SPOTIFY'S PODCAST BET TURNS INTO A SERIAL DRAMA

The prospect of podcast riches led to aggressive investments in celebrity deals and original programming

- Anne Steele

Spotify spent more than $1 billion to build a podcasting empire. It struck splashy deals with Kim Kardashian, the Obamas and Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. It paid $286 million for a pair of podcast studios and spent $250,000 and more an episode on exclusive shows to lure new listeners.

The bet hasn’t paid off.

Most of its shows aren’t profitable, according to people familiar with the matter, and the company has recently cut staff and programming to slow its losses. The company, which has struggled to report consistent profits, lost €527 million, equivalent to about $565 million, in the six months ending in June, on €6.2 billion in revenue.

No one in the business is making much money on podcasts, but Spotify, which has spent far more on the medium than its rivals, has more to lose than most. Spotify’s competitors, including Amazon, Apple and Google, tech behemoths with their own audio streaming services, have other, more profitable businesses.

Podcast revenue in the U.S. is expected to reach $2.3 billion this year, a 25% increase from 2022, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau, an industry group, and is expected to more than double by 2025. That represents a tiny slice of the $200 billion digital-ad market. Spotify spent its way to the top of an industry that turned out to be less lucrative than it appeared when it began its podcast quest in 2018.

“The size of the bet up against the size of the market just seems irrational in retrospect," Evan Shapiro, a media consultant and producer, said of Spotify’s podcast investment. “They’re out of runway."