Updated:
Tastemade
Tastemade, the food-and-travel media company Larry Fitzgibbon co-founded in 2012, runs a hybrid streaming-and-subscription business from Santa Monica.
Tastemade
Tastemade launched in 2012 under co-founders Larry Fitzgibbon, Steven Kydd, and Joe Perez, veterans of Demand Media who wagered that the shift to mobile video would create room for a food-and-travel brand built natively for smartphones. The company began as a studio producing short-form culinary and lifestyle programming before expanding into connected-TV streaming, ultimately licensing and operating its own 24-hour free, ad-supported television (FAST) channels. Tastemade operates under Tastemade, Inc., which has raised over $130 million in equity and debt financing over multiple rounds, including a Series E in 2018 led by Goldman Sachs' Merchant Banking Division and a subsequent investment from Amazon through its Alexa Fund (per Variety, 2019 and earlier filings). Revenue is split across advertising (direct and programmatic), content licensing, and a subscription product that combines recipe management, step-by-step cooking videos, and a social community for home cooks, putting the firm at the intersection of media platform and consumer subscription software. The company's strategy parcels into three connected lines: media, commerce, and technology. On the media side, Tastemade distributes programming across streaming platforms — Samsung TV Plus, Roku, YouTube TV — and retains a social footprint with roughly 300 million monthly cross-platform content views in its peak reporting periods (per the firm's advertising materials, 2022). Commerce includes branded content, shoppable video, and kitchenware partnerships that convert audience into consumer sales. In technology, Tastemade has expanded the subscription app with personalization features and AI-assisted recipe search, filing to integrate generative-AI tools into the cooking-education workflow in 2024. Tastemade's content travels across more than 140 countries, with a particularly strong audience in the US, Brazil, and the UK, and the brand has also built localized franchises in Japan and Latin America. Tastemade operates from dual US offices in Santa Monica, California, and Knoxville, Tennessee, with additional international production and partnerships often run through local content creators. The firm has shifted executive structure in reaction to a changing media-advertising environment; co-founder Steven Kydd stepped back from day-to-day leadership around 2022, leaving Larry Fitzgibbon as the public-facing CEO guiding Tastemade's reinvention beyond ad-supported video into direct consumer revenue. March 2023: Tastemade launched a new streaming partnership with Comcast's Xumo, cementing distribution across every major US connected-TV platform (per Adweek, March 2023). The company has been acquisitive when content libraries or audiences add density — it bought the rights to key food-travel shows and struck IP-sharing pacts — but the primary growth engine has been organic channel and app expansion. What separates Tastemade from incumbent food-media houses like Food Network or Condé Nast is a wholly owned first-party data pipeline. The company monetizes an audience it directly tracks across smart TVs, streaming apps, and a proprietary subscription product, making it less dependent on intermediating platform algorithms than many video-first peers. In this structure Tastemade is more akin to a vertically integrated consumer brand with a media arm than to a pure content studio.
General information
Firm type
Asset Manager
Year founded
2012
AUM
Undisclosed
Location
Region
North America
Country
United States
City
Santa Monica
Corporate office
Santa Monica, CA, United States
Additional offices
Knoxville, TN
Principals
Larry Fitzgibbon
Co-Founder & CEO
Steven Kydd
Co-Founder
Joe Perez
Co-Founder
Sector focus
Frequently asked questions
Is Tastemade a media company, a technology company, or a consumer brand?
It operates as all three, but the architecture tilts toward consumer brand with integrated media. Tastemade distributes free ad-supported streaming channels across 140-plus countries, while the Tastemade+ subscription app layers recipe management and instructional video into a paid experience (per the firm's official investor materials). That subscription piece — unmediated by platform algorithms — gives Tastemade a direct consumer revenue stream most video-first food brands lack.
Who backs Tastemade, and what do those relationships signal?
Tastemade's institutional equity backers include Goldman Sachs' Merchant Banking Division, Amazon's Alexa Fund, Redpoint Ventures, and Raine Ventures. Goldman led the Series E round in 2018, and Amazon participated as a strategic investor in a later round (per Variety, 2019). The capital table signals both media-distribution firepower and an ambition to embed Tastemade across Amazon's screens and voice-powered devices.
How does Tastemade make money when so much of its content is free to watch on social media and streaming television?
Tastemade monetizes through three connected lanes: advertising revenue across its owned-and-operated FAST channels and social video, content licensing to third-party platforms, and the paid Tastemade+ subscription product. The subscription app also generates behavioral data that makes the advertising business more attractive to brand sponsors and shoppable-video partners, creating a flywheel effect between the two revenue lines (per the firm's press materials).
Does Tastemade function more like a venture-backed startup or a traditional media company?
Its capital structure is venture-backed — Tastemade has raised over $130 million in equity and debt across multiple rounds — but its operating footprint more closely resembles a modern media group with a tech buildout. The mix of advertising, subscription, and content licensing pulls the margin profile closer to that of a streaming platform than a traditional production studio.
Which geographies and platforms matter most to Tastemade's audience?
The US is the revenue center, but Brazil and the UK have material audience bases, with additional localization in Japan and Latin America. Platform-wise, Samsung TV Plus, Roku, YouTube TV, and — as of early 2023 — Comcast's Xumo are the primary connected-TV distribution partners that deliver free ad-supported channels (per Adweek, March 2023).
How is Tastemade using generative AI in its product?
Tastemade began integrating generative-AI features into its cooking app in 2024, focusing on AI-assisted recipe search and personalized meal-planning suggestions. The company has publicly positioned these tools as a way to make its massive library of cooking instructional video more searchable and to drive deeper in-app engagement, though it has not disclosed exact user-adoption numbers (per the firm's official communications, 2024).
What is Tastemade's acquisition history or strategy for buying content assets?
Tastemade has not been a serial acquirer; it has made selective content-library and intellectual-property acquisitions where the assets deepen its food-and-travel catalog. The primary intellectual-property expansion has come through organic channel launches and partnership agreements, including deals to license and syndicate complementary cooking and travel series across its streaming footprint.
Profile maintained by Altss using OSINT (open-source intelligence), regulatory filings, licensed data partners, and verified direct submissions. Read the methodology. Last updated: . Continuous refresh with full update cycles at least every 30 days.
Need institutional-grade insight on family offices?
Altss delivers:
Prefer a guided tour?
We’ll walk you through: