Nicki Caudill and her close friends and fellow staffers at Johnson Central High School have been eating lunch together in teacher Amiee Webb’s room for years, talking about their families, their lives — and what they eat.
The teachers in Paintsville, eastern Kentucky, were having such a good time that one day in 2023, Caudill said, she had the idea to film them talking about what they ate for lunch and post it on TiKTok. to make.
She changed the name of her personal TikTok account to “JCHS Lunch Bunch.”
“We talk about our lunch, we talk about our family, we laugh at each other, we joke about… what we eat. We just got people interested in us. It just took off from there. It’s wild,” Caudill told the Herald-Leader on Friday.
“We thought she was crazy when she did it, but we had fun with it,” Webb said. “A few weeks later we got positive feedback, so we just started working on it.”
Their TikTok account had at least 28,400 followers this week and caught the attention of The Washington Post.
The concept is simple: each video features a short clip from each staff member describing what they brought for lunch that day.
Some of their videos have been viewed more than half a million times.
The staff shows off a variety of flavors in the lunch kitchen, from Taco Bell burritos to peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, leftover homemade tomato soup from dinner the night before to a school lunch tray loaded with fried chicken and mashed potatoes.
Along the way, the employees laugh with each other and share tidbits about what’s going on in their lives: one is sick with a stomach flu, the other tried to order a $5 sandwich from Subway, only to eventually void the deal by add bacon and pay. $15.98 for a sub and chips.
They clearly love to have fun with their audience.
In a March 14 video, they teased: “We have a big announcement. One of us is pregnant, and we want you to guess. Before sharing lunch that day, seven staffers lined up and introduced themselves so viewers could share their guesses about who the expectant mother was in the comments.
Sometimes they answer viewer questions in subsequent videos, sharing a recipe for spaghetti squash casserole in one video and showing details of popcorn seasoning an employee uses to add flavor to apple slices in the other.
“If you use a quarter teaspoon or less, it’s all zero points on Weight Watchers, and they make apples absolutely delicious,” the videographer says off-camera.
When viewers wanted to know how they could get their lunch from restaurants during the short lunch breaks assigned to schools, they created a video showing an aerial map of the school with all the food options nearby.
Caudill posts to TikTok Monday through Friday during the school year and Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays during the summer, with teachers in the group sending Caudill videos to post. Fans told them they couldn’t go all summer without the videos, Caudill said.
A video might include good-natured banter about tuna looking “soupy” or weird eaters, teachers who don’t want to put sauces on their food, she said.
Weight Watchers sent the group lunches and merchandise. Other food companies sent shakes and salads. State education officials and a TV meteorologist stopped by for lunch.
Webb said between 10 and 14 teachers come every day.
“We’ve always just been friends and I think it shows,” Webb said. “Many of us do things together outside of class.”
She said the group is “pretty open” about the videos. They share health trips, children and vacations.
“We try to share little glimpses of who we are,” she said.
