In a series of videos, former Poppi Cosmetics intern Olivia Reiskin (@igotdumbbitchitis) says her former boss ghosted her mid-internship. She claims the cosmetics company is lying about why, and now she may not be able to graduate promptly.
Reiskin posted her initial TikTok, which has almost 13 million views, in late June.
The former social media intern claims that her former boss removed her from the Slack group chat. And logged her out of the company TikTok. And blocked her on iMessage. Just a day before, Reiskin says, they had talked like normal.
Reiskin later identifies her former boss as Nikki Namen, the founder and CEO of Poppi Cosmetics.
In a June 29 follow-up video, Reiskin claims to have been an intern for Poppi Cosmetics since March 2024.
“The boss texted me at 4pm the day before asking when I could make some content. And I told her I can make some content later in the week,” Reiskin says. “She said, ‘Oh, yeah, that’s great.’”
The next day, Reiskin says, Namen blocked every account Reiskin has access to on the company’s TikTok and Instagram.
The former intern then explains that she was using her Poppi Cosmetics internship to fulfill college credits at Boston University.
Boston University requires all undergraduate College of Communications students to fulfill a zero credit professional experience.
Reiskin says after sending an email to Namen and not hearing back, she assumed Namen blocked her there, too.
“Now [I] don’t really know what to do because [I] don’t know if BU is gonna give [me my] four credits,” Reiskin says. “[My] only way of basically getting in contact and her knowing [I] exist is by leaving one star reviews on Amazon.”
Poppi responds
On July 3, Poppi Cosmetics posted a statement to the company’s Instagram, referencing Reiskin’s TikTok posts.
The statement implies that the former Poppi Cosmetics intern did not tell Namen that she was seeking college internship credit until May.
The statement also says Reiskin told the company she had not complied with the university’s required internship hours.
“The former intern requested that the Company execute the document and to misrepresent to the university that the former intern complied with the university’s requirements for credits, something that the Company would not do,” the statement reads.
The statement also says that the Poppi Cosmetics reported Reiskin with evidence to her university.
“With the Company’s full cooperation, this matter is now being handled and investigated by the former intern’s university,” the statement reads.
The Daily Dot reached out to Poppi Cosmetics, but the company never responded. In the statement, a representative wrote that the Company will not provide any further comments. At least until the university investigation has subsided.
After meeting with Boston University, however, Reiskin told the Daily Dot there is no investigation.
‘I really felt the need to defend myself’
Boston University did not immediately respond to the Daily Dot’s request for comment.
About a day after Poppi Cosmetics posted the statement to Instagram, Reiskin shared a response video on TikTok.
“I really felt the need to defend myself, as a lot of the stuff that Poppi Cosmetics wrote in that statement is not true and is incredibly misleading, and is making a lot of people believe that what I did was the cause of me getting terminated,” she says.
In addition to the zero credit option, BU also offers one, two, and four credit internship courses.
In her video response, Reiskin says she’s enrolled in the four credit option, which requires her to write an essay.
“There was no time log, there was no me logging false hours, there was none of that,” she says. “It basically would just be me writing an eight to 10 page essay about what I learned.”
Reiskin says that she did not reach the required 15 to 20 hours per week at Poppi Cosmetics. However, since she had been working at Poppi Cosmetics since the spring, she would have fulfilled all the necessary hours by the end of her internship.
“There’s also no way for her to know how many hours I worked or didn’t work every day, since as I’m content creating, she doesn’t know how much time it would take for me to get ready or research trends, or how many tries it would take on a video,” Reiskin says.
The former Poppi Cosmetics intern confirms that she did not tell Namen about the college credit until May. However, she says that Namen never denied helping her get credit.
“I opened up to her about the fact that I was a transfer student coming from Baylor, but BU hadn’t accepted a lot of my credits because a lot of the classes at my old school didn’t fit into my new school,” she says. “So I was already graduating a semester late, and I really wanted this internship to count for four credits so that rather than graduating a whole year late I could only graduate a semester late. Nikki really sympathized with me in this moment and she talked about her experience in college and how she completely understood where I was coming from.”
In the company’s statement, the representative does not mention Reiskin’s claims of Namen and the company blocking and ghosting her.
“At the end of the day, she is trying to victimize herself and her company and paint me as the villain by trying to get me on the only thing that she has on me because at the end of the day, I have done nothing wrong,” Reiskin says. “I’ve also now been hearing about a lot of other situations where people have been dealt with very unprofessionally by Poppi cosmetics, and this includes customers and people that she has worked with in the past.”
All over an unpaid internship
In the comments, Reiskin wrote that this was an unpaid internship. Many viewers expressed frustration over this detail.
“If they’re not giving you credits, they need to pay you,” one viewer commented.
“In what universe would a uni student do an internship for no pay and no credit? It’s just all so unbelievable,” another wrote. “Truly hope you get justice!”
Other viewers commented in support of the former Poppi Cosmetics intern.
“The thing is, even if they wanted to fire you because of the university credits thing, they should have the human decency to simply talk to you,” one viewer said.
“Wanna know the number one reason I believe every single word you’re saying? YOU haven’t turned off your comments on every post,” another commented. “Unlike Poppi Cosmetics. Can’t even tag them! They’ve turned that off too.”
“I’ve never heard of Poppi Cosmetics and now I will NEVER BUY FROM THEM!!!!!! It matters how you care and treat people,” another wrote.
“I hope you’re talking to attorneys, girly,” another said. “I’m sorry this happened to you. I’ve NEVER even heard of Poppi Cosmetics.”
@igotdumbbitchitis Such a fun tuesday😍😍 tried email next will let yall know if she answers!!! Like what girl i want my internship credit for bu
♬ Suddenly I See – KT Tunstall
The Daily Dot followed up with Reiskin via TikTok direct messages. She said she did not want to share whether she will be taking any further action against Poppi Cosmetics.
On July 11, she shared that she is now a social media intern for Fifty Six, a marketing agency.
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