Gimlet Media

History

Gimlet was founded in August 2014, and was originally billed as the American Podcasting Corporation (APC). Blumberg was eventually convinced to change the company's name. After working with Lexicon Branding, Blumberg and Lieber chose the name Gimlet Media for the venture.

The company has raised $1.5 million in seed funding at a $10 million valuation. After raising most of its initial capital from investment firms Betaworks, Lowercase Capital, and Knight Enterprise Fund, Gimlet invited the listeners of its shows to help raise the last $200,000 through crowdfunding platform Quire. The company is estimated to bring in $2 million in advertising revenue in 2015.

In December 2015, Gimlet closed a Series A round of funding that raised $6 million at a $30 million valuation.

In July 2015, Gimlet announced it would add the option to pay for membership, a decision motivated by a desire to diversify revenue streams to include more than advertising. Members are given early access to pilots for new Gimlet shows, as well as other benefits. Gimlet is exploring other ways to diversify its revenue.

People

Alex Blumberg, an award-winning radio journalist, producer for This American Life, and co-founder of Planet Money, came up with the idea of a for-profit podcast network after the success of a t-shirt fundraising campaign for Planet Money. He chose to document the foundation of Gimlet in the first season of StartUp, the company's first show.

Gimlet's co-founder, Matthew Lieber, holds an MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management, is a former radio producer at WNYC, and worked as a management consultant with the Boston Consulting Group.

Current shows

^* Science Vs was originally launched and produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) as part of ABC Radio's First Run digital-first podcast program, before Gimlet announced in October 2015 the podcast was moving to and relaunching on their network in 2016.

StartUp

StartUp's first episode aired on September 5, 2014, and was hosted by Alex Blumberg. Through documentary-style storytelling, the podcast shares Blumberg's experience building Gimlet Media from an idea through to a startup business. In episode 12 of season 1, Blumberg announced his new co-host, Lisa Chow.

The second season of StartUp focused on online dating company Dating Ring. Dating Ring differentiates itself from other dating companies by offering access to offline matchmakers, as opposed to purely algorithm based date-generating. The company was incubated at Y Combinator. The second season explored the difficulties of gaining success in the competitive online dating market, as well as the sexism ingrained in Silicon Valley culture. The third season changed the format, exploring a different business every episode, while the fourth season, starting in November 2016, will focus on American Apparel founder Dov Charney.

Reply All

On November 24, 2014, Gimlet's second show, Reply All, made its debut. The show is billed as "a show about the internet," and is hosted by PJ Vogt and Alex Goldman. Vogt and Goldman previously worked on WNYC's On The Media before creating and hosting the technology and culture podcast TLDR.

Surprisingly Awesome

Gimlet launched Surprisingly Awesome, originally featuring Adam Davidson and Adam McKay, on November 3, 2015. Producer Rachel Ward filled in for Davidson or McKay throughout season 1 when one or both were unavailable. On October 5, 2016, Ward announced at the beginning of season 1 episode 22 that Davidson and McKay had left the podcast. In episode 23 on January 19, 2017, Ward announced that she would be moving on to another Gimlet project.

The premise of the show is to take something that on the face of it is uninteresting, and by exploring its story, show that it is actually of interest.

Science Vs

In October 2015, it was announced that the podcast "Science Vs" hosted by Australian science journalist Wendy Zukerman would move to Gimlet Media after previously having a season of the show produced by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) as part of ABC Radio's First Run digital-first podcast program.

The program dissects fads that are framed as scientific facts. The second season started on July 28, 2016.

Heavyweight

In September 2016, Gimlet released the first episode of the podcast Heavyweight with Jonathan Goldstein. The company describes the format as stories "about journeying back to the moment when everything went wrong."

Homecoming

Homecoming, announced in November 2016, is Gimlet's first fictional podcast. A six-part thriller starring Catherine Keener, David Schwimmer and Oscar Isaac.

Crimetown

The third new series in Gimlet's line-up for the fall of 2016 is a documentary series "centered on organized crime", with the first season focusing on Providence, Rhode Island.

Twice Removed

Twice Removed is Gimlet's first family history podcast, which aims to prove "we're one big family." The show was announced on December 5, with the first season debuting on December 16, 2016.

Mystery Show

Mystery Show, Gimlet's third show, was launched on May 22, 2015. The show featured host Starlee Kine solving mysteries that could not be solved by using the Internet, brought to her by listeners and friends. The mysteries tended to deal with missing objects, people, or other day-to-day questions, eschewing the season-long investigation of a serious crime, as done in Serial.

The final episode of Mystery Show's first season was released in July 2015. On October 6, 2016, Alex Blumberg announced on the fourth season premiere episode of StartUp that Mystery Show had been canceled.

Sampler

In January 2016, Gimlet launched the podcast Sampler, hosted by Brittany Luse, which, according to the producers, was "devoted to bringing you the best moments from the world of podcasting" by presenting excerpts from other, non-Gimlet podcasts and interviewing their makers. On October 17, 2016, Blumberg and Luse announced on the Sampler season finale that the podcast had been canceled.

Undone

In November 2016, Gimlet described their new documentary series Undone as a show about "the things that happened when you weren't looking." It was hosted by Pat Walters who'd previously been a producer for Radiolab. For the show's season finale, Walters announced that Undone would not be returning for another season.