February 2021. That is when The Volume was born. Longtime sports talk host Colin Cowherd founded the platform, channeling his entrepreneurial spirit and enterprising tendencies to create a new and innovative spot for content creation. Despite operating in a media ecosystem replete with consumer optionality, The Volume has remained distinctive and sought to stand out with informative and engaging shows.
To celebrate the company’s success, an annual Wednesday night party preceding the Super Bowl was established. Audrey Chames, The Volume’s chief of staff, is responsible for putting the event together. This year’s event featured two floors packed with media professionals reflecting on the proliferation of this business venture.
“I always tell everybody we’re baseball scouts,” Cowherd said. “We find people that we think deserve better editing and production, and I think we’ve done a really good job. We’ve found executives and editors and producers and talent that have built a really strong company, and we’re getting bigger quicker. I like the direction we’re headed.”
One of the initial hires Cowherd made with The Volume was to bring on Logan Swaim as the head of content. Swaim joined the company after serving as an executive producer at DAZN, He also filled the same role for Good Morning Football on NFL Network. In working with Cowherd, Swaim feels that the team is empowered to look for new shows and talent, retaining a sense of creativity throughout the growth phase.
“His philosophy on life and work is to just pivot [and] be mobile,” Swaim said. “‘Don’t worry about being right, just get it right the next time,’ and so that allows us to take risks. ‘Be bold, take swings, we’re going to miss sometimes,’ and he’s never upset in those moments because he knows that we’ve learned something along the way.”
As someone with a comprehensive background in sports media and production, Swaim understood the advantage to a multiplatform content distribution strategy. At the same time, he foreshadowed the value of speed, thus constructing an infrastructure that allows for the haste taping and distribution of content. For example, when the Dallas Mavericks decided to trade superstar guard Luka Dončić to the Los Angeles Lakers earlier in the week, the team recorded five emergency editions of shows across its networks and promptly made them available to the audience.
“A podcast is not fully realized until there’s audio and video, so to me, we think of it as two different audiences, but the same content,” Swaim said. “To be on YouTube, which is a highly discoverable, algorithmic supercomputer for fans to find your content, is especially valuable now more than ever. Brands love it because there’s a visual medium there, there’s more inventory there, and on the audio side, fans love to consume products the way they always have – in their car, on the way to work, on the Subway – and so we need to be in both to maximize our audience.”
Cowherd started The Volume in partnership with iHeartMedia, agreeing to a deal in which both entities would co-produce the shows released through the network. The venture originally launched with five offerings, including Cowherd’s own podcast and shows hosted by media personalities such as Alex Monaco and Renée Paquette. In the years to follow, the company signed deals with athletes such as Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green, former NFL cornerback Richard Sherman and Notre Dame Fighting Irish teammates Kyle Hamilton, Cam Hart, K.J. Wallace and Conor Ratigan, and entered into partnership with Shannon Sharpe and his company, Shay Shay Media.
The Volume additionally partnered with DraftKings for the sportsbook to serve as the presenting sponsor of all podcast and video content. The company brought on additional advertisers to its shows, conveying that the built-in audience embedded with podcasts allows for successful brand integrations that deviates from traditional talent deal structures. Dane Aagaard, chief revenue officer for The Volume, who has built a direct sales team with 10 members in under a year, emphasized the manner in which the company does business.
“The process for me is always trying to identify not just bringing advertisers in, because they have a marketing budget, specific KPIs, but also trying to identify the brands that a lot of the personalities that I work with use on a day-to-day basis,” Aagaard said, “so when they do promote these products, it’s extremely organic, it’s super authentic, and that essentially turns into driving influence with their audience.”
Meanwhile, talent are spread across the country and given the necessary resources to produce stellar multimedia content. The remote staff is intentionally designed to rapidly produce content with minimal notice amid breaking news and other seminal developments.
“We’re a company that was founded by a talent – so we’re focused on making sure each show reflects the vision of each host via top-notch production support – from our head of production Alisa Harrison, head of digital Matt Kline and head of original content Andrew Samson,” Swaim said. “That’s what you get with a company founded by Cowherd – best-in-class people who work for the talent. Not the other way around.”
