Ashley Flowers struggles to grow podcast empire

Ashley Flowers grew Crime Junkie into the second biggest podcast in the US, just after Joe Rogan. But behind the scenes, her podcast company Audiochuck has faced executive turnover, staff departures and growing pains as it tries to expand its true-crime empire. On a scale from -100 to 100, Audiochuck's employee satisfaction score fell from 27 to -34 by the second quarter of 2026. Staff say they've been pushed to the brink over stress and long working hours. One person even told me they threw up before presenting ideas to Ashley because she can be so exacting. Recently, Ashley also cancelled her second-most popular show, The Deck, to free up more time for herself, but also costing employees their jobs. It regularly received over 300,000 downloads per week. Meanwhile, her company is facing a lawsuit from a former programing partner. In a statement to Bloomberg, a company spokesperson acknowledged that the company has faced growing pains. They said that as Audiochuck has grown quickly "...its systems and processes haven't always kept pace, and Audiochuck has worked directly to address that." All of this is happening as Ashley faces more competition than ever. Audio podcasters are turning to video platforms like YouTube to find new audiences. Now the question is whether Ashley can adapt her podcast empire to an industry that's rapidly changing around her while simultaneously turning around her workplace culture.