Last month, the Duchess of Sussex announced her new podcasting deal with Lemonada, a female-operated company and home to mostly women podcasters. I said at the time that Meghan made the choice to go for an offer with less money, likely because she wanted to give a boost to Lemonada. I’m sure Audible was interested, and probably several other podcasting platforms. One of the funniest things about Meghan’s move to Lemonada was that we learned that Archewell owns the archives of Meghan’s first podcast, Archetypes. Spotify never owned Archetypes, so now Meghan has brought Archetypes to Lemonada and that podcast can be heard on multiple platforms, as you can see by the change in watermarks/branding. Obviously, various “experts” are trying to make all of this sound bad:
Meghan Markle and Prince Harry have been busy since stepping back as senior working royals. Following the early end of her Spotify deal last year, the Duchess of Sussex is relaunching her podcast career with a new streaming network – but could face a £16million loss. Meghan has signed with American podcast network Lemonada Media to create new content, and her old 12-episode Archetypes episodes will also be distributed by the firm. But while her previous Spotify gig was worth around £18million, her new contract could be worth significantly less.
Branding expert Andrew Bloch told Fabulous: “The Lemonada deal is believed to be worth much less than the former Spotify deal. While the couple were paid around £18million by Spotify, Lemonada’s total revenue across all of its podcasts was around $8million (£6.3million) last year.”
Although the deal’s worth is not yet known, Andrew estimated: “Meghan’s new deal could be worth roughly 10 per cent of Spotify deal, so around £1.9million.”
When the Duchess of Sussex signed onto the Spotify deal, she joined the likes of former US President Barack Obama. Meanwhile, Lemonada showcases podcasts from former Seinfeld actress Julia-Louis Dreyfus and Nickelodeon child star Jenette McCurdy.
Yeah, signing up with Lemonada means less money, but what else does it say to you? It says to me that Meghan enjoys podcasting so much that she’ll do it for less money. It says that the money isn’t the point of it. It says that she would rather work with a female-led company than the toxic bros at Spotify.
Photos courtesy of Cover Images, Archetypes posters courtesy of Spotify and Lemonada.