Welcome to YouTube Millionaires, where we profile channels that have recently crossed the one million subscriber mark. There are channels crossing this threshold every week, and each creator has a story to tell about YouTube success. Read previous installments here.
Twenty years ago, when the D’Alessandro siblings were kids playing in their basement, Marco remembers Pier as “the original content creator.”
“He had this little orange camera. We would film movies in the basement with my family,” Marco, who’s 26, says. (Pier is 24.) “Usually it was the siblings, but the girls would be playing like house or something. We would infiltrate their game, and just annoy them when we’d be filming it. It’s so funny to look back on it and see like, those are like the origins. It was foreshadowing what it would become.”
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And what it would become is SaucyTV, Marco and Pier’s fast-growing shared presence on YouTube and TikTok. The brothers grew up on YouTube prank content, and in 2022, they began uploading their own pranks, with frequent guest star appearances from their scene-stealing parents. They spent the year batch filming a lot of content and then examining audience response to that content, tweaking things to refine their style.
Nowadays, they feel like they have their voice pretty well nailed down. And SaucyTV has grown enough that it includes their parents, siblings, and both Marco and Pier on part-time bases (Pier is still in college, finishing a communications degree, and Marco is teaching digital media design at a local college; Pier intends to go full-time on content once he graduates).
Marco says the involvement of the entire D’Alessandro family is part of what makes SaucyTV truly come together.
“Everyone contributes in a way. We might start with one singular idea, and we build upon it all together with everyone giving their opinion or their two cents,” he says. “We create something so much better than what the original vision was that it almost seems like every person has their own unique importance that they bring. It’s almost like, everyone needs everyone.”
And, with SaucyTV recently hitting Marco and Pier’s goal of one million subscribers, they foresee 2024 being their best year yet.
“We were experimenting, but we found our rhythm,” Pier says. “I think this coming year is going to be our year because we have a killer lineup, like just the best ideas we’ve ever had, and they’re all coming to the forefront.”
Check out our full chat with Marco and Pier below.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Tubefilter: Nice to meet you both! Let’s start with, imagine somebody is reading this and they have no idea who you are. Give me an introduction about the two of you–what it was like growing up, and then how you ended up on social media.
Marco D’Alessandro: I can start us off. I think I have a pretty good idea. It’s funny, he was the original content creator, because I remember when we were like, I think I was eight, and he was six years old. He had this little orange camera. We would film movies in the basement with my family. Usually it was the siblings, but the girls would be playing like house or something. We would infiltrate their game, and just annoy them when we’d be filming it. It’s so funny to look back on it and see like, those are like the origins. It was foreshadowing what it would become.
We all had such good chemistry over the years. We didn’t really know where this was going to go, or really what we wanted to do. Our mission really was to just bring our memories to life, bring our family dynamic personality to life. We wanted to inspire people to leave their comfort zone. The big thing about us we always say is, we want to inspire people to challenge themselves to be better, leave their comfort zone, do things that they figure they might be afraid to do. We also want to, I guess, share the love that we have between all of us. Those are like the big highlights.
It started a long time ago, and it got a lot more professional as the years went on. We had no idea that it would blow up the way it did. We never wanted to do this for the sake of being famous or anything like that. We really just, we loved doing it. It’s just so fun to make videos, and get feedback and love from the community. Did that sum it up pretty well?
Pier D’Alessandro: I think you did pretty good.
Tubefilter: When did you originally end up on YouTube? What year-ish?
Marco D’Alessandro: I think we started up like a year ago when it came to uploading itself. I think it was August 31, 2022.
Tubefilter: Oh, very exact. Okay.
Marco D’Alessandro: Yes, I think so. I think we started in either August or very early September. What happened was, we actually had started filming earlier within the year, and just getting a bunch of content trying to figure out our rhythm, and what we wanted to film in the first place. Then we finally took all the footage we made, and we started making it into its own little adventure, its own video.
Pier D’Alessandro: We were doing a lot of exploring during that phase, but it was crucial. I would argue that that was, if we didn’t do that phase, we would have really no direction of what we’re doing right now. Our first ever video was our dad at the outlets acting like ridiculously childish, like just going out and interacting with everyone he saw. I saw him doing that. He inspired me, I wanted to emulate that. We went down a road where we were like, “All right,” like, “We should test all of our limits, do the craziest, like ballsiest things, like whatever.”
We looked back on the stuff that we were doing. Then that gave us a little bit more direction because we said, “Maybe we don’t want to be doing this specific thing. We want to be the type of people who could play a prank or do a joke that everyone likes.” Everyone in the vicinity likes, because we’ve done things where the feedback from the people isn’t that great, but the audience loves it, or vice versa.
