Meet the Costco Guys, the father-son duo behind the song of the summer

The Befumos, who lived in Colts' Neck, New Jersey before moving to Boca Raton a few years ago, seem to have an innate knack for virality. Starting when he was in college, AJ wrestled professionally, under the stage name “American Powerchild Eric Justice.” (AJ's son Eric is named after Befumo's wrestling persona.) Befumo left the ring in 2005 and until recently worked full-time as a regional manager for a national mortgage company. “People can say what they want: that wrestling is fake, that it's scripted,” says Befumo. “It suits you. It takes weight on your body.”

Despite this, AJ continued to do social media on the side, at one point starting a family vlogging Channel when Eric was three years old. But it never gained enough traction. “It wasn't anything like what we do now,” says Befumo. “It was just to remember what we did, to have something to look back on and laugh about. But it was a ton of work.”

In 2022, AJ started a TikTok account to promote his mortgage services by appearing as a character he named “Mortgage muscles.” In these early videos, he's much more subdued, standing in front of an American flag and giving home-buying advice, interspersed with occasional comment in the Marvel movies. But “it wasn't really fun,” he says. “It felt a little forced.”

Once Eric got involved, the channel really started to take off. “I just wanted to be in some videos because all my friends had YouTube channels at my school and they had like 100 followers and my dad had 1,000 followers,” he enthuses. “So I thought it would be cool if I was on his channel.”

In late 2022, the duo made a video at Boca Raton-based Charm City Burger King, in which Eric enthusiastically features his father eating the “Big Sloppy,” a double-boiled cheeseburger topped with a fried egg. The video had 100,000 views. “And then my dad said, 'This is now a father-son channel,'” Eric concludes.

Over the next year, AJ and Eric gradually built a small but respectable following of just over 10,000 followers. This exploded in January 2024 when they uploaded a video of themselves shopping for dinner at Costco. It's a star-making moment: AJ starts lifting weights with two jugs of milk, followed by Eric happily dancing with a pack of Premio sausages. The video now has approximately 7.9 million views. “We were like, wow, this is what going viral is,” says AJ.

The Befumos began focusing more and more of their content on their Costco adventures, culminating in their reviews of the store's food items. (The “boom or doom” scale was inspired by another TikTok creator who uses a “Gas or Ass” food review system, with Eric referring to the latter on Zoom admirably as “the 'AS-S' word”.) Their followers regularly criticize their ratings system and accuse them of being too liberal with their booms. “We won't condemn something if it's good,” says AK. “Maybe we should start going to worse places.”

At first glance, a huge big-box retailer might seem like an unlikely source of inspiration for a family TikTok account. But it has to be said that the Befumos seem to genuinely love Costco shit. When I ask Eric to explain his appeal, his face lights up. “It's kind of like an awesome warehouse with a great food court and cheap food,” he says. “Like, you can get a quarter pound hot dog for $1.50, and you can also get one [20-ounce] soda.” (AJ declined to specify whether the channel has a financial relationship with the brand, saying only that they have a “very, very good relationship” with Costco.)

However, the relationship with Costco was not all sunshine and rainbows. In March, the Befumos say, they were banned from a local store for about a month, which they attribute to elderly Boca Ratonites who complained about the meat-swinging, meat-throwing antics. “We're making a lot of noise,” says Big Justice. “I won't say we don't. We're always yelling things like 'DOUBLE CHOCOLATE', picking things up, throwing them in the basket.” So AJ appealed to Costco's upper management, receiving an email from the company's chief legal counsel. “It was like, 'Hey Costco guys' — so now, we have Costco referring to us as 'the Costco guys,'” says AJ. “And they were like, we love what you're doing.” He says the brand gave them their full blessing to film, provided they let management know in advance and don't feature staff or shoppers in their videos.

Most high profile creators get a lot of hate and Befumos is no exception. The page regularly attracts vitriol from commenters who accuse it of being squeamish or attacking the Befumos for their physical appearance – including their Kalomannized eyebrows and eyelashes. “Who is your lash tech?” or some variation of it, is a comment that appears unexpectedly often in their videos. “It's all a gift from God,” says AJ when I ask about such questions. “He is the Italian in us.” (She does occasionally get Botox, though.)

Of the negative comments, AJ says, “I think there are two ways in this world to build the biggest house. Number one is to build the biggest house. Number two is to build the smallest house and try to knock down all the other houses. So if someone wants to build their house like this, trying to tear down our house, we will continue to build and bring happiness, positivity and great justice.”

The level of virality the channel has reached – they now have a small staff of editors, as well as management in the form of digital talent agent Night Media – has also prompted the Befumos to consider withdrawing Eric from the school, or at least putting him in a much smaller private school. “School right now for Big Justice would be a distraction for everyone,” says AJ “It would be a distraction for him, the other students, the teachers. Things are very different for us at this time in our lives. So we are looking at other options.”

Although Eric clearly loves being content with his father and being in front of the camera, he admits that the level of attention he was getting was a little overwhelming. He says he's been harassed by kids at school who beg him to make videos or play nonstop clips from the family's old YouTube channel, such as a trailer voice proclaiming, “AJ grills meat.” “It was a lot for me,” he says. “Because I have to do my job.” One time, he recounts, he was at the mall with his mom when the kids imitated him asking for pictures. “It was a little scary,” he says. “Because there were kids pushing me, pushing me, grabbing me, taking pictures of me.”

AJ says that while the newly discovered rumor has required the family to make “adjustments,” he has no major concerns. “For me, privacy is over. In the world we live in, there is no such thing as privacy,” he says. “I think it's about raising your kids to be confident, [to] keep them protected and know they are loved and watched over.' About the future of the family he says: “this is how we are now, this is the life we ​​have chosen. So we're all in.”

As they figure out how to recalibrate their lives, Eric, an avid baseball player, plans to participate in a global home run derby that will be documented on social media. AJ also plans to return to the wrestling ring at least one more time and is working on scheduling a date. And of course, there's more music: a track promoting AJ's return to wrestling has already been recorded, and a remix of “We Bring the Boom” (this time, featuring appearances from the likes of Rizzler) will be released later this month.

In the meantime, they are enjoying the fruits of their newfound fame. Since releasing “We Bring the Boom” — a 1980s hip-hop-inspired track that grew out of an impromptu car rap, AJ says — the song has been remixed and duetted “hundreds” of times and used as a walk-up song by the local Boca Beach Boys baseball team. The catchphrase has become so well-known, AJ and Eric say, that a roller coaster operator during a recent trip to Universal Studios announced their arrival by announcing that the ride “is going to be a blast.” And indeed, right before we log out of Zoom, AJ and Eric then say goodbye with a hearty, “BOOM!”

It's admittedly a bit of a surprise – but the truth is, it shouldn't have been. After all, they bring prosperity. That's what they do. They bring the explosion. They bring you the explosion.