The Daily - From DealBook: Alex Cooper on Building a Media Brand

Episode Date: December 8, 2024

The host of the “Call Her Daddy” podcast and founder of the Unwell Network discusses her interview with Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of the 2024 election, her podcast’s journey from chatting about sex advice to delving into more serious subjects and how the Unwell Network’s fan merchandise became a eight-figure business.“I don’t care if people consider me a journalist or a podcaster, or just a girl that talks online every week.”This interview was with Andrew Ross Sorkin of The New York Times at the annual DealBook Summit and recorded live in front of an audience at Jazz at Lincoln Center. Read more about highlights from the day at https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/12/04/business/dealbook-summit-newsUnlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Unlock full access to New York Times podcasts and explore everything from politics to pop culture. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify.

Hey, it's Michael. I'm here to let you know that this weekend, we're bringing you something a little bit different from our colleagues here at The Times. It's a conversation with Alex Cooper. If you don't know, she is the host of the hit podcast, Call Her Daddy. Recently, our friends over at the Dealbook Summit held a series of conversations between our colleague Andrew Ross Sorkin and a huge, varied, and prominent group of people. They do this every year.

But this year's guests included former President Bill Clinton, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, the chair of the Federal Reserve Jerome Powell, and the tennis legend Serena Williams. It was a fascinating lineup. All the conversations were important, but here at The Daily, we were especially struck by Alex Cooper and her insights into media, culture, and how power really works in 2024. If you don't know a lot about Alex Cooper, here's a couple of key facts. A couple years ago, she landed a deal for her podcast worth $125 million, and Time magazine has called her, quote, arguably the most successful woman in podcasting. Rolling Stone, meanwhile, has dubbed her Gen Z's Barbara Walters.

And right before the election, she quite memorably interviewed Vice President Kamala Harris on her podcast. Cooper sat down with Andrew Ross Sorkin to talk about her unlikely rise from hosting a pretty raunchy dating show to becoming what she is now, one of the biggest and most important voices in all of podcasting. So if you want to listen to any of the other Dealbook conversations I just mentioned, you can listen on our NYT audio app, or you can search for Dealbook Summit wherever you listen.

Okay, here's Andrew Ross Sorkin in conversation with Alex Cooper. I consider myself Alex Cooper. I don't care if people consider me a journalist or a podcaster or just a girl that talks online every week. I know what I'm doing is changing a lot of lives and I know a lot of women specifically have been extremely impacted by the conversations I'm having. So if you want to put me in the box of a journalist who just

interviewed the vice president of the United States, sure, put me there. This is Andrew Ross Sorkin with the New York Times and you're listening to interviews from our annual Dealbook Summit live event, recorded on December 4th in New York City. There we are. There you are. Oh my God, we're here. We're here. Kind of a different vibe.

It's a little bit of a different vibe. Just a little. It's just a little bit of a different vibe. Alex Cooper is here, and the reason we wanted to have her here today is that the media world is really shifting under our feet, who the public trusts, how they gather and get their information, who people are sharing their information with. The direction of travel seems to be moving towards podcasts and the reigning queen is Alex Cooper. She is the host of Call

Her Daddy. Her podcast is the number one podcast for women on Spotify with millions of listeners per episode. It's an, excuse me, an unbelievable thing. She recently inked a deal for $125 million with SiriusXM. She also launched her own media company called Trending and the Unwell Network. She's building an empire. So we want to thank you for coming and welcome the head of the Daddy Gang.

Oh my God. Thank you for having me. Hello everyone. So there's a lot to talk about here in terms of what's going on. I want to try to understand all this. You know, I went back and re-listened to your first episode ever. Oh no. Which was about sexting. Oh, what? Yeah.

And now you're being called the Gen Z Barbara Walters. So I'm trying to understand, if you could just help us, how this happened to you. And I don't want to say it happened to you because I think you did this. But when you started with the first episode, what you thought was going to happen? So I grew up and my father was a sports television producer. So I was like in a television truck my whole life. And I was like, I want to be a director. I want to be a producer.

I want to be in media in some capacity. I was making little short form movies my whole life. And then I played division one soccer in college. And so I had this obsession with working hard and creating films and content. And when I graduated, I got fired from my sales job, and it was the absolute best thing that ever happened to me. And I was like, what am I going to do?

