In 2025, Alex Eats Too Much has been in existence for 8 years. I started this as an image journal on Instagram of the food I was eating. I had hopes people would discover my Instagram and blog, and I could change my career. Over the course of the last year, I decided it was finally time to make that change, making the leap to have Alex Eats Too Much be my full time job. If you didn’t see, I quit my job and bet on myself.
It’s been three months since I quit, and it’s going just ok. I ate many great meals. I spent a lot of time traveling in Pennsylvania and to some other great destinations. I’m finally getting caught up on making videos of all the delicious things I eat and all the great places I visit. I’m working on posting longer videos to YouTube more frequently. I have a bunch of half written blog posts that I need to share on this website. This is all to work toward the two goals of sharing more experiences for others to have a reference and discover, and monetize my website and YouTube. However, I’m disappointed in the number of partnerships and collaborations I have done in the three months since leaving my job. I had some partnerships. I’m thankful I got to work with the PA Lottery again this holiday season for the 3rd year. I was able to work with Bob Evans Restaurants and discovered they actually have a pretty good breakfast for a chain restaurant. Unfortunately, I also had a couple of travel partnerships I thought were happening fall through. That said, I don’t regret it at all.
I did a lot of self reflection in 2025. I began to examine how I was spending my time and realized it was time for a change. I already had big plans for 2025 before deciding to make Alex Eats Too Much a full-time commitment. I had a couple of big trips already planned with hopes to create some really cool content from them. I had plans to work with a lot of restaurants over the year, but work kept getting in the way. And work got in the way a lot. I paid off a lot of my debt in 2025. I had decent savings. However, I was working my butt off. I was losing sleep. I was constantly stressed out. I was beginning to hate the job I used to love. Instead of just finding a new job, I bet on myself. I spent 8 years building a brand, so it was time to do something with it. I wanted to travel more. I wanted to experience more.
Every year, I use this post as a reminder to hold myself accountable for the goals I set and create new goals for the next year. My 2025 goals never included leaving my job, but I can see if I accomplished any of my goals.
2025 Goals from last year’s Recap
- Keep Growing the AlexEatsTooMuch Brand – This is the first time I’m not basing growth on a number of followers. I’m going to be much more arbitrary this year. I want to see more partnerships with brands and destinations. I want to see more paid opportunities. The amount of effort I put into posting has become so much greater.
- I definitely grew my brand. Follows and views are up from last year. I am getting a lot more emails asking for partnerships and collaborations. Unfortunately, they are mostly hosted or gifted. It’s fun eating at great restaurants and going on amazing experiences, but I need to do a better job of converting offers to paid.
- More Blog Posts – I am going to keep doing the monthly roundups and year end posts. I want to move all my travel content to separate blog posts. I want to write more posts about big events or amazing dinners.
- I would call this an in progress goal. I only posted 2 new blog posts and updated one from years ago. I started 4 other blog posts, which I never finished. If I had finished those, I’d say I met this goal. I also don’t count the monthly roundups that I post. I got that posted every month, but I don’t have any real focus.
- More YouTube videos – I didn’t make one long format video in 2024. I’m going to start recording more video in landscape so I can create longer videos.
- I posted 9 YouTube videos this year. I have a few more that are in the works. Two of them have a decent number of views. I’d say I accomplished this goal.
- More Travel – I need to expand my travel outside of Pennsylvania more. I went out of town a lot, but only three of my trips were outside Pennsylvania. I know I already have at least two confirmed out of state trips in 2025 and I hope I will have more than that.
- I added a lot of travel in 2025. Unfortunately, no trips out of the United States, but at least got out of Pennsylvania. I even made videos out of some of these visits. I spent time in the following places.
- Laurel Highlands, PA
- Seneca, SC
- Las Vegas, NV
- New Orleans, LA
- Greenville, SC
- Cleveland, OH
- Happy Valley, PA
- Reading, PA
- Gettysburg, PA
- Chicago, IL
- New York, NY
- Harrisburg & Hershey, PA
- I added a lot of travel in 2025. Unfortunately, no trips out of the United States, but at least got out of Pennsylvania. I even made videos out of some of these visits. I spent time in the following places.
- Create a Business Plan – I still dream of a future I can do content creation full time. In order to do that, I need to make sure I have a steady income. This will mean figuring out how I can better earn money off of everything I do. I can’t pay my bills off of comped meals and event tickets.
- I didn’t create a formal business plan. I dove into this full time based on the fact that I was receiving enough requests that I had to turn down and a work life balance that was no longer a balance. This is something I need to focus on for early 2026.
2026 Goals
- Develop a Business Plan – Yes, I need a real plan. I have to set targets to hit weekly and monthly.
- Pitch Myself – I need to create a list of businesses and destinations I want to pitch myself. I will send emails until that list is exhausted with a follow up to each if needed. I don’t exactly like that I will be sending the same type of emails I send to my own spam folder, but I have to do it. I really haven’t pitched myself much previously because I didn’t have the time to take on the extra partnerships. Now I have plenty of time.
- Be More Organized – I started in December, trying to organize my thoughts and content. I created a tracking board in Trello so I can track what ideas I have, what I am working on and what I have completed. I am also working through all my content from the last few years that I haven’t organized at all. I’m trying to get it all in folders separated by photos and videos, and based on location. I want to be able to reference content and even reuse it as necessary.
- Travel More – Since I don’t have to ask for PTO, I have the opportunity to go on many trips and create content about them. So far, I have confirmed trips to Central Pennsylvania, a cruise, and a conference for 2026. Hopefully, I’ll be adding so much more.