Marco D’Alessandro: It’s just an experiment, really.
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, we were experimenting, but we found our rhythm. I think this coming year is going to be our year because we have a killer lineup, like just the best ideas we’ve ever had, and they’re all coming to the forefront. I don’t want to give away too much.
Tubefilter: Yes, no spoilers.
Marco D’Alessandro: No spoilers.
Pier D’Alessandro: No spoilers. I’ll just say this–
Marco D’Alessandro: Just, please stay tuned.
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, stay tuned. My dad is a construction master. He could build us anything. That is all I’ll say.
Tubefilter: Interesting. Very interesting. What were you two up to before this? Were you in college? Were you working careers?
Marco D’Alessandro: I was in college. Were you graduated?
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, he’s still in college. He’s actually wrapping up finals right now.
Marco D’Alessandro: Yes. I was a college kid at the time. Now I’m lecturing at St. John’s. They wanted me to come back and be a professor. I’m actually teaching digital media design. Pier is in–
Pier D’Alessandro: I’m in a communications program.
Tubefilter: Very useful for this.
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, absolutely.
Marco D’Alessandro: Yes, it goes hand in hand.
Pier D’Alessandro: Basically, when we started, it was a COVID thing, because when everything just shut down, and everyone was just home, we wanted to find something to do, pass the time. We originally started off by just posting videos just that we had already, like of memories that we had of just instances, and some of them popped off. We were like, “Oh, that’s really cool.” Then we decided to actually start making stuff for that purpose, rather than just using what we actually had. Then it just took off and then the next thing, and then the next thing, and then we just– And before we knew it, we’re sitting where we are right now.
Marco D’Alessandro: I was just going to say like, during the time we started, we were just all together during that time period because of COVID. We started before then, but it was never any direction. It was sort of like posting once a month, or like four times a week, and then taking a three-week hiatus. It was sort of, my old account was called Marco_dells, and I actually scrapped that in favor of Co_dells, which is what my name is now. That’s when we started taking it a little bit more serious.
The whole bringing our family together during that time when we were all in that one house, none of us had any jobs or schooling at that time. It really was just us all together. That is what gave us the outlet to pursue this common interest. That’s why I love it so much, because all of our family has something that we could connect about, talk about. Really, for hopefully the rest of my life, we have this thing that we could all work on together. It’s just the best excuse to hang out with my family.
Tubefilter: Yes, your family is very, very involved. I’d like to hear just how it is to work with them. You guys have a fairly big family, and everybody’s involved. I’m just curious about how that experience goes for everyone.
Pier D’Alessandro: Honestly, it’s really, really fun sometimes. We put in a lot of time to it, because we want to make it look good. Everyone has a creative standpoint that, in each video, it’s good, because they are able to put some of their own little creative flair into it. The video is a part of everybody’s brainchild, like there will be an idea from me, from Marco, maybe from my dad, and then we swirl it all together. It becomes something really good, because it’s all of our thoughts rather than just one.
Marco D’Alessandro: I definitely agree with that. Everyone contributes in a way. We might start with one singular idea, and we build upon it all together with everyone giving their opinion or their two cents. We create something so much better than what the original vision was that it almost seems like every person has their own unique importance that they bring. It’s almost like, everyone needs everyone. There are times, of course, where people are frustrated. I’m not going to throw anyone under the bus, mainly my sisters, but sometimes they just, they’ll get a little frustrated because they want to be doing something else, or we’re pranking them. They’re annoyed, and they don’t want us to post it, but they’re really good supports about it. My mom is really good support about it. I would say most of the time it’s, there’s a lot of banter behind the scenes. When we’re like trying to get something done, it’s almost like we’re just saying little annoying quips to each other whenever we can, whenever we could get each other, like, “Oh, all right, you’re a little out of pocket for that one.” We’re just, I guess that’s our love language. We’re sort of just like, am I on with that?
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, you’re on with that.
Marco D’Alessandro: We just like, I don’t know, that’s just our chemistry. We just like to annoy each other because I think it brings out the best in all of us. If we could get each other laughing, and we make the energy good, it just resonates with the camera.
Tubefilter: Yes, definitely. Pier, when you graduate, do you intend to go full-time with this?
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, I do. I’m having a blast with it, and I want to just see where it goes.
Tubefilter: Yes. You mentioned, Marco, that you, over the last year, you’ve really sharpened what you guys want to do, and how you want to do content. Is there a specific type of video you’ve nailed down that’s really helping drive your growth?