I'm on unemployment checks. And I decided, okay, there's clearly a huge hole in the market. There's Howard Stern, and then there's no one for women, where women can actually feel like, oh, that is what I talk about with my friends when I'm behind closed doors. And we don't feel comfortable speaking about certain things in public because as women, we are at a disadvantage. Sorry, boys in the room, if you disagree, but it's the truth. So I started on episode one just talking about my life

and my sexual experiences, yes, but also it progressed to talking about my relationships and my friendships. But yes, it was very sex-heavy, and I was proud of it. I know it was salacious and I know it was out there, but I also am like a marketer at heart, and I was like, this is gonna get everyone talking, and then eventually I shifted the narrative,

but I think it worked. ["The First Man"] When do you think you knew it worked? Oh, I knew it worked when we published episode one. When episode one went up, the virality of the first three episodes was lightning in a bottle. I worked with Dave Portnoy at Barstool Sports and he was like, I've never seen something in my entire career.

Because again, it was just filling a hole in the market and that's half of the reason why I did it. You worked with Dave. I did. And Barstool. Yeah. How important, I mean, Barstool has become a force in the influence in this country.

What did you learn when you were at Barstool? You can never speak your mind too often on social media. I think when you think it's a little too much, go even farther. Like I think Dave, as crazy as he seems maybe,, he's really, really smart with what he's doing. He knows exactly the type of audience that he's garnered, and people hang on to every single word he's saying. So I think working with someone like that just made me recognize that what I was doing,

I could keep pushing it further and further, and there was kind of no limit. Did you ever worry, though, that you had gone past the limit? Oh, every week. I was like, ooh could keep pushing it further and further. And there was kind of no limit. Did you ever worry, though, that like you had gone past the limit? Oh, every week I was like, oh, was that a little too much? And I was like, upload. But it kept working. Well, so but that's a question. It kept working. So I'm curious what you think of just what's happened in the culture,

because the culture has gotten more coarse. It's gotten more crude. Yeah. People have been willing. Maybe it may be the argument is that People have been willing, maybe the argument is that people have been willing to have conversations they weren't willing to have before. Yeah. But there's also, it's changed the tenor

of the kind of conversations that people have. Is that good? Is that bad? What are we supposed to think of all of this? I think it's good and bad. I think when you look at social media right now, there's a lot of people that you can say, oh my God, they shouldn't have a platform,

whether they're spreading misinformation, or it's racist or whatever it is, where you're like, why the hell is that person given a platform? But I also think then there's the other side with what I've done with Call Her Daddy is, I am having conversations that have not been to the degree publicly talked about in a capacity

in a positive manner, right? Like mental health, we all now know like mental health, no, no, no. I'm sitting down with women who are talking about their lived experiences in such detail in moments where people are like, holy shit, I don't want to hear about this. This is, well, no, this is what's happening in real life. So listen and understand what's going on. And I think it's, if anything, moved the conversation forward to, finally we're having more authenticity and it's not just this like perfect facade.

But you pivoted away, dare I say, from the sexting stuff. Yeah. Right, like on purpose? No, I was like, I literally have nothing more to give. Like, I've said it all, I've given you all my tips, now what else is there to do? It wasn't on purpose. I literally like, I put it all on the table. I was ready to move on.

And then you became an interviewer. Yes. And one of the things I'm very curious about is you've done a lot of fascinating interviews. I mean, you ask, I mean, I like to think that I ask them occasionally tough questions. You know, you ask like Gwyneth Paltrow, Brad Pitt, or Ben Affleck.

Well, we all want to know. Like, I don't know. And so what I thought was so interesting about this is Christina Aguilera, who you interviewed, said that, quote, you feel safe to her. Yeah. Do you feel safe? Do you think that when you interview people you're a

safe place? Because I've been listening to a lot of these episodes and I'm not so sure. You don't feel safe? Do you feel safe right now with me? I don't know. Listen, I think that a lot of people, everyone is always fascinated, like how do you get this out of people? Like why are they telling you things that they've never said in media after 20 years. I think it's because I was raised by a therapist and my entire life all I did was this it was like sit down let's talk about your feelings and I think that's like

very taboo for a lot of people it's like don't talk about how you feel if anything don't acknowledge it ever and just keep it moving and when I sit down with people from the minute I open the door at my studio, I am so intentional, intentional about the way that I am speaking to someone, I am giving them all my attention and I'm actually listening to what they're saying because I genuinely care because I know the community that I have built cares. Every single thing

I do is for my audience, I live and breathe it. My husband is always like, we are in a relationship together plus a third, which is the daddy gang. All I do is for my audience. And so, yes, I think when a celebrity sits down, they're like, oh shit, you actually care. This is kind of refreshing. You're not like, all right, next question.

