Context: Call Her Daddy is one of the biggest podcasts in the world. For the past month or two, Alexandra Cooper and Sofia Franklyn were trying to get out of their 3-year deal with Barstool Sports. Dave Portnoy, the Founder and President of Barstool Sports, went on the podcast last night to breakdown what is going on.
These are my abbreviated notes from the latest episode, everything is from the perspective of Dave Portnoy.
Background:
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The first time I saw Call Her Daddy, I saw a clip on Alex's Instagram. I reached out to Alex and asked her about plans for the future.
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We reached a deal with Call Her Daddy to sign contracts.
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There was back and forth around the IP of Call Her Daddy. They didn't want to give us the name, but we didn't want to blow them up and have nothing.
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"We [Barstool] got the IP."
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Deal terms: 3 year deal, 70K base salaries.
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Every person we sign for talent. I tell them this:
At the end of the 3 years, best case scenario — "You are now a huge star and can negotiate with us for a lot more money OR you can go somewhere else."
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Call Her Daddy launches and is an instant success.
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6 Months In: Alex re-negotiated for a larger salary, but Sofia didn't get a raise.
After the 1st year of the 3-year deal, Barstool and Call Her Daddy started to renegotiate.
- The podcast is huge. We are starting to have contract negotiations for year 2.
- If you talk to anyone at Barstool, there is NOTHING we like more than renegotiating contracts. And paying talent more because they are doing well.
- We start the negotiations — "If you are unhappy with anything. Let me know."
- I get an email from their lawyers: "We don't feel Call Her Daddy were represented properly at the beginning and we shouldn't have given you the IP."
- After the first year, here is what they earned...
- Alex: $506K
- Sofia: $461K
- We specified in their contract that they would get bonuses based on download milestones.
- Lawyer's Demands:
- $1M guarantee for each
- They want to be freelancers and not Barstool employees
- 50% of everything that Barstool did for them (merchandise, ads, etc.)
- They wanted to be able to do their own merchandise and ads as well.
- Give them back the "Call Her Daddy" IP
At that point, Barstool cut off negotiations.
- That's when they started the trail...Alex and Sofia were shopping Call Her Daddy around to other companies.
- Barstool's stance was that if they went to another company, we would sue them. "We have a 3 year contract."
- "Like what company would sign somebody if the second they get big, they are just going to walk out the door."
Dave & Barstool Sports finally counter-offers:
- They hadn't put an episode up in a month, and they asked to meet. Alex and Sofia said they were looking to leave and I proposed a new deal. This was 3 weeks ago:
- $500K guarantee for each with generous performance bonuses.
- Increase in merch. They would get 7.5%
- I'd knock 6 months off of their contract.
- I'd give them "Call Her Daddy" IP.
- We get 80% of Call Her Daddy alcohol
- "I just wanted to get this thing going. I thought they would sign it there."
- They didn't take it on the spot...and they went dark. That's when the controversy unfolds...
- Alex asked to privately talk: "We are never going to get a deal done. Sofia is refusing to sign. She is going to continue to move the goal post."
- Sofia's new boyfriend (Peter Nelson) is a HBO exec. And he came into the mix and brought in his lawyers to help negotiate. He was "openly" shopping Call Her Daddy to other companies.
- Peter Nelson got them a new deal with Wondery — they were going to call it "The Fathers." Wondery knew that they would be sued. They were trying to use every trick possible to get out of our contract.
- The second that Alex told me: "I want to get a deal done with Barstool, I don't think I can get it done with Sofia" — I called Sofia told her that.
We started working on a new deal with just Alex.
- The deal we initially proposed was 50/50 between Alex and Sofia.
- With just Alex, we proposed 75/25 between Alex and Barstool.
- The Wondery deal fell through, so we offered Sofia her own podcast on the network.
- If you think you're the key talent then this will blow up.
- 1 year, 500K guaranteed.
- We just heard from lawyers instead.
- They were both going to stab us in the back despite signing a 3-year deal. I still tried to offer them new deals. I gave them a very generous 50/50 deal and it still didn't get signed...