The youngest millennials turn 30 this year.
Betches, the quintessential millennial media brand, is celebrating its 15th anniversary, which means it’s now half the age of the primarily female audience that grew up on it.
The company has come a long way from its roots as a pop culture blog for millennial women. While Betches still runs a website, it has expanded into social media, podcasts, newsletters and microdramas, as well as into topics like politics and sports. Betches’ main Instagram account has 8.7 million followers.
The company says that its combined platforms now reach an average of 1 in 2 millennial and Gen Z women each month.
“We exist in the space of the creator economy meets young women, meets entertainment and culture,” Maggie Milnamow, chief commercial officer of Betches Media, told us on Thursday’s episode of Scalable. Before joining Betches earlier this year, Milnamow spent more than a decade at Business Insider and the New York Times.
As Betches’ reach has grown, so has its team, which is led by CEO and co-founder Aleen Dreksler. The company now has 70 full-time employees and has been adding to its executive ranks by hiring Milnamow and media executive Paul Josephsen as chief operating officer. It’s currently looking to hire a head of content.
The company also has 25 creators on staff, in addition to a separate network of creators who develop content. Many of the creators Betches works with have amassed tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of followers on their own accounts.
Take Jared Freid, who hosts the podcast “U Up?” with Betches co-founder Jordana Abraham. Freid has more than 500,000 followers on his personal Instagram account and landed his own Netflix comedy special in 2023. Then there’s Tess Tregellas, who has about 260,000 Instagram followers and will be part of the “Magic Mike Live” show on Broadway this fall.
“We sort of act as this incubator for incredible comedic talent,” Milnamow said.
Milnamow sees these creators’ success as an opportunity, even as some build big enough followings that they may no longer need the Betches brand. It’s a tension other media companies are also grappling with as they elevate the profiles of employees or start working with creators who already have large followings.
Betches’ approach seems to be paying off: Milnamow told us revenue is up 70% from 2025, though she didn’t share exact revenue figures. The company makes most of its money from brand partnerships, including with companies such as Dunkin’, Peacock and Pepsi.
Betches, which was acquired by UK-based LADbible Group in 2023, also has an official partnership with the NFL, which has increasingly been trying to reach more young people and women.
For Betches, the partnership has brought in new types of advertisers, including fast-food restaurants and CPG companies. It’s also a way for Betches to cater to female sports fans who are “unsatisfied by the coverage of their team, their sport,” Milnamow said. Betches is currently in talks with several other leagues about potential partnerships.
In June, Betches signed with CAA for representation. While Milnamow expects brand partnerships to remain the majority of its business, working with CAA will also help the company diversify revenue streams and experiences. That could include community, subscriptions, more live events—and maybe even Broadway.
We’ll be first in line for Betches on Broadway tickets if it happens!
For our full conversation with Milnamow—including what’s next for Betches’ business (hint: more M&A)—tune in to our latest podcast episode, embedded below or available wherever you get your podcasts.
The Great Re-Bundling?
Entertainment platforms are teaming up again. But instead of streamers banding together, they’re joining forces with social platforms.
On Wednesday, Disney and TikTok announced a partnership to bring creator and user-generated content featuring Disney characters and stories from TikTok to Verts, Disney+’s short-form video feed. The program will start piloting in the US in the coming months.
That follows YouTube’s partnership with NBCUniversal to include its streaming service Peacock in a new YouTube Premium subscription bundle in the US early next year. As part of the deal, NBC Sports will also be a production partner for certain live sporting events on YouTube.
These deals are very different, but they both reflect how the media landscape is converging. The problem is that consumer attention is heavily splintered across many different platforms, devices and types of content. In order to succeed, everyone needs to be a little bit of everything. Read: YouTube needs more premium content for TVs and Disney needs more short-form, creator content. (That’s why virtually all streamers now have TikTok-like feeds.)
For YouTube, the new bundle could also potentially boost its subscription revenue. In its second-quarter earnings report, parent company Alphabet said YouTube subscription sales are now growing faster than ad revenue, though from a smaller base.
This isn’t the first time that Disney has tried to open up its ecosystem to other platforms: It had previously struck a similar deal that would bring AI-generated Disney characters to OpenAI’s Sora. The $1 billion deal fell apart when OpenAI shut down Sora earlier this year.