Yeah. But do you think of yourself as a, this is not, no, no, no. Do you think of yourself as a journalist then in a way, or do you think of yourself as an entertainer? Because the other reason I mention this is I think that there's this sort of interesting cross thing happening. And I don't know, to be honest,

because I grew up as a traditional journalist, I can't tell if I think this is healthy or not. Yeah, I think it's so healthy, first of all. No, I consider myself Alex Cooper. I don't care if people consider me a journalist or a podcaster or just a girl that talks online every week. I know what I'm doing is changing a lot of lives and I know a lot of women specifically

have been extremely impacted by the conversations I'm having. So if you want to put me in the box of a journalist who just interviewed the vice president in the United States, Sure, put me there. But I can also, I'm fine with podcaster too. Okay, so let's talk about that. You did just interview the Vice President ahead of this last election. You had tried to avoid politics.

I did. Or at least you said you were trying to avoid politics. And then what happened? Did they reach out to you? Did you reach out to them? Yeah, they reached out both sides reached out and They both so Trump reached out to oh, yeah, we had a zoom call with Trump's team. Tell us about that. I wasn't on it I was like, let me know how that goes. I wasn't I wasn't I wasn't on it

But they reached out and I think the interesting thought for me was what I have built, I'm the very competitive person back to my athlete nature days. I'm like, how do we keep ramping this shit up? And although I didn't want to technically get into politics, I did recognize there was a larger conversation that was directly impacting my audience, right? Joe Rogan has a conversation, he knows his audience. I know my audience. And it's a bunch of women looking for someone

to advocate for them every single day. And I understand people are like, oh God, like you're gonna focus the whole time on abortion? Yeah, I am. Because it's not about abortion, it's about women's right to their bodies. So I thought why not have on someone that could potentially have a huge impact on our country. And so I did it. It was fun. What did you do? I'm actually curious,

what did you think of the interview itself? I thought it was fascinating. It was the fastest interview I've ever done in my life. I was like, oh my god, I have 50 minutes. It was like 45 to 50 minutes with the vice president. And I like to get comfortable. Like I'm in it for two hours usually just like lubing the person up, like hanging out. Like we're getting cozy, okay? And with the VP, I was like, there was a clock on.

So that was a little uncomfortable to me that I was on someone else's terms. But overall, I thought it was a very incredible conversation and the amount of research and time I put into this interview was probably the most I've ever done in my career because I had fracking conversations written down. I'm like, ooh, we could go into this and this. But I, at the end of the day, ultimately decided

I just wanted to focus on women's rights. And I know some people were like, why didn't you ask her about the border? Go watch CNN. Like, I don't know. Like I'm going to talk about what's helpful to my audience. There's a little bit of controversy about that podcast because you didn't.

Do you know about this? No, what? Because in DC, this interview happened in DC. Yeah. In a hotel. Yeah, not in a hotel. It was like a random house. It was like a random house.

But apparently, you can tell me, they spent, the Harris campaign spent like $100,000. I did, yeah. You know about this? It's hilarious. To build the studio. Yeah, that's not true. To make it look like it was the studio that you used in LA.

My studio that is gorgeous in Los Angeles doesn't even cost six figures. So I don't know how cardboard walls could cost six figures. But do you think they did that? I mean, you saw it. Absolutely not. With love to them. Oh my God, it was gorgeous. But like, it wasn't that nice.

It wasn't like gorgeous marble like no that was not six figures. So Trump goes on Rogan. Yes. Do you think she should have gone on Rogan? I'm not the vice president of the United States maybe one day no just kidding. I don't know I think that's up to her I think like listen I think we had a great conversation I think she could have hung with him but I think at the end of the day they clearly had a campaign strategy that I wasn't in these meetings and I just did my job. Did you um have you ever have you ever gone on roguing yourself? No. What do you think of what do you think of what he does since you guys are you guys are basically head to head. Yeah.

Do you feel that way? Do you feel like he's your biggest competitor? I don't think of Joe when I'm having my morning coffee every morning, but I'm very aware of the comparison in the media. Every single article probably that's ever been written about me, Joe Rogan is in the same sentence, which great. I mean, he's one of the biggest is in the same sentence, which great. I mean, he's one of the biggest creators in the world.

