How a B.C. hairdresser emerged from mental-health crisis as one of TikTok’s highest-paid stars (2025)

Even before the pandemic arrived like a global wrecking ball, life had been a battle for Kris Collins.

After years of depression and anxiety, the suicide of a close high-school friend and a traumatic sexual attack, she was diagnosed in 2019 with anorexia nervosa. Collins admits she wanted to die at the time, until a photograph of her emaciated self “so scared” her that she set about conquering the eating disorder.

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And then came COVID-19 and yet another setback, as overnight she had to shutter the hairdressing business she ran from her parents’ home in Abbotsford, B.C.

Jobless and “dying of boredom,” Collins took up her younger brother Jacob’s suggestion and downloaded a social-media app that was just gathering steam in North America.

Collins, now 26, says she wasn’t exactly enthralled by the videos of lip-syncing and dancing amateurs on TikTok, so decided as a fun “therapeutic outlet” during anorexia recovery to create her own content.

And in the process transformed her life.

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A little over two years later, Collins — Kallmekris on TikTok — is one of the biggest stars on a platform that itself has exploded in popularity. According to Forbes, she is the fifth highest-earning content creator on the app — not including celebrities from other domains — making an estimated US $4.75 million in 2021.

The other numbers are astounding, too. Collins has almost 48 million followers on TikTok, while her quirky, relatable comedy sketches have earned 2.1 billion likes. That’s billion, with a B. She’s also on YouTube, with almost eight million subscribers there.

Hollywood Reporter recently put the Canadian at the top of a list of “Five Comic Voices to Watch on TikTok Right Now,” calling the app the future of comedy.

“I wake up every day just in denial,” Collins admits in an interview recently over Google Meet. “I’m just so incredibly blessed…. I’ve been very humbled by this whole whirlwind.”

Her success underscores a fascinating aspect of TikTok’s rise to social-media dominance: its ability to rapidly turn “ordinary” people — typically at a very young age — into celebrities with bulging bank accounts. Viral popularity still comes to just a small minority of content creators but, insists a TikTok-sponsored article on c2Montreal.com, it can emerge anywhere, “giving everyone a shot.”

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And Canadians seem particularly adept at exploiting the phenomenon. Also on the Forbes list of the top five TikTok earners is Josh Richards, who grew up in Toronto and made his first million on the app as a teenager. He’s now branching into acting, production and other business ventures.

Lance Ulanoff, U.S. editor in chief of Tech Radar, attributes Collins’ success to being very funny and attractive, but also “real” and having “a sort of fearlessness” in her varied performances.

While it’s tough to nail down the secret to stardom on the app, the ingredients appear to include finding a shtick that resonates, staying with that basic idea and producing content regularly, he says.

Yet TikTok virality can vanish as fast as it emerged. Video makers who don’t have a powerfully unique brand or fail to keep up with the app’s trends – like the current craze for performing a dance from the Netflix television show Wednesday – can find themselves essentially abandoned by its algorithm, Ulanoff notes.

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“It is kind of a brainless system, it’s not editorially driven,” he says. “It feels like lightning in a bottle and then it escapes the bottle and you don’t know where it went.”

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But if the popularity of some TikTokers is a bit mystifying — and time-limited — Collins stands out as someone with undeniable talent, not just good looks and an eagerness to cavort in front of the camera.

Her sketches typically feature Collins playing two or more characters, distinguished only by costume changes and different voices or accents.

She’s a master of dead-pan delivery, with a remarkably expressive face that speaks as comically sometimes as the lines she actually voices.

Forbes described Collins’ brand of humour as family-friendly, on a platform where sexual innuendo and bare skin are staples. Family is definitely a focus of her sketches, but they have an edge, too. There are vaguely negligent parents, bratty toddlers and family members who seem intent on aggravating each other.

And some of her most-watched — and funniest — videos have her saying out loud those morbid thoughts we normally keep to ourselves. “Do you think we’d get decapitated if that semi-trailer stopped abruptly and we went under it?” she cheerfully asks a friend (also played by Collins) sitting next to her in a car, earning an appalled look.

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“I have very, very dark humour naturally,” she acknowledges with a chuckle. “There are a lot of things that probably wouldn’t fly on TikTok or YouTube, which I respect…. (But) I think it’s important to talk about things that are a little more taboo, that people can really relate to.”

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It’s perhaps not hard to see where that darkness — and the sense of honesty and vulnerability that shines through in her videos — was born. In an emotionally raw YouTube post last year, Collins recounted her mental-health journey through almost constant tears.

There was depression that started in middle school — “I was not ever happy” — anxiety attacks and the suicide of her high school friend, which she says actually made her understand the pain such an act can cause. She was just beginning to recover from that trauma toward the end of high school when she was raped, understandably sending her into another tailspin.

And as much as Collins is grateful for her newfound stardom, she notes that such worldly success does not fix deep-seated mental-health issues. Even today, she says she struggles with imposter syndrome and the negative thoughts a few nasty comments online can trigger.

After high school she started, then dropped out of a university education program, realizing she was not meant to be a teacher, and headed to hairdressing school instead.

As well as the hair clients she saw at home, Collins did stints on the Vancouver-area sets of the CW network’s Riverdale and other TV shows.

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She says she had a dream as a child to be a stand-up comedian — or a lawyer, oddly enough — and fantasized while on set of appearing in front of the cameras. But it wasn’t until the end of 2020 that she realized the TikTok thing actually had the makings of a career, and finally gave up hairdressing.

Collins set a torrid pace at first, producing multiple videos a day, seven days a week for her first year on the app, though she’s slowed down somewhat since then.

“This job is something that’s constantly on my mind,” says the self-described workaholic. “I’m bringing notepads to my family dinners to get content…. My friends and family call me all the time, saying ‘This just happened, this could be a really funny skit.’”

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Though the characters are largely based on those close to her and are frequently the butt of the sketches’ humour, “they love it. And it’s funny, because it’s extremely accurate so they can’t even say anything.”

The money comes from corporate partners, companies whose products Collins promotes, usually in funny videos much like the non-advertising ones. Current partners include McCain, A&W, Karma and Amazon Canada. She says she could make millions of dollars more but doesn’t want to alienate her followers with too much marketing content.

Having conquered the internet’s new frontier, Collins has ambitions now to dip her toes in the traditional entertainment industry, whether as an actor, creator or both. She says she’s constantly drafting ideas for TV series and movies.

But she’s not about to abandon TikTok, and hopes Hollywood takes note of her legion of fans there.

“It’s the new media. It’s definitely king right now and I don’t think it’s going to go away any time soon,” Collins says. “Every A-lister is on TikTok, because that’s what everyone is looking at.”

If you’re thinking about suicide or are worried about a friend or loved one, please contact the Canada Suicide Prevention Service at 1.833.456.4566 toll free or connect via text at 45645, from 4 p.m. to midnight ET. If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, call 911.

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