Marco D’Alessandro: What I think is like the core of our foundation is me and Pier’s perspective of our family, like showcasing, like that’s the core. Then we build out from there. I think what has driven the growth so much is the diversity. Because we have our solid core that we rely upon, which is like our family, and our memories, the things we do with each other. We expand out from there, which is like us going out with our dad in the world. I don’t know if you ever saw like the saucy Santa we did last year or whatever. We just want to do stunts out in the world with Pier, my dad, anyone else who wants to be involved, that like portray a positive energy or vibe where we’re lifting up people around us.
I would say that, like if we had to go for an all encompassing summary of what it is like that is driving the growth, I think maybe a few videos caught on, and then people understood the type of energy we’re trying to bring. Because I feel like a lot of pranksters and a lot of people who do what we do are more so fixated on the views. For us, it’s never really been about the views. It’s about spreading the positive energy, the positive vibes. We just want to be able to have people relate to us. We even had a session where we went out and did interviews with tons of people, and we post those.
I feel like that even brings a new demographic to the page to see our other stuff. They like it, and they subscribe. I think it’s because we have so many of our branches and so many networks. Then when they come to that core, they like what they see.
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, I think that’s, I agree with that. I think it’s just because we do it all in a way. Whether it’s the dynamic is just me or Marco, or both me and Marco, or me and Marco with our family. It just, it works. Also our dad is a legend. He literally, he’s the reason why we have the personality we have. Our mom is the reason why we have the morals we have. It’s a good mixture. I know that I’m very grateful for my family because I know that many people’s families, they have their issues. We have our issues, of course, and everything, but I know I can rely upon them at the end of the day. My mom has instilled good virtues in us, and my dad pretty much taught us how to be funny.
Tubefilter: There you go, essential.
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, it’s important.
Tubefilter: Yes, and then you guys post– tell me about your YouTube strategy, how often are you posting Shorts?
Pier D’Alessandro: I think every other day. Every other day, we’ll post like two to three, I would say, right?
Marco D’Alessandro: Yes. What we’ve been doing, we have been just trying a bunch of different things. We have a few people in our ear giving us insight into what might be smart. If we’re going for the two a day, we always post the core one, which is like our family. Then we’ll post like a saucy clip out in the world, which is like us doing something with a camera in public, or we’ll post an interview clip. Or sometimes we’ll post all three.
Marco D’Alessandro: Yes, sometimes we’ll do all three more often than before.
Tubefilter: How does filming work for you guys? Do you go out in public and film and chop that into multiple Shorts over multiple weeks? How does the video production process work for you?
Pier D’Alessandro: When we go out into the world, we will film a giant block of things.
Marco D’Alessandro: Usually one or two days, right?
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, one or two days. We’ll film a lot of stuff, and then we will take it. For the shorts– well, first off, that big piece of footage is going to be its own long form video. Then what happens is we take it, and then we dice it up into shorts based off of, say we do an interview, and we cut up each question that gets asked into its own short, essentially.
Marco D’Alessandro: We went to a few music festivals over the summer. We went to three different ones. We went to Gov Ball, Rolling Loud and EZoo. What we did was, the entirety of the three days we were there, we were just filming. We weren’t even going to the shows. My sisters were, because they had to take their pictures for Instagram and stuff. Me and Pier were just straight business the entire time for all of the festivals.
Pier D’Alessandro: That’s not true.
Marco D’Alessandro: Okay, maybe at Gov Ball on one of the nights, we might have sipped a little bit and took a break. We got so much filming done that we– I don’t even know how many shorts we have. We have hundreds of videos that we haven’t released yet, hundreds.
Pier D’Alessandro: There’s a lot of content that is already filmed that is just unpublished right now, and we’re excited to get it out.
Tubefilter: Very cool. You guys plan pretty far ahead, because you said you’re already thinking of stuff for 2024.
[Note: This interview was conducted in early December 2023.]
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, just some ideas, really. Like our bigger ideas, we held off on doing them, like ideas that we’ve had in our heads for years before we even knew we wanted to do this, because to do our big ideas when we don’t have the numbers and the idea doesn’t get the love that we think that it deserves, we just want to make sure that it’s being seen by who it needs to be seen by, and we’re doing it correctly. That’s why we hold off until things are more correct in the world.
