Substack says it may very well be worthwhile — nevertheless it nonetheless isn’t

Substack nonetheless isn’t worthwhile regardless of attracting huge names within the unbiased author world, whose newsletters and blogs rake in a large digital subscriber base for the platform. Hamish McKenzie, one in every of Substack’s founders, informed The New York Instances that it might select to be worthwhile however is focusing as an alternative on “investing in and persevering with to develop the enterprise.”

In line with the Instances, X proprietor Elon Musk provided to amass Substack throughout a telephone name with its CEO, Chris Greatest, in April 2023. Musk even reportedly recommended making Greatest “chief government of the mixed firm,” however Greatest turned down the provide.

Substack has repeated the road that it might select profitability if it needed for years. Greatest mentioned on Nilay Patel’s Decoder in 2020 that the corporate might develop into worthwhile “rapidly” if its bills didn’t develop. However its “focus has at all times been on being very comfortably default alive” — that’s, rising and gathering investments. He additionally mentioned, “…except you may elevate cash, the corporate goes to finish.”

The Instances particulars a number of current strikes the corporate has made to develop its enterprise and shore up funds. These embrace elevating cash from its writers (one thing Axios reviews it not too long ago did once more), beginning its personal Twitter competitor, Notes, and betting on political content material, which has accomplished nicely on the platform. The Instances writes that Mehdi Hasan’s Substack-hosted political outlet Zeteo is ranked fifth on the politics leaderboard, “producing about $3.9 million” yearly.