In June 2026 Ashley Flowers called the staff together and told them she was cancelling their second most popular show. The Deck was at that time drawing over 300,000 downloads a week. It was not a content crisis. It was a deliberate choice.
In the same month Bloomberg published an in-depth investigation into Audiochuck, the largest true crime podcast business in the US. The picture painted by journalist Ashley Carman is a thorough portrait of what happens when a creator-founder tries to rebuild her business as an organisation.
From Crime Junkie to an investment firm
Audiochuck is built on Crime Junkie, the second most listened-to podcast in the US and number one in true crime. Ashley Flowers led it as Founder and CFO, not as CEO. She handed the running of the company to others.
In February 2025 Audiochuck took $40 million from TCG, its first external investor, at a valuation of roughly $250 million. The plan included expanding video production, new shows and growing headcount to 130 people.
Then came a CEO. Next was TV and Film Lead Matt Shanfield, formerly of Sony. Professional management had arrived to scale the company.
A year later
In her Bloomberg report, Ashley Carman summed up the results. Roughly 30 of 100 staff left over the past year, including the newly appointed CEO. The subscription model stalled at around 75,000 members. The Deck was cancelled. And the company faces a lawsuit from former programming partners.
Flowers told Carman that the decision to cancel The Deck, a show with excellent viewing figures, came down to balancing her private and working life. Her daughter made clear how much she was hurt by her mother's absence.
The rift between the founder and management
Audiochuck is not Audiochuck because of its catalogue. It is Crime Junkie and Ashley Flowers. For five years she built the platform entirely around one show and one host. Subscribers pay for her, not for a series.
Bringing in outside capital and professional management is a logical step for any company, but for a creator-founded business it creates structural tension. The investor and the CEO see a scalable business. The founder sees her identity. Carman summed up this rift at the end of her piece. “This story speaks to the difficulties creators have when trying to diversify their businesses beyond themselves, having to cede control and partner with new people.”
Audiochuck is for now the most thoroughly documented case of how the creator economy is testing whether creators can found companies, or whether they merely sustain the people who can.
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