TikTok, but not all of his experiences were positive. That’s why he researches companies on other platforms.
She has rented bounce houses from Jump Into Bliss for four events: a bachelorette party, a friend’s birthday party and two parties for her children.
“It’s been amazing just to see them expand so much,” Sidowski said. “Looks like they’re really taking party planning by storm.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=/VZhZsuqSA7A
(Video by Rachel Fortunado/Cronkite News)
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