I've never met him. We had like a little like family tie when we were at Spotify together. And I have a lot of respect for what he's doing. We'll be right back. You have a big deal now at SiriusXM. Yes. And some people say that one of the reasons that SiriusXM wanted to get you is because that you could become the successor at some point to Howard Stern.

What do you think of that? I just am like, I, oh my God, I was gonna say something saying like I have a vagina, but that was gonna be inappropriate. So, Pretette, let's rewind. I am a woman, like I don't need to keep being compared to these men. I'm like, I'm Alex Cooper.

I'm gonna be Alex Cooper all day. And if I happen to sit next to Joe Rogan or Howard Stern, put me in the middle. But I'm not trying to be the next Howard Stern. I think Howard Stern is so talented. What he has built is incredible. And I think what I have built is also incredible. So let's go back for just a moment in terms of this empire that you're building.

No, no, I want to go back to this. I was laughing at like, why did I just say that? This is the thing I think about all day. I'm like, why did I just say that on this stage? But it's okay. Just go back in time because one of the, so you're with Dave Portnoy and you're at Barstool. And I should ask, by the way, just because I think it's a fair question to ask, though.

I'm sure he would hate the question, which is there's been lots of things that have been written about Dave Portnoy that are not flattering, would be the politest way to put it. That is polite. I like that. What do you think of that actually as a woman who knows him and has also read these things and may know other people or know other things about that? I mean, I think I could ask every single woman in this room, like, what's been said about your boss? Probably similar stuff. If you think about any media company, I remember in at Barstow, everyone

was like, how do you work for Dave Portnoy? I'm like, should I go over to like, and then I named all the media companies ever. I was like, I have a point. Like, it's everywhere. It's not Dave Portnoy. So I think I was if anything, it's like, of course, that's what's being said about him and many men. Well, I hope it's not everywhere. Not you.

I feel like you're nice. Thank you. I'm trying. I'm trying. And so you're at your... I had too many coffees today. You're at Barstool. You're at Barstool.

And we should say, by the way, you had a partner originally. Yes. Sophie Franklin was your partner back in the day. And there was a riff, a break, which you can go read about, and there's a whole lot about that. In retrospect, do you think that was the best thing that ever happened to you? Do you find that very sad that you sort of started one way

and went another way? What's the, what's the likely emotional piece of that? Because a lot of people, and I think we have a lot of business leaders here who have partners or start with partners, end up without partners. And I'm really just curious how you think about that emotionally. I mean, listen, I think a partnership

is always going to be very difficult. I think anyone in this room that has a partner, even in life, like it could be romantic, it can be business, that is a very hard dynamic because you are two complete different people trying to come to one agreement. And when I started Call Her Daddy, yes, I had a co-host. And we were from very different backgrounds. We wanted very different things.

I was the crazy maniac being like, I've wanted this my entire life. I have never been more passionate about something. I'm going to drive myself through a wall until I get what I want. And I think we just had very different ideas of what success in our life looked like. I am a mother-fucker.

I am never gonna stop. I am going to be doing this till the end and then some. And we just did not align on what we wanted to do with our careers. And I think that's fine. You go from Barstool, you go to Spotify, and then you go to Sirius. Yes.

So tell us about what you're trying to build here. Well, I think what I've built is a lifestyle and a community of people, right? Like at first it started as an IP that had a catalog and it was many episodes of me talking about my life and then I started interviewing people and now I have a catalog that is obviously worth a lot of money, but aside from a catalog

of just content, what the content has built is a community of primarily women who show up every week and want to be seen and heard and want to engage with the content. And from there, I thought to myself, how can I build past just a show if I do have this community that wants more? And I started the Unwell Network,

which is now my company with my husband, and we have expanded where I'm now signing younger Gen Z creators to uplift their voices and I'm very particular about who I choose that will work at this company, but I'm basically curating more and more creators so that when someone goes to my network, they know who I am and they like my content

and so they trust me to essentially create a palette for them of like what else do you wanna listen to? Here you go, there's five other shows. On top of that, because of the community aspect, I wanted to launch live events. I think a lot of people think that Gen Z wants to sit behind their phones and they don't want to go to live events.

That's completely wrong. They want to be in person, they want to experience things. And so this past year and a half, I've launched two live tours that sold out in seven cities. And we've done live events. I did an event with the Red Sox where I showed up and we did an activation. We had more unwell jerseys on women than Red Sox jerseys.