Marco D’Alessandro: We really needed to go through the rite of passage. We needed to go through that grinding phase where we had no idea what we were doing, or else we would have never come out on the other side. I look at my early YouTube videos, and I like chuckle a little bit because, I like them and everything, but it’s just so far from what I would post now. The cool thing is seeing the development, and the fact that we could still use those clips, they’re salvageable in some ways, like we could repurpose them, we can make them into mashups. But because we went through that phase, now the ideas that we’ll bring to the table will be done in such a better way that we could be truly proud of it when we’re posting that.
Tubefilter: Yes, you’ve come a long way in a year.
Marco D’Alessandro: I know, we never expected this. Just something happened around like, I don’t know, maybe September, and we were just like, “What’s going on?” We were like, “Maybe we’ll hit a million by like next December.”
Pier D’Alessandro: I know.
Marco D’Alessandro: That was like our hope, and we exceeded all expectations, and we just couldn’t be more grateful. It has inspired us to change our whole operation. We want to do this forever. We want to just full tilt, bring everyone what they want, the most value.
Tubefilter: Is YouTube the place for you? I know you guys have a TikTok account, but it seems like YouTube might be your focus?
Pier D’Alessandro: I feel like we have a pretty decent amount on TikTok, if you just scroll all the way down. As of recently, we’ve been putting YouTube on a pedestal because we really want it to get to where it needs to go, so it needs a little extra love. We’ve been focusing a lot on the YouTube and the other apps right now. We’ve been, still are creating a lot for the other social medias, but we just want to make sure YouTube is right before the end of the year.
Marco D’Alessandro: Also, we didn’t mention this yet. Our greatest dream when we were kids was to do YouTube. We used to watch some of the big names at the time, like Rémi Gaillard, or those types of people. That’s what we were like, “We could do this, this is going to be so cool.” We never had the courage to do it until recently where we got our foot in the door with the content creation field. The reason why we’re so full steam ahead with YouTube was because this was our greatest dream, not TikTok, not Instagram, not Facebook, YouTube. The gold play button was our holy grail. We used to talk about that when we were kids. When I get it in my hands in real life, it’ll be like completing a journey.
Pier D’Alessandro: YouTube just has a bigger creative element. They treat their creators really well, a lot better. You are able to have a lot more freedom. I really do like creating the short form things, like the shorter videos like we do on Reels and whatnot. There’s a lot of rules in place, and the videos can’t be too long. You’re a little limited. It’s still a fun time, but the YouTube is where you really get to shine as a person because, you get to be yourself. It’s hard to be yourself in a 8 to 12-second video online. When you’re doing a bit, or you’re doing a thing out in the world, you’re just interacting with people as you. It’s just a lot more freedom than the other apps.
Tubefilter: Very cool that you guys grew up on YouTube.
Marco D’Alessandro: Yes, it’s still the thing I watch the most. I don’t even watch Netflix. YouTube is the way to go.
Pier D’Alessandro: Our YouTube era was like those gold-digger pranks. Those ridiculous videos were, I’m sure you’ve seen them. We were also like 12.
Tubefilter: That was the intro, huh? YouTube gateway.
Marco D’Alessandro: Yes, we would watch those guys. If I’m going to be totally honest, now that I’m older and have greater perspective, and a little bit more developed, I don’t agree with a lot of stuff they’ve done, and the roads they’ve gone down, but they got me interested in it, so I have to give them some sort of respect. I just wouldn’t do the same. Yes, I wouldn’t do the same level of stuff.
Tubefilter: I see. Yeah. I feel like we’ve talked about it a little bit, but what are you looking forward to most in the next six months to a year?
Marco D’Alessandro: Million subscribers.
Tubefilter: I would be surprised if you guys closed out the year without a million.
Marco D’Alessandro: Yes, I’d be surprised too. Plus, I’ve been telling everybody that I’m going to do it before the end of the year. If I don’t do it before the end of the year, I’m going to have to talk to a lot of people about how long I was, and I’m really not looking forward to that. I’m hoping that I get the good end of the stick. The next few months, definitely the million subs, that was me and Pier’s greatest dream together. I think I’m just going to lock myself in my room for like four days when we end up getting it. Hopefully, cross my fingers, but–
Pier D’Alessandro: I’ll bring some food. I think four days is a long time.
Marco D’Alessandro: Yes, I know. The thing that I’m really looking forward to the most, besides the gold play button, of course, is building the catalog of long form. Because I think we’ve got it down to a science. Every video has been a little bit of a tweak in the right direction. We basically have like our catalog that we have in our head built. Now we just need to bring it to life. The things we want to do to fill out our page, where if you go to our page, you’re going to see something you like. Regardless of your age, where you’re from, you’re going to like something on our page.
