Karen Ip

Karen Ip was born in Hong Kong, China, on August 10, 2000, to Chinese parents. Her father, who has an Instagram account named ‘Papapoppin’ moved to Toronto, Canada, with the entire family, when she was a child. Her mother’s name is not known on social media even though she is seen on many posts. Karen graduated from high school on June 30, 2018, and plans on completing her University education. She is single and is not dating anyone.

Coming from an Asian immigrant family in Canada, education always took priority in her home. But Karen Ip was always interested in social media, especially Instagram. She joined Instagram in 2015 and made her first post ‘the importance of importance’ on October 9. She was then known as ‘Baby Kae’. Consequently, she started to garner more attention once she started posting images of what she liked wearing, what she liked eating, and which makeup brands she enjoyed using.

However, this is exactly where she made the conscious decision to stand apart from thousands of other Instagram stars. She also started posting images and videos of herself without any makeup and highlighting acceptance of oneself, no matter how they look. Simultaneously, she also showed her unpretentious side by admitting that she did actually love doing makeup because it was fun and made her happy. Showing both sides of her character on social media was applauded by many who started to follow her on the Instagram account, now named ‘Fruitypoppin’.

While her mini vlogs on Instagram were bringing in more viewers, it wasn’t until August 15, 2017, that Karen ‘fruitypoppin’ Ip became an Instagram sensation. She posted a clip of herself, vlogging and then being interrupted by her mother calling her for dinner. She replied to her mother in traditional Cantonese, continued making the video, and ended with the words “pika pika, bitch’ while holding out a Pokemon ball. The video wasn’t special, but the natural humor, funny circumstance, and her response to her mother ensured that the clip went viral. Not only did the clip get more than 1.6 million views, but was reposted by many celebrities including Drake. All this attention translated to her gaining more than 1.1 million Instagram followers in the next six months. Since then she has kept posting random, creative, and funny clips.

Karen has also continued posting makeup and fashion tips on her account in 2018. Her positive message to fans and her willingness to show her glamorous and non-glamorous side online, have taken her follower numbers to a whopping 1.4 million. By the end of 2017, Karen Ip also started to take her YouTube channel ‘FruityPoppin’ more seriously. Most of her videos start with her catchphrase “Hey guys! What’s Poppin, What’s Gucci”. She initially started by posting makeup vlogs like ‘Sweet Dewy Sugar’. On November 25, 2017, she posted her first Q&A session entitled ‘Wait You’re Not 12? / Q&A’, which became the first video on her channel to get over a million views.

Fruitypoppin also started posting funny videos providing insight into her Asian culture while living in Canada. Her YouTube video ‘No Honour Roll, No Spring Roll’ posted on January 6, 2018, became the most popular video on her channel with over 1.4 million views. Karen’s ‘This Is An ASMR Video’ series is also equally popular, registering millions of views and taking her subscribers numbers to 702k within a year.