Talent across the network effectively serve as their own executive producers. Swaim aspires for those working with The Volume to market themselves and publicize the shows that they are building. On top of that, the company has social media teams posting content on different handles to maximize aggregate viewership. Cowherd and other brand personalities also promote content from The Volume, further bolstering the reach and exhibiting collaboration to meet the moment. The paradigm for evaluating talent has subsequently shifted amid the development of digital platforms, something Swaim feels is the biggest question in the business.
“If there was an exact science, everyone would be doing it,” Swaim said. “I suppose it’s kind of like being a GM of a sports team where we use a mix of analytics and the eye test. From there, we look for talent who are a cultural match with our team behind the scenes – hard workers, risk takers, coachable and completely authentic.”
Two years after its launch, Pro Football Hall of Fame tight end Shannon Sharpe teamed with The Volume to bring the Club Shay Shay podcast to the platform and produce new programming with his Shay Shay Media brand. Alongside former NFL wide receiver Chad “Ochocinco” Johnson, Sharpe started the Nightcap in addition to his other work. Swaim and his team work closely with Ashleigh Arnim, the head of content for Shay Shay Media, and consider the partnership to be a game-changer.
“He’s one of one,” Swaim said of Sharpe. “What he’s been able to do with Club Shay Shay and Nightcap over the last year is just a testament to his audience and his fandom, who is just along for the ride for whatever he’s doing now and whatever comes next.”
Cowherd has always had a penchant for building things. He surmises that he would try to be a general manager of a football team if he did not do this. In creating the platform, he has demonstrated a keen eye for spotting talent that can cut through and impact the overall viewing audience. Swaim regards Cowherd as looking for “young, disruptive talent” who facilitate expansion, and he recently added another venerated, proficient media personality to the roster.
Nick Wright, the co-host of First Things First on FS1, recently agreed to a deal with The Volume to bring his What’s Wright? podcast to the network, an enterprise that was previously under the auspices of FOX Sports. Wright has frequently been a guest on Cowherd’s programs, and he will now be working with him in this new capacity outside of FOX Sports.
“We needed another generalist, somebody that could talk about anything and smartly,” Cowherd said of Wright. “I think he’s a very unique talent.”
As the company moves forward and approaches five years in business, Cowherd has an idea of what he wants to do in different time frames but is refraining from communicating specifics. It aligns with a lesson Cowherd learned from George Bodenheimer, the former president of ESPN, the network where he spent more than a decade of his career hosting radio and television programs.
“I think companies make mistakes,” Cowherd said. “We have a clear view of what we’re doing that will develop over the next year. I think we tend to have two to three-year visions. I know what I want to do in the next six months, but I also know what I want us to become in the next two to three years.”
Aagard outlined that The Volume wants to add more shows and diversify the overall portfolio, pointing to potential verticals in the hip-hop and entertainment genres. Moreover, the company could consider additional podcasts for female audiences surrounding the WNBA and soccer. Swaim echoed that the company is aiming to move into new categories, one step towards which is a new music podcast coming as soon as next week.
“It just feels like the future of where all of the most creative people, both in front of the camera and behind the camera, are going to be,” Swaim said, “and we want to expand into new categories – music, entertainment, pop culture, comedy – and so there’s really no limit or no ceiling.”
Cowherd remembers his wife telling him that he acted more akin to a manager than a talk show host, and although he used to laugh about it, he recognizes how his passions align with the observation. A few years ago, he voiced that The Volume was worth more than $100 million and that he was not aiming to sell the company anytime soon despite reported interest from investors.
“There’s a certain responsibility when you run a company and own a company to create a great environment for people, and I take that responsibility very seriously,” Cowherd said. “So I love growth – I want us to be a 200-employee company or more – so I take it very seriously. It’s one thing to be a talk show host, it’s another thing to own a company and be responsible for those people’s well being. I love it. This is everything I dreamed it would be. I’m so proud of the team, and I think it’s a cool place to work.”
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Derek Futterman is an associate editor and sports media reporter for Barrett Media. Additionally, he has worked in a broad array of roles in multimedia production – including on live game broadcasts and audiovisual platforms – and in digital content development and management. He previously interned for Paramount within Showtime Networks, wrote for the Long Island Herald and served as lead sports producer at NY2C. To get in touch, email Derek@BarrettMedia.com or find him on X @derekfutterman.
