ZOE SPENCER - Comfort Food, Uncomfortable Growth

Host Coline Witt welcomes streamer and content creator Zoe Spencer to an episode of "Eating While Broke," where Zoe cooks her throwback meal: pork and beans with cut-up hot dogs, butter, pepper, and sugar, served with rice (or bread). While cooking, Zoe talks about growing up in a two-parent, middle-class household in Brooklyn with hardworking parents, her early jobs (a supermarket at 16, Burlington through college, and a bank job after graduating in May 2022), and how she was fired from the bank due to a branch shutdown and let go from Burlington for constantly posting her shifts. Zoe discusses creating staged-but-unscripted blind date videos, transitioning into Twitch, differences between YouTube RPM and Twitch’s real-time subs/donations, and a successful collab with Sexyy Red arranged through her team. She shares that she’s building a mostly Black women-led team, and says her biggest challenge is staying focused and consistent, noting she can stream 8–12+ hours when locked in. Zoe opens up about streaming feeling less fun and more performative, her desire to pursue acting through classes, self-tapes, and auditions, and her interest in comedy while also wanting challenging roles like horror or serious drama, including a dream project with Regina Hall.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.