“Podcast Studio Near Me”: A Chat With Brian Howie Who is Bringing New Media to the MULO World

Multi-location (MULO) marketing services storefronts are nothing new. Brands offer printing  and swag to small businesses and conference-goers, delivering flyers, brochures, posters, signage, and even tee shirts to consumers and companies. Companies like AlphaGraphics, Minuteman, Signarama, and Staples fulfill those needs. Custom Ink started as an online-only creative and production resource but now has multiple retail locations. In an upcoming article, We’ll cover “conventional” marketing services brands.

But now podcasts are a core marketing element; businesses, coaches, and consumers can have their own channels. In fact, 5 million podcasts exist worldwide, and nearly 90 million Americans listen to them weekly.

Brian Howie is a successful podcaster. His relationship podcast has run for about eight years, and he found himself helping others launch their own podcasts. He realized that the barriers to entry for the media were:

• Nowhere to record them and nowhere to professionally and affordably produce them
• Tremendous competition meant breaking through the podcast clutter was becoming more difficult.

That was his impetus for opening PodPopuli, which now has eight locations (Ohio, Arizona, and Florida), and more on the way (Atlanta, Nevada, California, and Connecticut). The company currently records more than 300 different shows each week, and each location grosses about $350K annually.

We spoke with Howie about why someone would go to a PodPopuli location rather than buy an in-home set-up or record at a local mom-and-pop studio.

“We have expertise in not just recording shows but marketing and growing them,” he responded. He refers to his customers as “talent,” and helps them find their unique brand voice, discover their audience, share their message, and move from conception to monetization.

PodPopuli distributes content on outlets including Apple Podcasts, iHeartRadio, Spotify, Stitcher, YouTube, Audible, and all other global and local podcast platforms.

“In 1999, everyone needed a website. In 2023, everyone needs a podcast,” Howie says. Although that may be a bit of an overstatement, the reality is that watching and listening to subject matter experts and entertainers has become part of the fabric of everyday business and personal life. Podcasts provide education and entertainment for commuters, lifelong learners, gym-goers, and even children and teens.

According to Pew Research, the number of podcast listeners has been growing steadily. A recent study indicates that as of early 2023, 75 percent of Americans ages 12 and older have listened to online audio in the past month, while 70 percent have listened in the past week.

What’s next in this MULO category? Perhaps conventional and digital media production — from printing to podcasts — will be widely available to consumers and businesses. The old “copy shop” may be replaced by an all-in-one DIY marketing studio, enabling everyone to be a star — if only for fifteen minutes.

In the interim, Howie has found a way to tap into the huge voice/video recording and dissemination market and is bringing high-quality podcasting to the masses.