A controversial YouTube family has announced their retirement from the platform and plans to start hosting an annual festival instead.
The ACE Family is a Los Angeles-based YouTube channel started by Austin and Catherine McBroom in 2016. The couple started making a name for themselves on YouTube for their prank videos and daily vlogging. They now have three kids — Elle, Alaia and Steel — who are also regularly featured on the channel.
Since 2016, the ACE Family has garnered more than 18 million subscribers and multiple controversies. Last year was a particularly rocky one for the couple, with multiple lawsuits filed against them and a foreclosure threat made to the family’s $10.1 million mansion.
In one of their most recent videos, the couple announced their plans to host a festival in place of continuing with the YouTube channel. The event will be called the ACE Fest and held sometime in Los Angeles in August 2022.
“The sad news is … this is the last year that the ACE Family will be on YouTube,” Austin said in the 16-minute video. “We actually wanted to make this video a year ago, and we wanted a year ago to be our last year, but we just can’t seem to stop doing what we love to do.”
Austin went on to explain that the reason he and Catherine wanted to pause YouTube production was that they wanted to do a lot of traveling in 2023, although they did clarify that they weren’t fully leaving YouTube but just planning on posting a lot less frequently.
Most of the commenters seemed crushed by the news and talked about how they had been following the family since their started.
“When I saw this I was hoping it was a prank,” one person wrote.
“Omg this is sad news but happy for you guys!” another added.
“This will be our first time actually able to travel,” Austin explained. “Not only travel but work on some big, big, big, big projects.”
One of those projects will be the ACE Fest — inspired by the previous years of success Austin and Catherine saw with their annual charity basketball events.
“Every event that we have sells out in seconds,” Catherine said. “[But] this one is going to be the best one because of the way we structured this.”
ACE Fest will be open to all ages and is described on the event website as “Disneyland meets Coachella.” It’s also advertised as “maybe the last ACE Family event.”
“There will be two different ticketing options,” Catherine continued. “The first ticketing option is the silver one. … You buy a ticket and that’s a plus-two.”
The silver ticket is $299 and allows guests to go on free rides and play free games.
“The second option is you get a ticket and then you get a plus-four,” Catherine said.
This option, which Austin referred to as the VIP pass gold ticket, is $499 and is valid for all ACE Family events throughout 2022, including Austin’s upcoming fight. Every VIP pass member will also get “an exclusive wedding gift” from the couple, who plan to marry at some point toward the end of the year.
Of the 5,000 tickets being sold, two random VIP pass holders will be picked to actually attend the wedding.
A month before posting the video, news circulated that Austin had reportedly settled two lawsuits that came from 2021’s “YouTubers vs. TikTokers” boxing event. Weeks after the fight took place in June, several participants came forward to say that they hadn’t been paid.
Months after the boxing event, Austin was sued for $200,000 by the city of Beverly Hills after hosting an “unsanctioned gathering” of ACE Family fans for a “YouTube Takeover Parade.”
Ethan Klein took to his H3 Podcast to express confusion over Austin being allowed to put on another expensive, over-the-top event following his recent alleged legal problems.
“Who the f*** is working with him to put on events at this point?” he asked in the March 22 episode.
The post Controversial YouTube family announces new festival, chance to go to their wedding appeared first on In The Know.
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