How two college friends reunited to build a thriving politics podcast
Pantsuit Politics succeeded by not trying to cater to audiences in coastal cities.
Editor’s note: This article was produced by Carson Brunson, a freelance writer based in Nashville.
In 2015, Sarah Stewart Holland picked up the phone to call someone she hadn’t spoken to in years. She and Beth Silvers had been sorority sisters at Transylvania University in Kentucky, but since graduating over a decade earlier, their interactions had been mostly limited to Facebook likes and comments.
But as soon as they started catching up, Holland noticed they had the conversational chemistry that would translate well to a podcast. Before hanging up, she joked, “We’re not going to talk anymore unless we’re recording it.” And that’s what they did.
Both moms to newborns, they carved out late-night hours after bedtime to sit down in front of a microphone and talk politics on their new podcast, Pantsuit Politics. “It met a need for us,” Silvers said. “I was shocked that anyone was listening at all from the beginning. We really weren't trying to make a product. We would have never used that word at the beginning. It was just fulfilling to be able to sit down with another adult and talk about the news.”
More than 10 years earlier, Holland and Silvers went their separate ways after graduating from college in 2003 to attend law school. Holland headed to D.C. and, after earning her law degree, pursued a career in politics as a congressional staffer and campaign aide. Silvers practiced business restructuring law (a hot field during the 2008 financial crisis) before becoming an HR executive. Eventually, Holland moved back to her hometown of Paducah, Kentucky, to start a family and transitioned from politics to blogging. She launched a parenting blog with a friend and also had her own blog where she wrote about politics.
Silvers, on parental leave and spending a lot of time scrolling while feeding her newborn, followed along. “I liked how she would do a stroller review next to thoughts on the civil war in Syria,” she said. “I thought it was really interesting.” She decided to reach out to Holland to see if she could contribute a couple of guest posts. After reading Silvers’ writing and perspectives, Holland wondered: What else could they do together? Holland’s husband, an early podcast devotee, encouraged her to start one herself. While podcasts were gaining popularity, there weren’t many in the political space. After that initial catch-up phone call, the pieces came together, and Holland and Silvers recorded their inaugural Pantsuit Politics episode in November 2015. Just four months later, each episode was pulling in around 5,000 downloads.
Now, nearly a decade later, Pantsuit Politics is still thriving and has grown to include two full-time employees and a contractor. In a recent interview, Holland and Silvers discussed how they grew the podcast’s listenership, how they’ve monetized the podcast (including hosting a widely attended live event in Paducah), why they moved from Patreon to Substack, and what is (and isn’t) next for them.
Let’s jump into the findings…
Building a non-coastal audience
While the podcast primarily focused on politics, its appeal wasn’t just the subject matter. There was a unique dynamic between the hosts: Holland sat on the left side of the political aisle, while Silvers sat on the right. In their premiere episode, they introduced themselves as “a woman from the right and a woman from the left that accessorize the news with a fresh perspective.”
Despite their differences, there were no shouting matches or dramatic walk-offs. Instead, they approached every conversation with grace. In fact, listeners have described them as “America’s political therapists.” Their goal is simply to inform — not spike cortisol levels. (It’s worth noting Silvers formally withdrew her support from the Republican Party in 2019.)
Holland and Silvers initially recorded weekly episodes of Pantsuit Politics, but with how quickly the news moves, they soon transitioned to a twice-weekly cadence. From the start, episodes have been structured into three blocks:
Block one breaks down current events: What’s top of mind? What’s making headlines?
Block two is typically an interview or a deeper dive into foreign policy, a long-term trend, or a topic that isn’t necessarily front-page news.
Block three, called “Outside of Politics,” gives the co-hosts space to talk about anything — from their daily routines to pop culture to parenting. “It gives us a chance to just be full humans and also have a little bit of an exhale after what can be some intense discussion around politics,” Silvers said.
When it comes to choosing what to cover, Holland and Silvers have always focused on discussing topics that meet their own needs and curiosities instead of trying to predict what their audience wants. “If something hits and is bothering me, that’s a good indicator it’s going to be on the minds of our audience, too,”Silvers explained.
Holland echoed this sentiment, saying her approach has always been to simply sit down and have a genuine conversation with a friend. “I can honestly say I was not thinking about the audience, at least for the first 10, 15, 20 episodes,” she said. “It just wouldn't have worked — and still really wouldn’t work. I think some of the hardest moments are when I get too consumed with what the audience thinks. The podcast works because I am talking to Beth, and Beth is talking to me.”
As for how Pantsuit Politics attracted new listeners early on? “The name of the game back then was being featured by New and Noteworthy on iTunes,” Holland said. “When [Apple] did that, the audience found us very quickly.”
Other early boosts came when they appeared on Jimmy Williams’ podcast, DecodeDC. “I don’t know how he found us, but he really liked us,” Holland said. “He was going to start a podcast… so he reached out to us and was like, ‘You’re the experts… let’s get on and talk about this.’” At this point, Holland and Silvers had only been podcasting for about three months. Williams’ following attracted a wave of political news junkies to Pantsuit Politics.
An appearance on Jen Hatmaker’s For the Love podcast also gave Pantsuit Politics a lift. While Hatmaker’s show isn't focused on politics, her broad audience exposure introduced new listeners to Holland and Silvers. Even today, nearly a decade later, listeners still say, “I heard you on Jen Hatmaker,” Holland said.
Listener growth happened quickly. By the time they attended their first podcasting conference about four months after launch, each episode got around 5,000 downloads. “It was affirming to hear from the audience that was finding us,” Silvers said. “Our email would be people who work at the Brookings Institution, as well as moms who felt like they couldn’t stand the news but really wanted to know what was going on. That range told us there’s something going right here that’s interesting and worth continuing to explore.”
The Trump of it all has also contributed to the podcast’s growth. “It’s the bittersweet reality of my life — that this president that I hate is probably responsible for my career,” Holland said. “It was just an enormous amount of growth around his election and through his first term, for sure.”