We’ve seen a lot of people come and go on The Bachelor and The Bachelorette, and while fans tend to stay interested in former contestants’ love lives or the fun things they’re posting on social media, we don’t typically think about what it’s like for them to go back to their regular lives and jobs. Apparently it’s not always so easy after appearing on national TV, and Justin Glaze and Susie Evans opened up about their different — and frankly shocking — experiences with how the reality dating show impacted their careers in the real world.
Bachelor Nation first met Justin Glaze on Katie Thurston’s season of The Bachelorette, where he was the runner-up, before appearing on Season 8 of Bachelor in Paradise. If you don’t recognize his name, you’ve likely seen his oh-so-memeable facial expressions. Susie Evans, meanwhile, received Clayton Echard’s final rose on The Bachelor Season 26. They didn’t get engaged on the show and ended up splitting within months of the finale. Glaze and Evans actually just went public with their own relationship after months of speculation, but business was the topic of a good portion of their chat on the Trading Secrets podcast recently.
How Being On The Bachelorette Affected Justin Glaze’s Career In Finance
It’s not hard to see why the brand deals started to flow in for Justin Glaze after his stints on reality TV. In addition to the fact that he made it to the end of The Bachelorette, memes of his exaggerated facial expressions were guaranteed to continue circulating long after he returned home. What the investment sales consultant found out, however, was that finance and The Bachelor apparently don’t mix, and he opened up to fellow Bachelorette contestant Jason Tartick about why he ultimately had to leave his job:
Inevitably opportunities came along and, as you know, the finance industry is very highly regulated, and so there were some nuances that I didn't know I had to navigate, but was totally fine navigating. And what I mean by that is, you know, any outside income I had to report and get brand deals approved, and so this was a brand new process to me, to the firm, and it got complicated pretty quickly.
Justin Glaze said he started to juggle his corporate job with his new social media opportunities, and while his employer had been supportive of him going on The Bachelorette, they were wary of the income he was earning from his newfound fame. After Glaze forgot to report income from making Cameo videos, he said his firm told him to shut it down, as they couldn’t control what he was saying in the videos.
He also apparently got some pushback from his company for posting images from a trip to Belize that his firm had approved. Despite the fact that he was working remotely from Belize, his employers seemed to think that it was a bad look for him to also be posting about the fun things he was doing, like swimming with turtles. He argued:
What's the difference between me working remotely in Belize and someone who wasn't on TV that's in Martha's Vineyard right now? There was no answer. ‘Well, the optics. You're in the public eye right now.’ I was like, ‘I understand that but it's like if people want to snoop and watch my stuff and compare and complain, there's only so much I can do,’ and so it became a bigger issue.
The tipping point came, Justin Glaze said, after another friend from The Bachelorette, Andrew Spencer, invited him to a USC football game. Glaze’s employer saw him on TV, and he got in trouble for not reporting that as a “perk,” despite him being someone else’s guest and the game being played on a Saturday, when he wasn’t working. Glaze continued:
It got to the point where it’s like, ‘Hey listen, we need to have a conversation. If you are going to want to continue to work here, you can’t do anything Bachelor-related.’ It was very unfortunate. I felt more so betrayed than anything. I was like, ‘You guys told me to do this. Why can’t I succeed at both?’ Because I wanted to maintain that career and I wanted to maintain the social aspect, and I felt like I was doing both well.
His story was shocking to me, because it seems like he really wanted to continue his corporate job and was trying his best to balance both. I can see how his company would be nervous due to the regulations of the financial industry, but it’s wild to hear some of the things he was getting in trouble for.
Susie Evans also said she was forced to leave a job that she loved, though the circumstances were much different.
Susie Evans Recalls Why She Left Her Restaurant Job After The Bachelor
Susie Evans, who was waiting tables at a restaurant in addition to being a full-time wedding videographer when she went on The Bachelor, said she returned to being a server when filming ended. She said she enjoyed the job and didn’t have any weddings booked at the time. However, her presence ended up putting a strain on the establishment. She told Jason Tartick:
I actually went back to waiting tables because I loved it. … They would, like, play the show as I'm serving tables. They would have the TVs going, and it would literally be The Bachelor episodes. I actually thought it was kind of funny, but I've also just always loved the restaurant industry. … It got to the point where I was like, I'm becoming a burden on them, because people were calling: ‘Is Susie from The Bachelor working tonight?’
Susie Evans didn’t say whether or not her presence created tension with her employers or with any of the non-Bachelor Nation customers, but that still sounds pretty intense. It was likely a distraction at the very least, and it sounds like privacy became an issue, with people wanting her boss to disclose her work schedule.
Both Susie Evans and Justin Glaze said they were making enough money through brand deals to offset the jobs they gave up because of their Bachelor fame. However, their stories make me wonder if other contestants who don’t make it as far on the show or get as many Instagram followers from it also have similar issues transitioning back into their day jobs?
These wild stories will likely be more on my mind as I watch Joey Graziadei and his contestants continue their journey on The Bachelor. Tune in to new episodes at 8 p.m. ET Mondays on ABC, or streaming the next day with a Hulu subscription. Also check out our 2024 TV schedule to see what premieres are coming soon.
