Did AliExpress take authenticity too far? A woman was “freaked out” after she received a keychain from the online retail marketplace and learned she got more than she bargained for.
In a viral clip, Claudia (@claudbarajas) shares her horror at realizing her pretzel keychain was more than a decorative fob.
“Thinking I got a cute keychain from AliExpress,” Claudia writes in the text overlay of her TikTok. She shows a screenshot of the product listing, which revealed over 500 people have purchased it. It also described the bundle keychain as “high grade.”
Then Claudia shows a photo of the keychain attached to her Longhcamp bag. “Cute, right?” she asks.
Her third photo, however, reveals a broken off piece of the pretzel. “Turns out it’s a real pretzel??? Wtf???” Claudia writes in the overlay.
The TikToker adds in the caption that the fact that it’s a “real” pretzel freaks her out. “I don’t like it,” she writes. “AliExpress count your days.”
Several viewers recalled the incident of a Temu croissant lamp that went viral last year.
“Did we not learn from the temu croissant lamp,” a top comment with 21,000 likes read. Another echoed, “Croissant lamp incident all over again.”
What’s the Temu croissant lamp?
In September 2024, a woman purchased a croissant lamp from Temu. What she didn’t expect, however, was for the croissant to be real.
In her viral TikTok, which made headlines across news outlets, the creator @froginahatgirl says she found “hundreds of ants” underneath her croissant lamp. She ended up breaking it open and finding out it indeed was an actual croissant. What many didn’t know, though, was that the Temu product was probably a dupe from Pampshade, a company that makes lamps out of real baked goods, such as croissants and baguettes (this writer purchased one in 2021, and it’s the cutest decor ever).
It appears Claudia’s and @froginahatgirl’s qualm is that they weren’t made aware it was real food, since it wasn’t disclosed in the listing.
Others were skeptical
While many comments reminisced about the Temu croissant lamp, several other of Claudia’s viewers were convinced Claudia was wrong.
“That’s just super dried foam,” a top comment with 76,000 likes read. To address these concerns, Claudia posted a follow-up TikTok.
In that clip, she uses a hammer to break apart the pretzel, which sat on a foam plate. While it is difficult to verify from a video whether it’s real, it indeed appears crumbly like a real pretzel. Viewers urged her to test the rest of keychain, which also had a bar of chocolate.
In another video, Claudia shows the chocolate and reveals that this one, at least, is made of plastic. After several folks begged her to do a “taste test,” Claudia leaned into the joke and “tested” the pretzel in another clip. She did clarify in the comments, however, that she didn’t really eat the pretzel because “whether it’s foam or a real pretzel, that’s gross.”
The Mary Sue reached out to Claudia via TikTok message and to AliBaba Group via web contact form.
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