Good morning. Miles Riehle, the creator behind the X account that posts a clip of Daniel Craig saying, “ladies and gentleman, The Weeknd,” every Friday, is shutting down his account. More than four years, 150 tweets, and 500K followers later, Riehle’s account was one of the longest-running bits on the platform. One thing's for sure…this Friday won't be the same without him.

— Hannah Doyle 

How Recho Omondi Is Growing a Podcast into a Media Company

Fashion designer Recho Omondi has taken the podcast road less traveled—she started the fashion interview show The Cutting Room Floor (TCRF) in 2018, went exclusively on Patreon in 2021, and waited until last year to add video. 

Omondi told us more about how going against the grain has paid off →

Launching video has significantly grown TCRF’s audience. Omondi started posting video-first episode clips to Instagram last year. On TikTok, her videos comparing fashion to sports and showcasing her leather-bound fashion decks have topped 1 million views, and she’s tallied nearly 200K followers and 5 million likes.

• “I don’t think there’s anything like a clip going viral on social media,” Omondi told us. “So that’s been really effective and it really made audiences build a familiarity with my face as I’m the constant, and the guest is the variable.” 

• Proof of concept: Last month, Patreon offered to host a members-only live event for TCRF in NYC. The company booked a venue with a 100-person capacity. Over 600 people RSVP’d and showed up from cities like Atlanta and DC—with a line out the door. 

Keeping it exclusive plays to the premium advantage. “I think a lot of people use Patreon as an early release, which I think is so futile,” Omondi said. “That doesn’t seem like a competitive play to me. So I use Patreon as a completely different offering.”

• Even as TCRF expands into new (and free) content verticals, patrons will still get exclusive video podcast episodes and audio monologues with details on Omondi’s personal life and a look behind the scenes.

• “I like to see it as two different platforms competing with each other. You don’t want one to be a replica of the other,” Omondi said. “That way your core audience isn’t only paying attention to you on Patreon—they’re going to want both episodes.”

Looking ahead: This year, Omondi plans to grow her team and add fashion news reporting, on-location interviews, and more sponsorships to TCRF.

“I’m trying to fill that gap where you can care about fashion but also be fed something of substance,” Omondi said. “I think education is so important so I think about how the audience can extract something from me—whether it’s a financial figure or something you never knew before—that to me is the value proposition.”

Why Graham Stephan Closed His Coffee Company

When finance creator Graham Stephan started Bankroll Coffee four years ago, it was an instant hit—it made $100K in its first weekend and brought in $30-40K/month over the next year and a half with limited marketing.

So why is Stephan shutting down Bankroll? He explained in a recent video →

Increased overhead costs: In recent years, costs including coffee, shipping, and marketing on Facebook and Google increased significantly. 

“The more I learned about the coffee business, the more I realized just how difficult it would be to scale off my own name,” Stephan said. “We’d have to keep raising prices and keep pushing more sales just to make it sustainable, which is why at the end of the day we decided to shut it down.”

Lack of passion: “My creativity and passion was really in creating YouTube videos, it wasn’t in building a standalone product,” Stephan said. “That’s why [creator Maxx Chewning] sold [his Sour Strips candy brand] to Hershey, and I'm in my guest bedroom making YouTube videos.”

Zoom out: Stephan, who’s been on YouTube for eight years, has spoken extensively about his plans to post less frequently and narrow his focus to fewer projects. 

“As a result of simplifying, those few things end up doing so much better,” Stephan said. For example, his podcast, The Iced Coffee Hour, hasn’t missed a weekly upload in almost five years and counted over 200 million views in the last year alone.

Platform News: Tumblr Takes on TikTok, Adobe Revamps Search

Tumblr released a video feed called Tumblr TV last week. In line with the recent flurry of platforms launching vertical feeds, Tumblr told TechCrunch it saw a 35% increase in iOS app installs and a 70% increase in new users joining its Communities feature after last weekend’s TikTok pause.

Adobe loaded its Premiere Pro search panel with AI-powered “Media Intelligence,” which lets users find specific scenes, spoken words, or metadata in a video by describing the footage. 

RedNote reportedly pitched US creators to promote the China-owned social media platform ahead of the TikTok ban with sponsored videos. Payment details are scarce, but according to Wired, posts had to be left up for at least six months. Since last week, RedNote has risen to the top 10 of US app store charts.

👀 Creator Moves

• Design creator Ana Inciardi is hiring a part-time social media manager to grow her design brand across platforms. 

• Running creator Kate Mackz is looking for a part-time thumbnail designer to create graphics for her YouTube channel.

• Mythical is hiring a culinary intern with a background in production and/or culinary arts.

Looking to bring on new team members? You can post opportunities on our (free) job board here.

🔥 Press Worthy

• Alix Earle launches a skinny jean with FRAME.

• CES^® 2025 was a milestone moment of creators' growing influence in tech. Learn why.*

• Good Good kicks off a Survivor-style golf competition series.

• Cleo Abram reaches 5 million YouTube subscribers.

• Social commerce platform Flip opens a $100 million creator fund.

• WNBA forward Cameron Brink is launching a podcast with creator (and Steph Curry’s sister) Sydel Curry-Lee.

_{*This is sponsored advertising content.}