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Patrick Ta & Avonna Sunshine’s TikTok Drama Is About Paying Black Creators

The makeup world is shook right now. On Dec. 7, beauty influencer Avonna Sunshine posted a TikTok about her experience with a makeup brand that ruffled *a lot* of feathers. And although Sunshine never explicitly mentioned the company by name, she spent the whole video breaking Patrick Ta Beauty products, so it wasn’t difficult to figure out which brand was at the center of all the drama. 

In her video, Sunshine insinuated that she had not received compensation for doing business with Patrick Ta Beauty, and even though she contacted the brand several times by email and directly messaged Ta in November to rectify the situation, she received no response. Her Campus reached out to Sunshine for further context about her claims, as well as to reps for both Patrick Ta Beauty and Patrick Ta himself for more insight into the issue, but did not hear back in time for publication. 

According to her video, Sunshine felt it was necessary to make a post not just to air out her individual grievance, but also to shed light on the systemic racism Black social media creators often deal with. “I thought about [letting it go],” Sunshine said in her post. “But then, you see people — especially Black people — riding for the company, and that doesn’t make me feel very well because I just wonder: If those Black creators that are supporting you so heavily knew that you were out here not paying Black creators, how would they feel?” 

The response from the internet came quickly in support of Sunshine: content creator Golloria George, who took part in Patrick Ta’s most recent foundation launch, reposted Sunshine’s video; others created videos calling out Ta, and comments such as “pay her” were left under Ta’s recent posts. 

In response to Sunshine, Ta posted a TikTok video on Dec. 8, in which he addressed Sunshine’s claims, apologized, and shared his plan to make things right. (Interestingly, that video was quickly taken down, and was soon replaced by another video, in which Ta said pretty much the same thing but was noticeably more emotional. Ta addressed this in the caption of his second video, writing, “I recorded many rounds of this response and wanted to share what felt most authentic. This was my original take.”)

@patrickta

this is not a situation I took lightly. I recorded many rounds of this response and wanted to share what felt most authentic to me This was my original take. More importantly, this is about righting my wrong

♬ original sound – patrick ta

“I immediately reached out to Avonna after seeing her video, and I don’t expect a response from Avonna — she doesn’t owe me one,” Ta said in his post. “Avonna, I am truly so sorry that this has even escalated to this point, and I am sorry that I didn’t see your message a month ago.”  

Ta then went on to explain how the issue may have come to be, saying, “This was my finance team that made this mistake.” He also shared that he plans to compensate Sunshine, and explained that his company is working on reviewing its process for content creator invoicing. “It is our job that our vendors and our creators get compensated for their work, and I will never let something like this happen again,” Ta said to end his video.  

Her Campus reached out to Sunshine for comment on Ta’s response, but did not hear back in time for publication. Although Sunshine has not made another video since her Dec. 7 post, fans should keep an eye on her page just in case she has any more updates to share in the coming days.  

Kenzie Nguyen is the Her Campus Fall News and Politics Intern. This semester, she’ll be covering all things on the presidential election, current events, and trending news. She’s very excited to be working with Her Campus, and is looking forward to engaging with the Her Campus community. Outside of Her Campus, Kenzie is also an Executive Editor at The Olaf Messenger, St. Olaf’s student newspaper. She is currently pursuing a degree in English with a concentration in International Relations as an aspiring journalist. In her free time, she loves watching reality TV, going to the movies (Cherry Coke and popcorn is the best movie snack combo, FYI), and hanging out at her college town’s local coffee shop (Goodbye Blue Monday) and bookstore (Content) — which she highly recommends if you’re ever in Northfield, Minn.