The “Popeyes Meme Kid” is Now a Collegiate Football Player With a Billboard and Endorsement Contract

You’re presumably acquainted with Dieunerst Collin regardless of whether you haven’t known about him.

Anybody who has involved Twitter or virtual entertainment over the most recent 10 years has presumably seen his face. Collin was just 9 years of age when the image that put him on the map showed him giving the side eye while holding a cup at Popeyes. He became one of the most well known response GIFs and pictures on the web with only one look.

The East Orange occupant wasn’t excessively amped up for his viral distinction from the start. Yet, his viral second ended up back at ground zero this week. Collin, who will be 19 one month from now, will be presently a school football player and just marked an arrangement with Popeyes to utilize his name, picture, and similarity. This is known as a “Nothing bargain.”

He got the arrangement subsequent to getting his devotees and the overall population to make sufficient commotion online to stand out of the broiled chicken chain.

“With all the help, I had the option to take it and use it to extend my name and not simply keep me as the Popeyes kid,” Collin tells NJ Advance Media.

A board is the main thing that emerged from that arrangement. It tends to be seen on his home turf. In the photos on the sign, similar image and saying from a long time back are presently helping Collin out. Popeyes posted an image of the school green bean before the Newark board as a meta-reference to the image and the New Jerseyan behind it.

The football player, who is currently a hostile lineman for the Tempest at Lake Erie School in Painesville, Ohio, mirrors the expression all over when he was 9 years of age, which is close to a later photograph on the bulletin. This time, he has a lot bigger cup in his grasp.

The Popeyes meme kid, who is now a college football player, has been offered a NIL deal from Popeyes.

After years of being an internet meme, Dieunerst Collin is finally capitalizing off his image after reposting the meme with his state championship.

— Pop Base (@PopBase) January 12, 2023

“From images to dreams,” peruses the bulletin. What’s more, underneath: “Popeyes, pleased backer of Dieunerst Collin.” Collin was simply continuing on ahead as a youngster at that Popeyes when a video of him became a web sensation on the now-old application Plant. In the 2013 clasp, Collin is approached to say the expression of another viral star, Lil TerRio.

He just remained there and looked. Collin turned into an image after screen captures of him giving the side-eye went everywhere.

We should leap to the year 2021. Collin presented with the prize after his secondary school football crew, the East Orange Grounds Panthers, brought home the state title game.

He gave a sign of approval for his set of experiences as an image by giving the side-eye. @Jerseystar973 posted the image of Collin from the Plant video image that everybody knows on Twitter.

“From Popeyes to State Champion!!” they tweeted. The tweet was a hit since it let everybody know what “Popeyes kid” was doing and set up the support bargain.

Collin, an interchanges major at Lake Erie, turned around to something he knew a smidgen about for the following part: virtual entertainment. On Instagram, the football player requested that Popeyes help him. On January 8, he utilized the two pictures of himself from the 2021 tweet and requested all from his devotees to repost them and label Popeyes.

His objective was to allow the cheap food to bind realize he needed to “talk business.” His message was shared by notable Twitter accounts, which put the focus on Popeyes to answer.

“It really required under 24 hours,” Collin says. By Jan. 12, the organization had openly invited the football player “to the family.” He was glad to such an extent that he started to move.

“This has been a wild ride,” says Molly Hoffman, the athletic chief at Lake Erie School. “It was the discussion of our grounds that the Popeyes kid was coming,” she says, however the school urged individuals to utilize Collin’s real name. This was being discussed less and less until last end of the week, when the public media appeared.

BREAKING: Popeyes has signed Dieunerst Collin — “The Popeyes meme kid” — to an NIL deal.

Collin is now a freshman offensive lineman at D-II Lake Erie College.

— Front Office Sports (@FOS) January 11, 2023

“It was ideal to have such an extraordinary young fellow go through this interaction with us,” Hoffman says of the Nothing bargain. “I can’t praise enough of him.”

She feels that Collin’s experience could make it more straightforward for competitors at other little universities to get into the Nothing. Loved ones have been sending him recordings of the bulletin at 742 McCarter Expressway over the most recent couple of days. On Jan. 15, Popeyes showed the image to its audience interestingly.

“My mom, she’s exceptionally energized,” Collin says. “My dad really was personal catching wind of it and seeing it … He was against the image as was I, quite some time in the past.”

Collin could have done without that individuals had been referring to him as “Terio” for a couple of years due to the video and image. “That was really bothering,” he says. However, when the renowned image of Collin was put close to his genuine excursion, the significance of that image changed.

The football player appreciates that his arrangement is with a brand that isn’t simply connected with him in light of an image, yet in addition since it helps him to remember his loved ones.

“Popeyes has forever been there for my family when we couldn’t make supper,” he says. “We would simply appreciate it and stay there and have family minutes and talk and snicker.” Collin will likewise invest his time into turning into a YouTuber and Twitch decoration to associate with additional fans and supporters later on.

Last Lines Early on of 9, Dieunerst Collin was at that point a web image. The kid, who was 9 years of age at that point, gives the side eye while holding a cup at Popeyes.