Love you Red Sox. And the GM said it was the highest grossing night of the year aside from Pride. And it was on a random Wednesday against the worst team in the league. So it was a pretty big success. So it's live events. We have touring now. We have television shows.

We have movies. We have podcasting and I never sleep. There's going to be some other stuff, which I want to talk about in just a second, but I want to ask you this about building other stars effectively. Is the goal long-term to always have a show and to be the face and brand of this platform? Or you have Alex Earl now, who is taking off in a huge way. She may become massively popular, which would be great, I would imagine, for the network. Yeah. But how do you think about that long term? Would you like to build five or ten of those and then hang out and be the producer of those things? I mean, I think I will always be talking because

I literally can't shut up. But I love talking. I'm always going to be sitting in front of camera in some capacity, whether it's a podcast or it's a show on a streaming service, it can go either way. It's a talk show. I'm sitting, I'm talking to people, I love what I do. When it comes to the creators that I am signing, of course I'm always like, there's the singles, there's the doubles, and then there's the home runs and the triples, right?

And of course I wish every single creator would be a triple, but I also think there's something beautiful about finding a creator where I was at when Dave Portnoy found me. I was a really ambitious kid that wanted to work hard and had a vision and I think a lot of the people that I've started to work with I see so much potential in them and I'm there to just help them in any way I can mentor them because I've been through a lot. But I don't think it's I want to be the face of this. It's not an

ego thing. I just I'm pretty good what'm doing, so I'm just leading the charge a little bit here. TV. TV. You had a show during the Olympics. Mm-hmm. Do you want to do more TV? I love television, yes.

I have so many meetings, I would say every other week with writers for scripted and unscripted. I'm very interested in the television space, and I think it's something that my audience, yet again, like all I ever think about is my audience. Do they like to watch TV? Yes. Do they like podcasts? Yes. Do they like to go to concerts?

Yes. Do they like live events? Yes. Do they like merchandise? Yes. And so I'm constantly going into the avenues where I think I can explore for my audience. OK, I have a final question for you,

and it's actually about us, the legacy media. Okay. Oh, I'm very curious. I'm going to ask you for advice. Okay. There's a lot of people who say they distrust the legacy media and they actually trust you over the legacy media. Yeah. And I'm very us, what you would tell us to do. Oh, that's hard. I've been having a lot of conversations recently because people have come up to me asking like, why you and not, you know, like a news reporter. And what's challenging is when I was growing up with my parents, I would sit in our family room and I would watch the news with my parents and I

trusted the people and what they were saying. And unfortunately, yes, you're right, that has shifted. And I think there has been a wave of skepticism within the gens. I'm just speaking for Gen Z and millennials, honestly, like I think a lot of us feel like we're getting sold a crock of sh** every week because when someone is knocking at you every day like, believe this, believe this, believe this, and it's the only thing you're constantly talking about, people don't want to be told what to do anymore. I think Gen Z, the minds of young creators and adults and young individuals, people want to figure it out for themselves.

They don't want to be told what to do. And I think creators like me, I'm not having on a politician every week. So when I do, it's like, oh shit, we better listen to this, because they know I'm going to come at it from a perspective of I don't really have an agenda. So I think my advice would be finding a way when you

are creating or whether you are selling or in business, finding a way to find any form of humanity that is not so perfectly lined up that it feels like I'm getting sold a fucking ad like, come on, like this is bullshit. It has to feel somewhat more organic. And I know that's challenging. But maybe you should give those young interns more of a voice and maybe you should listen to them when they have some ideas. That was an organic conversation, everybody.

Alex Cooper. Thank you, Alex. Thank you so very much. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Thank you. Dealbook Summit is a production of The New York Times. This episode was produced by Evan Roberts and edited by Sarah Kessler. Dealbook Summit is a production of the New York Times. This episode was produced by Evan Roberts and edited by Sarah Kessler. Mixing by Kelly Piclo. Original music by Daniel Powell.

The rest of the Dealbook events team includes Julie Zahn, Hilary Kuhn, Angela Austin, Hayley Hess, Dana Prakowski, Matt Kaiser, and Yanwei Liu. Special thanks to Sam Dolnik, Nita Lassam, Ravi Matu, Beth Weinstein, Kate Carrington, and Melissa Tripoli. Thanks for listening. Talk to you next time.