Mallory Brooks has over 136,000 TikTok followers. Her content has generated 7.7 million likes.
On the app, she is a modern professor of sorts, doling out wisdom about how to be an informed shopper — especially when it comes to influencer-founded brands. She has investigated the quality of buzzy brands including Set Active, Parke, Daily Drills, Nuuds and Daphne.
Her posts educate her viewers on the nitty gritty details of clothing construction, including which tags make sense inside which garments, how things should and should not be sewn, and how to evaluate fabric quality.
Brooks started posting about apparel, using her background in apparel design, in November 2024. She worked at Bass Pro for five years before her role was eliminated in a round of mass layoffs. And, quickly, some of her social media content gained momentum. For example, when creator Madeleine White (4.9 million Instagram followers) introduced her intimates brand, See You Tomorrow, Brooks accused White of mislabeling certain garments. White responded, ultimately burning a dress to prove it was, in fact, silk, but acknowledged and apologized for the mislabeling.
When Brooks’s new reviews drop, followers comment in anticipation. A recent post in which Brooks holds up a box of garments from Daphne, Paige DeSorbo’s new pajamas brand, earned comments like “MY SHOW’S ON!!!” and “I am sat!!”
Below, Brooks fills Glossy Pop in on how she got started on TikTok, why influencer brands fascinate her and how she’s staying true to herself even as she gains her own following.
When did you start posting clothing reviews and what inspired them?
“The first one was the my response video, or my little rant, about two influencers’ pajama brand, because I was just so genuinely pissed off that [brands offering such poor quality] are the way of the world. … More than just my background in apparel, I’m passionate about talking about the relationships we have with influencers and how, most of the time, you start following people because either you can relate to them or they make you feel good. They’re entertaining. But eventually, when they grow, it’s this horrible pattern of them realizing their name has so much credibility and they can literally sell anything and everything, and their audience will buy it no matter how shitty it is.”
So, what’s going to happen as you become an influencer?
“The one brand I’ve had a truly positive experience with is Popflex, and they gave me an affiliate link. … They had a one-day sale, and they truly never have sales. I wanted to tell people, but then I was like, ‘Peace, love and mercy. I’m so sorry. I’m gonna sound like an influencer.’ I was like, I always make fun of the phrases they use, like, ‘This never happens! This never goes on sale.’ I don’t want to sound like that. I make it very clear that I will never vouch for a brand 100% — nobody should; you should never have such intense brand loyalty that you think a certain brand could never disappoint you.”
Why do you think people want to follow your content?
“I’m still trying to figure it out. I think because I give a perspective that most people aren’t used to hearing. Influencers online and selling product — they’re so positive. No one’s being honest because everyone’s doing it to make money. I don’t want to sell anybody anything. I want to be an educator. I hope that’s the label I can [give] myself — that I educate, not that I influence, because it’s not my goal to sell product. I don’t want to quit my day job. I don’t want to be an influencer. I want to educate people and help them become more informed consumers. I’ve done it for my friends for years.”
How do you decide which brands to look at?
“The influencer brands are my focus, because it’s just so different. You can’t compare an influencer brand to a national brand, when it comes to the parasocial relationship piece of it. Because that relationship is a huge passion of mine, I tend to lean toward the influencer brands. … I was motivated [when people left angry comments defending influencers and their brands] because it just proved my point that the relationships people have with influencers are at this crazy, toxic level. This is why I’m talking about it, because getting death threats [in response to my critical review of] overpriced shitty pajamas is insane. There’s people that are dying, Kim.”
