Transparency item: Spoilers for “The Bachelor” season 28 are mentioned in this article.
Season 28 of “The Bachelor,” which aired on ABC, caught people’s attention across the country and on social media for the dynamics in the Bachelor House and predictions of the bachelor, Joey Graziadei‘s, endgame, according to TV Insider.
Residing near the notorious Bachelor Mansion in the reality show, students can experience some of the places visited by the show’s contestants such as the surf shop and beach from Joey’s surfing date as well as the Bachelor House itself.
Some students said watching the show with friends during the most recent season 28, which starred Joey as the bachelor, became a weekly ritual.
First-year Tabitha Vanderhorst said this season of “The Bachelor” was super entertaining and kept her on her toes.
Vanderhorst said she bought a mini projector so she could invite her friends over to her first-year housing suite to watch the show. She projected the show onto her ceiling, and she and her friends laid on the floor watching the show together, Vanderhost said.
First-year Avrey Roberts said she found the show this season to be a fun one, and she thought Joey was one of the best newer bachelors.
Roberts said Joey had a great selection of women, despite the amount of drama that occurred at the beginning of the season. As the season went on and more women were sent home, the less dramatic it was, Roberts said.
Roberts said she joined a group of six girls each Monday, and they called themselves The Bachelor Baddies. The group included Roberts, a first-year, two sophomores, one junior and two seniors.
She joined the group at senior Madilyn Henshaw’s apartment each week for the watch party, and throughout the week, she said they would send each other TikToks about the episodes.
“We grab snacks, catch up and watch the show together,” Roberts said.
Roberts said all of the group’s initial predictions on who Joey would end up with pointed to Daisy, but the group later was divided between Kelsey Anderson and Daisy, who ended up being the final two women on the show.
Some members of her group have visited the surf shop that Joey took Jenn Tran to on the first one-on-one date, Roberts said.
Sea n Soul, a popular surf and coffee shop on PCH across from Zuma Beach, got a feature in the third episode of the current season. For Joey’s one-on-one date, he took Jenn on a sunny surfing date in Malibu.
Sea n Soul’s manager, Rachel Liakos, said the producers filmed in their shop in September. They told her and the shop owners that this one-on-one date was the first surfing date ever filmed in the show’s history.
With the Bachelor mansion being in Kanan Dume, it was only natural this date would feature one of the beautiful beaches of Malibu, Liakos said.
“They Googled surf shops, and we have a boutique side showing,” Liakos said. “So, the producer of the show or one of the scouts liked our store and asked if they could record here.”
Liakos said she worked heavily with the main producer of the show to figure out sizing and colors for the wetsuits and surfboards. The process was slightly difficult at the time as the producers had not yet revealed this season’s bachelor.
When the team arrived on the day of filming, Liakos said they set up the shop the way they saw fit for the show, and the process went very smoothly. It was at this point that Liakos got to meet Joey for the first time.
“Afterwards, he was so nice, so polite, and he was like ‘Thank you so much, honestly,'” Liakos said. “As a human being, it threw me off how generous and normal and nice he was.”
Liakos said if you watch episode three at 33:58, you will see that Joey — who knew how to surf beforehand — got a retro wood-style and teal blue, almond surfboard. Jenn, the woman he took on the date, got a McMahon yellow, foamy board, which is perfect for beginners.
Liakos handpicked both boards based on the details given to her by the producers.
Liakos was not certain which beach they went to but said she would assume it was Zuma Beach based on the scenes she saw and how much space there is out there.
If you watch the scene from the third episode, the producers cover most of the logos for filming purposes, however, the end of the in-shop scene shows a mug that reads “Sea n Soul” as the couple exits the shop.
The season recently concluded on March 25. Joey proposed to Kelsey and since then, the couple has been active together on social media and in public.
The show also announced during the finale that their next Bachelorette will be Jenn Trann.
Due to the recent season’s spike in viewers and presence online, it is no surprise students also engaged with the show more this season, especially considering how close they are to various filming locations.
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Contact Amanda Monahan and Samantha Wareing via email: amanda.monahan@pepperdine.edu and samantha.wareing@pepperdine.edu
