Giggly Squad's SiriusXM Deal Prices the Creator, Not the Show
A reported $160 million multi-year deal, four sold-out Madison Square Garden nights, and a sleepwear label on the side: platforms now buy creator businesses.
SiriusXM's multi-year Giggly Squad deal, reportedly worth $160 million, treats the podcast as one arm of a creator business.
SiriusXM signed Giggly Squad in a multi-year deal reportedly valued at $160 million, and the show then sold out Madison Square Garden. [Giggly Squad's SiriusXM deal signals a shift from podcast networks to creator ecosystems — Digiday (November 2)]
Paige DeSorbo and Hannah Berner's podcast made SiriusXM its exclusive distributor in September, with the platform selling the show's advertising worldwide and new programming planned for 2027. Weeks later the duo sold out four live nights at the Garden. [Giggly Squad's SiriusXM deal signals a shift from podcast networks to creator ecosystems — Digiday (November 2)] [Paige DeSorbo: a SiriusXM deal, 51 Daphne styles, and nothing that renews — Built by Foundry]
The Garden run is the detail the industry keeps citing: Giggly Squad is the first female-hosted podcast to headline Madison Square Garden, and tickets averaging in the mid-$100s sold out across four nights. Digiday's read is that the deal isn't really about a podcast. Platforms are competing for creator-led businesses that combine audio, video, social reach, sponsorships and live events, and Amazon's investment in the Kelce brothers' New Heights is the same move in another jersey. Kelli Hurley runs podcast partnerships at SiriusXM on the buying side; the trade group Sounds Profitable's Tom Webster notes reach has been flat since 2024, yet 8 percent of podcast consumers started in the last 30 days, which is exactly the audience growth a creator brings with her. [Giggly Squad's SiriusXM deal signals a shift from podcast networks to creator ecosystems — Digiday (November 2)]
DeSorbo's own balance sheet shows the model: the podcast runs through SiriusXM, ad-free episodes sit inside SiriusXM Podcasts+ at $5.99 a month, and her Daphne sleepwear label sells 51 styles direct, none of it subscription, all of it hers. The network era paid for shows and rented the audience's attention. The ecosystem era pays for the person and everything attached to her, because the audience follows the creator across formats in a way it never followed a feed. A reported $160 million sounds like a podcast deal. It's better read as an acquisition price for a small media company with two founders. [Paige DeSorbo: a SiriusXM deal, 51 Daphne styles, and nothing that renews — Built by Foundry]
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