Vlog Review: Refinery29’s Try Living with Lucie

Refinery29’s About Page

I have always been a fan of fashion, health, beauty and woman empowerment, so when I first discovered Refinery29, I knew I would love them. They cover all things beauty, wellness, different trends and styles and have a main focus on women and supporting women. As well as their online blog and social accounts, they also have a YouTube channel where they post the videos they have produced.

Refinery29 covers a lot of topics and has a lot of content on its channel, so I chose to just cover a small part of their YouTube in efforts to keep this review to just one blog post and to not make it too long. The series I chose to focus on is Trying Living with Lucie.

Lucie Fink’s About Page

One of their biggest video producers, Lucie Fink, does a lot of vlogs for Refinery29. She has a couple of different series including Try Living with Lucie and Lucie For Hire. I have always enjoyed Lucie and her online presence. She is young, creative and has a wide variety of interests. Also, I’m not sure if it is still ongoing, but at one-point Refinery29 had a contract with Delta to have the videos Lucie Fink was producing available to watch on their flights.

Try Living with Lucie is currently on its fourth season and has 93 episodes. In this series, Lucie challenges herself with trying something new for 5 days at a time or as Refinery29 says, “she dives headfirst into social experiments.” Some examples of past episodes include: 5 Days of Living Plastic Free, 5 Days of Meal Prep, 5 Days of Different Makeup, 5 Days of No Cell Phone and 5 Days of Volunteering. Sometimes Refinery29 will partner with brands for the vlogs as well.

Lucie makes the vlogs personal and relatable which is something I look for when I’m looking for new vlogs to watch. She will explain the purpose of why she is doing the vlog and will even relate it back to an article or other resource Refinery29 has put out on the topic. Also, Lucie always has a positive upbeat attitude with whatever the video is. She will also talk through everything she is doing and relate it to herself in some way.

Not only are the vlogs entertaining, but they are also very informative and often go with some trending topics of the time. The vlogs often have multiple layers to the overarching topic and sometimes include a professional to assist Lucie if it needed. Refinery29 makes sure that all the vlogs Lucie does will help you learn about a topic in a fun and lighthearted way. They always have their logo on the top right corner of the vlog and their descriptions are always filled with helpful information and links.

I believe that Refinery29’s vlog series Try Living with Lucie is an excellent way to absorb new information on a topic. The topics can be simple or complex, but they also find a way to dive deeper and give you a full scope. Their company is very in-tune with today’s society, and what content they should create, and how they should be putting it out. In my opinion a lot of women (and some men) would be able to connect with their company in some capacity.

Digital Influencer Danielle Carolan

Whenever I think of the typical digital influencer I think of Danielle Carolan. Danielle is a Junior at the University of Georgia earning a Fashion Merchandising degree and is a member of Kappa Delta Sorority. She has a YouTube channel, podcast, Instagram, and Twitter. Danielle is originally from Tampa, Florida and started YouTube in 2011 at the age of 12. “Gals on the Go,” the podcast she cohosts with fellow influencer, Brooke Miccio, was created a little over a year ago. On YouTube she has 562K followers and on Instagram she has 251K followers.

Her YouTube videos have stayed similar over the years, but the content is a bit different. The main differences now are that she does more vlogs and less sit-down videos and the content is more mature. She does a lot of week in my life videos, shopping hauls, current favorites and routine videos. Within her videos she talks about her college life, her boyfriend, spin class, her sorority, makeup, clothes and more. Sponsorships and brand deals, which most influencers live by, are frequent on her channel. The usual sponsors are HelloFresh, Revolve, Fabletics, thredUP, Casetify, Care/of and Princess Polly. She posts regularly once or twice a week, but sometimes more if there is a lot going on in her life, but she doesn’t have a designated day she uploads.

More consistent than her YouTube, Gals on the Go uploads every Wednesday without fail. Every podcast has the same structure. It starts off with some small chit-chat between Danielle and Brooke, then they go into their “Highlights and Lowlights”, favorites, and then they get into the meat of the podcast. The topics change and guests will make appearances as well. Just like her YouTube channel, her podcast has many sponsorships. Danielle and Brooke extended the podcast community and created a Facebook group where they could interact with their listeners on a daily basis. Gals on the Go even launched its own merch line recently.

A channel Danielle uses to reach her followers daily is Instagram. She is always posting whether it is in a story or on post. The content on her feed is aesthetically pleasing, lighthearted and fun. She uses similar editing styles with each post to make it cohesive. The content showcases her OOTDs, vacations, game days, and festivals. In each post she will tag the other people in the photo and the brand of the clothes she is wearing. Story highlights are also very present on her profile. Personally, I think she uses too many highlights.

Overall, I think that Danielle is a textbook influencer. She is consistently interacting with her followers and posting relatable content. She does brand deals and sponsorships which bring in her income along with AdSense. Danielle always has a positive attitude, and it seems like she never sleeps with all the projects she has going on. She has been an influencer for about eight years, and I don’t see her stopping anytime soon.

Vlogger Review: Brooke Miccio

Every day I spend a few hours on YouTube watching many different types of videos. Most commonly I watch YouTubers who are around my age that show their everyday life through vlogs. One YouTuber I have watched regularly for a couple years now is Brooke Miccio. She is a recent graduate from the University of Georgia and now works in tech sales. About a year ago she also started a Podcast called Gals on the Go. 

Brooke is a lifestyle vlogger, so most of her videos are just vlogs showing her daily life. Her main content during college was “college week in my life” or “day in my life” videos. I love these kinds of videos because I can relate to them. Now most of her content consists of “work week in my life” or “day in my life” videos. As I am in my senior year it is great to see how a new graduate is living and working. She generally vlogs her whole day except for when she was in class or at work. As she films, she talks through everything she does like what she is eating, drinking, wearing, etc. Vlogs like these are very relatable to many women who are around her same age and are living similar lives. They give incite on how someone else lives, and people can get tips and advice through her vlogs. Personally, I like to see how she balances her job, social life, exercise and travel because that is something that is getting harder as I am getting older. 

As most influencers do, she will also occasionally plug products, brands, companies, other influencers, podcasts, apps, etc. Some of the things she suggests are also monetized. This is how vloggers and YouTubers are able to keep making videos regularly. Brooke has a pretty consist upload schedule and posts 1-2 times a week or sometimes more if she has a lot going on in her life. Other videos she does are clothing hauls which are also pretty often a part of her daily vlog videos. Most of the time the clothes were sent to her or were bought with her own affiliate links. This shows that she uses the companies she promotes. 

Other content she has on her channel are vlogs from events she goes to or vacations she takes. Most of the time these vlogs/trips happen because she has a partnership with the companies or brands who are sending her. Generally, they are with other influencers to promote the companies’ image. A week ago she went to a Glossier pop-up in Boston where she lives, and she vlogged the experience to show everything the pop-up had to offer and was positively promoting the company. 

Another thing that Brooke does well is having a good description in every video including many different links. This makes it so her subscribers and viewers have easy access to all social accounts, affiliate links, codes and products that she talks about in her videos and even a small bio about herself. 

Overall Brooke’s vlogs are consistent and entertaining. She has a pretty decent size loyal subscriber base and is constantly reinventing herself. I really enjoy her content and the stylistic choices she makes, and I think she will continue to succeed as a vlogger and gain more viewership as time goes on.