That is what I’m most excited to do. Completing our catalog, our portfolio. I want it to be 100%. It can never be 100%, but it’s, by the end of next year, I think we’re going to be in a really good spot. I want everyone to watch our channel and feel some sort of fulfillment, or feel a little bit more uppity. I want them to be happy.
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes. We like being able to go out and do everything that we do. We have always said from the very beginning that we don’t want to be limited in what we do. I want to be able to wake up one day, do something, and then wake up the next day and decide to do the complete opposite if I really wanted to, and it still work.
Marco D’Alessandro: YouTube is the greatest place to do that.
Pier D’Alessandro: YouTube is the greatest canvas. It’s the biggest. It has the most potential. There are some people who aren’t going to like what we do, but they might like something else that we do. That’s why we like being able to make whatever we want to make, whether it’s interviews, pranks, a family vlog, whatever it is, you’re going to come to our channel, and they’re going to find something that they want to watch.
Marco D’Alessandro: We’re definitely upping the ante, because with the additional views and subscribers, the only thing we do, correct me if I’m wrong, we reinvest any sort of profit into the videos. Every single penny pretty much goes into production.
Pier D’Alessandro: We’re just making it the best it could be.
Marco D’Alessandro: That’s it. We just want to make the best stuff. I don’t care about living a luxurious life. I just want to do this. I just want to do this. This was me and Pier’s dream. I want to make the best quality stuff. Mr. Beast is honestly an inspiration. I didn’t always like everything he did, but I liked some stuff he did. I know that in reality, you can’t make everyone like you, but I respect so much what he’s done, and how much investment he puts back into his videos. I have to give him respect.
Pier D’Alessandro: He has a great mission. He does a lot of great stuff. What is it? He cured like a thousand blind people semi-recently. He went to Africa, and they did surgery on a bunch of blind people and gave them their vision back.
Marco D’Alessandro: Long-term, we want to do stuff like that. A few years ago, me and Pier were doing some charity work, and we thought raising like $4,000 when we were really young. We were like, “Oh my God, this is amazing.” We want to upscale that so much. We want to make our own mission. We want to do things we believe in because that’s the only time I really feel fulfilled.
Tubefilter: I don’t think $4,000 is exactly something to sneeze at.
Marco D’Alessandro: No, it’s not like a low amount, but I just know that if we put a strategy together, me and Pier could generate a lot of money for a good because. Any money at all is of course beneficial, but I know that if we team up–
Marco D’Alessandro: It could just get large scale.
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes.
Tubefilter: Perfect. Do you have any advice for creators? Maybe people like you who grew up on YouTube, and are similarly sort of waiting for the chance to get into it. Do you have any advice about how to go for it?
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes, so it’s going to just sound pretty basic or whatever, but don’t give up. You’re most likely not going to have any success for a while unless you are the true one in a million, that just overnight success, but most likely, you will not have success for a while, but if you keep going, you will.
Marco D’Alessandro: Slow and sustained growth is always superior to trying to blow up, because it involves a lot more strategy.
Pier D’Alessandro: Surround yourself with people who support you, because if you’re just told negative things all the time, you’re going to want to give up. I’ve seen people start, and then just stop because they haven’t gotten to where they wanted in like four hours, and I’m like, “What did you think was going to happen? You gave it four hours of effort,” and we’ve been doing this for like two years. To be honest, obviously, we are very happy at our growth.
Marco D’Alessandro: And lucky.
Pier D’Alessandro: Very happy and lucky, but I also do feel like it’s due in a sense that we put in at least 10 hours a day to this.
Marco D’Alessandro: We put in the work.
Pier D’Alessandro: Yes. We put in the work, so the results are something that we were expecting whenever they were going to come that they showed up. Just don’t give up, keep going, and just have a good head on your shoulders. Think positive thoughts, because sometimes it’s just hard to just do it at all.
Marco D’Alessandro: For me what I would say is, the biggest hurdle that most people, they don’t have that awareness of their fear. Really, the biggest thing is overcoming the fear, because the people around you are what matters so much. Once I separated myself from the people who were consciously and subconsciously holding me back, I was able to achieve a higher potential, and not worry about other people’s thoughts.
A lot of people will not put their full effort into something, because they’re afraid if they do, and someone critiques them, that their entire world and ego will collapse. For me it was about, I’ve been embarrassed so many times, and received so much hate that I feel like it has made me so much of a better person, because I’m not immune, but I’m so resilient now, and I have my mission, and I’m headstrong, and there’s no one that could knock me off this path.
