Substack’s Manhattan office, located on the ninth floor of a nondescript Midtown building in the shadow of the Empire State Building, is small and spartan compared to many other media companies.
“Not what you thought our office would look like, is it?” asked Sophia Efthimiatou, the company’s head of writer relations, on a recent day. I was there to meet Efthimiatou and Matt Starr, Substack’s writer-relations producer, hoping they would shed light on how a venture-backed company founded by tech bros, whose most popular newsletters have millions-strong followings, has developed an events strategy that is incredibly niche and led by a former downtown darling.