We’ll have to see how these new partnerships play out. Verts will likely get a boost from TikTok creator content, but it’s unclear how long that will last—or how successful any of the streamers’ short-form video feeds will be.
While we don’t expect a mass influx of new subscribers to YouTube Premium just for Peacock, it could pave the way for YouTube to strike more deals like this. And the more streamers it has under its belt, the more compelling a reason it has for viewers to subscribe.
That could give YouTube one more talking point for why it’s the new TV.
The Round Up
Spotify now has 300 million paying subscribers, making it the first audio streaming service to reach that figure. But its stock fell after reporting second-quarter results on Tuesday due to soft user growth and increasing AI spending. That was a similar story to other tech giants this earnings season.
Substack’s legal support program for independent writers notched its first federal court victory, Axios reported. The Defender program helped Jeff Stein, the author of the SpyTalk newsletter, win a $1 million defamation lawsuit brought against him in 2024 by former CIA official Keith Bass.
Whatnot, a live shopping startup, is in discussions to raise new funding at a valuation of about $20 billion, Business Insider reported. This would represent quite the jump from the $11.5 billion valuation it raised at last year.
Whatnot, best known as a place for buying collectibles like Funko Pop figures, is one of the few independent live shopping startups that has continued to grow and raise new funding. (This week, the Wall Street Journal reported that some people are going broke bidding on items on Whatnot, including one man who spent $1.4 million after reviving his baseball-card collecting hobby.)
Adobe announced a plug-in with OpenAI’s ChatGPT that brings its tools such as Photoshop, Acrobat and Firefly directly into the chatbot.
Acast creators can now publish video episodes on Apple Podcasts. In early tests, the podcasting firm found that Acast creators’ podcasts that added video saw about a 25% increase in weekly sessions, meaning listens or views of their show. (Scalable is distributed by Acast and we’re excited to start publishing video episodes to Apple!)
Today in TikTok
• Perez Hilton, the celebrity gossip blogger, was rushed to the hospital after appearing to harm himself while streaming on TikTok Live. Deadline reported that the livestream continued for about 15 to 25 minutes before it was taken down. A spokesperson for TikTok US told Scalable that the company banned his account and alerted law enforcement about the situation.
• TikTok shut down its Nashville office after two years and laid off local employees. A company spokesperson told local news outlets the decision was made to “streamline its operations.”
Creator Moves
Alex Cooper will produce a new Netflix movie based on the adult romance novel “Deep End.” It’s the latest in a string of films and TV shows Cooper is producing as she expands beyond podcasting. Earlier this week, Netflix released “Let’s Marry Harry,” a reality dating show starring influencer Harry Jowsey, which Cooper executive produced.
Amanda Hirsch, the creator behind the “Not Skinny But Not Fat” podcast, was named the host of Hulu’s reality TV podcast “Get Real.” The weekly show includes interviews with celebrities, pop culture commentators and stars from Hulu reality shows.
MrBeast’s chocolate brand Feastables teamed up with Liquid Death on a new peanut butter-cup flavored sparkling water. Liquid Death has tried unconventional flavors before, like hot fudge sundae.
Talent Tracker
Exits
Nikita Bier, head of product at X, is stepping down after about a year. He will remain an advisor to the company. It’s not yet clear who will take over his role.
Corie Henson, who led MrBeast’s studio division, is leaving after about a year, Deadline reported. She is moving back to Los Angeles after spending most of her time at the YouTuber’s headquarters in Greenville, North Carolina. Henson worked on his reality competition show “Beast Games.”
Jack Sylvester, an executive producer for Steven Bartlett’s “Diary of a CEO” podcast, is among four key staffers that have exited over the past five months, Business Insider reported.
Ashla Soter, head of production at Tubi, is leaving the company after three years. She didn’t announce next steps.
Hires
David Brinker is joining Pinterest as global head of content later this month. Previously, he was chief business officer at AI chatbot startup Character.AI and VP of content and partnerships at Snap.
Lexie Riegelhaupt joined LinkedIn as director of brand and creator partnerships. Previously, she was VP of brand at Weight Watchers and Adobe’s head of entertainment and culture marketing.
