Sarnia Nibbles is one of the few Sarnia influencers that actually has influence. When she posts a food review, it causes a reaction.
With over 6,000 Instagram followers, a series of popular food reviews on The Journal, and over 250,000 likes on TikTok, Sarnia Nibbles has blown up.
The popular blogger is all about engaging and sharing in all things Sarnia while remaining honest, so when she sat down with The Journal for a Q&A, the woman behind the handle proved nothing was off the table.
The Journal (TJ): Are you a born and bred Sarnia resident or when did you come to live here?
Sarnia Nibbles (SN): I was actually born in Scotland and I moved here when I was 12 and I'm 33 now so I've been here for a long time. I went to high school here, I live downtown, I live by myself, I just love Sarnia. It sounds so strange saying it out loud.
TJ: What is it about Sarnia that you love so much?
SN: I guess it kind of started with the fact that I really hated Sarnia. And I was in a really bad rut in my life, if we're getting down and dirty. If you really want to know the truth, I really struggled with alcohol addiction and I was like in the pits of depression. I am four years sober now and so when I got sober, I did rehab, detox, everything and I really struggled with liking Sarnia. Through my alcoholism life, I hated Sarnia, I was depressed. I drank all the time basically every day, and then, when I got sober, I was like, what am I gonna do with my life? How am I gonna have a social life? How am I going to go out and experience the city? How am I going to do anything?
So that's kind of like why Sarnia Nibbles was born in the beginning. I was like, well, I still want to have a social life. I want to go out, I want to eat, and so I'm going to start going to restaurants and eating, experiencing life as a sober person. And that's basically how it started, and its just kind of like snowballed into what it is now.
TJ: Did you ever think that this is what it would be like when you first started?
SN: No! I was kind of like, oh, it'll maybe be a little bit of fun. I picked up so many silly hobbies when I first got sober, I tried knitting, crocheting, taking pictures, like just silly things, nothing really stuck, and this online thing just kind of stuck. And then Nathan [Owner of The Journal] kind of got me to do some food reviews, and that just sparked my interest more and it just kind of started spiralling. I just have a love for Sarnia, there's so much to do here, and I really was jaded for all of my 20s, really, thinking that there's nothing to do but drink. So that’s the nitty gritty.
TJ: I have to ask, how do you fund your eating out?
SN: It kind of relates back to the whole not drinking thing too. So when I first stopped drinking, I'm like, man, I have so much money now. I can literally buy everything that I ever wanted. And then I just stopped feeling guilty about like, I can spend $65 on myself for a dinner. And I don't have any kids. So that is a lot cheaper to live. And I don't have a significant other. So I'm like, man, I'm just going to spend whatever money I want on food. I'm gonna make this a not guilty thing for myself. I do work as a PSW at a nursing home. That's my regular job. So over time, I get invited to a lot of places like, you know, come try this out. Come check this out.
TJ: If you’re being invited to places are you still anonymous?
SN: I would say at about half of them I’m anonymous. So I go in anonymously and I usually order and then by the end of the meal, it's obvious that it's me.
TJ: Will you ever reveal your true identity?
SN: At the beginning I started it saying like I wanted to be anonymous. So I want to be able to say truthfully what is real…I feel like I have imposter syndrome. I had a person recognize my voice the other day at Blackwater Coffee, so that was weird. ‘You must be the Sarnia Nibbles girl’. I'm like, ‘oh, it is me’. So it's cool. I like it. It's fun. You can't really go out in the same way anymore. You're really not that anonymous, even though my face isn't on it. It's so weird. It's totally blown me away that it's blown up. I don't know how it happened.
TJ: Do the places you go know you are coming?
SN: I try not to tell them, which kind of has screwed me in the past because, as an example, I posted about Navelli's on Tuesday. They had a $7.25 sub that I think is awesome. So I posted about it on Tuesday morning knowing it was going to be on that day and then they had like a lineup out the door. None of their staff got their breaks. They ran out of stuff. Like all this crazy stuff. So now, if I know it's a very small business, I have reached out to them. I called them ahead of time. So for example, Selina's Thai. I did a video on her and I just said, ‘hey, like I'm a social media person. I'm going to post a video about you today. I just wanted to give you a heads up.’ So I've done that now for a past couple small businesses that I know are going to be rocked.
TJ: Because you’ve blown up and are doing so much for these businesses that you are profiling, you’ve mentioned that you don't want to hurt a business, but you also need to remain truthful, how do you feel that you're going to do that going forward?
SN: I've already started to do this. If I have a bad experience somewhere, I just won't post it and that's really unfortunate because I still want to be able to post those negative reviews.
TJ: Yeah.
SN: I do think that's important and I'm really struggling with that in general. But there have been times where I've gone places and they've asked me to come in for review and I haven't posted it because it's not good. So anything I do put out is real, it's because it is good. But the negative ones I'm kind of like, people love that stuff too. The negative ones get so many shares.
TJ: Speaking of shares, you’ve started branching out with more civil engagement on the account, tell me about that transition.
SN: My first degree is in political science. So I went to Western for political science, so that's just like a passion of mine in general. I really have such an interest in it, almost like a rubber-necking syndrome in my own brain where I'm like so interested in watching it happen and like I live downtown so I see all that first hand every day and I just have such an interest in looking at it so I was like I'm going to start taking pictures of it and see what happens and that's kind of what has happened. I kind of feel like I've backed myself into a corner by calling it Sarnia Nibbles because now it's obviously not just food related.
TJ: Would you ever consider a Sarnia Nibbles rebrand?
SN: I don't know, I think there might be a Sarnia Nibbles rebrand. Right now I'm in my fourth year of nursing school so I'm like oh my God I need to figure out what I'm focusing on here because I have so much on the go but I think that there should almost be a rebrand. Maybe just have Sarnia Nibbles as a branch of it but then on the bigger picture it’s like what am I even doing with the account.
TJ: Where do you see this going in the next like two years or even five years?
SN: I have thought about this a lot because it is at the point where it would be monetized. So people are offering me money already for shout outs or just for general advertising. So that's a possibility. I don't know if that's the way that I want to go with it. I like keeping it authentic for now, but I could see myself rebranding it as a media entity and then kind of having like different branches like Sarnia Nibbles, Sarnia this, Sarnia that. So it's just like different blogging content.
Maybe do like podcasting, just be kind of like a random Sarnia personality that people watch. I'll be an RN quite soon and I am still going pursue that. I don't know what that looks like in terms of full-time or part-time and then continue to do this because, I don't know, this doesn't pay the bills either, it's like a passion project. Yeah, exactly, yeah, so I don't know, I don't know. I was kind of thinking I'll just keep doing what I'm doing until I graduate and then see where I'm at.
You can follow Sarnia Nibbles on Instagram, Facebook and TikTok.