- Film with Restaurants and Chefs – I don’t want to just film my meals anymore. I would like to actually get in the kitchen with chefs and see more of the behind the scenes of the restaurants.
- Continue Posting to the Blog – I don’t want to continue ignoring my blog. I want to get one thing posted per week. I have plans to post some itineraries for the places I visited. I am going to start a section of posts for my favorite restaurants. I have ideas for more opinion based posts.
- Continue Making YouTube Videos – I would like to create 2 long form videos for YouTube a month about travel. If I find time, I will also create recap videos of my restaurants from the month.
2025 Highlights
- I started the year celebrating my birthday at Cease and Desist, the secret bar space by The Warren. I spent the following day incredibly hungover.
- I spent a great weekend hosted by the Laurel Highlands with a great group of content creators.
- I went to the Southern Travelers Explore conference hosted this year in Seneca, SC. This was a fun meeting a lot of other creators and travel writers. I also learned some really great tips. Eventually, I might even get to put some of them into practice.
- I went to Las Vegas for the International Pizza Expo. This was an event I wanted to attend for years and finally did it. I had a great time. I got to try a bunch of pizza and other pizza place foods. I got to talk with a lot of Pittsburgh pizza makers. I would love to go again, but it was an expensive week, so I might have to take a year before going again. I also did a lot of touristy stuff while I was there.
- I was invited to my first hosted destination outside of Pennsylvania. I spent a long weekend in Greenville, SC. I had never been there but heard great things. I loved it. I ate a few great meals including one of my top meals of the year at The Anchorage. I toured a bunch of really nice museums. I walked around the city and saw great things like the Reedy Falls and a Greenville Drive baseball game.
- I attended one of my favorite concerts of the year, Amyl and the Sniffers in Cleveland. I’ve fallen in love with this Australian punk band. We need more punk rock again.
- My first of two trips to Happy Valley, PA this year was for a new camporee weekend. We spent the weekend in cabins at Black Moshannon State Park. We did a bunch of outdoor activities in the rain.
- I got invited to a private tour at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland. This is my favorite museum and I was incredibly excited to be invited by them for the afternoon. They had just opened the Saturday Night Live: 50 Years of Music exhibit, which SNL is one of my favorite shows. As part of the private tour, the group also got to spend a little time in the vault, where they store all the items they do not have on display.
- I spent a second weekend in Happy Valley, PA and this time it was all eating and drinking. I attended Tussey Mountain Wing Fest and I ate too many wings. I did a dairy farm crawl throughout the region and ate a lot of ice cream and cheese. I ate a bunch of meals at the remodeled Nittany Lion Inn. I capped off the weekend by attending one of my favorite beer festivals, Hoppy Valley Brewers Fest. I’ve always loved being in Happy Valley, but it is even better when I get to go back to eat all weekend.
- I got to collaborate again with Sheetz on their crazy partnership with Liquid Death. They were cutting sandwiches with chainsaws.
- I went to MATPRA Media Marketplace again. This year was in Reading, PA. We spent a day in Boyertown. We attended a Reading Fightin Phils game. I visited Hawk Mountain. I had a great time connecting with several destinations and other creators, all of whom I hope to do more with over time.
- After MATPRA, I did a quick 24 hours in Gettysburg, PA. I’d never been. We did all the history stuff. We also ate at a couple of restaurants with a lot of historical significance, The Dobbin House and Sweney’s Tavern at the Farnsworth House Inn.
- I spent a week in Chicago so I could see an all time bucket list concert. I went to see Oasis on the reunion tour. It was unbelievable. They sounded amazing. They clearly wanted to be sure it was an awesome show. Also, being around so many other fans singing along made it just an incredible experience. The rest of the week was spent eating at great restaurants, going on a donut crawl, and seeing the Yankees beat the Chicago White Sox.
- I got back from Chicago and immediately went back to Cleveland to see Nine Inch Nails. This was their new Peel It Back tour. It was a mix of acoustic piano remixes, DJ remixes and the usual hard driving industrial metal they do so well.
- I quit my job to take Alex Eats Too Much full time. After 8 years, I needed to make it happen. I needed to do what I enjoy.
- I hosted a Bacon Festival!!! I partnered with the founders of Beers of the Burgh to create Baconburgh: A Celebration of All Things Bacon. We spent months planning. We got 15 food trucks. We had lots of vendors. 4 bands were playing. It was a success. I learned so much about the festival planning business. We know we will be bringing it back in 2026.
- I impulsively bought a ticket to go to NYC to see the Yankees in the playoffs. I grew up a Yankees fan. I knew if I wanted to see playoff baseball again, I needed to go to a place that has playoff baseball. Yankee Stadium during a playoff game is wild. I went to the game they won. What an amazing experience. I also spent time in Chinatown, walked the Brooklyn Bridge, toured The Vessel and spent a total of 5 hours dealing with flight delays.
- I finally checked off another bucket list concert, getting to see Paul McCartney at PPG Paints Arena. The legend is 83 years old and still goes out playing almost 3 hours of The Beatles and Wings hits. It was incredible to watch.
- I was lucky enough to be invited again to the Pennsylvania Governor’s Residence for the annual Creators Holiday Party. This party gives content creators time to mingle and meet with Governor Shapiro. I spent time in 2025 promoting how Pennsylvania residents needed to vote in the Pennsylvania Supreme Court justice retention election. I hope in 2026 to spend more time promoting great events in Pennsylvania, the America 250 celebration, and Governor Shapiro’s reelection campaign.
I’m really looking forward to 2026. It’s going to be a great year. Thank you to everyone who has been hanging out so far. I hope you continue to follow along on my journey.
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