The Between Two Beers podcast started with just a microphone, a few bottles and 25 years of friendship. Little did hosts Steve Holloway and Seamus Marten know it would become one of Aotearoa’s most popular listens.
‘How many beers do you go through each recording?” Given the podcast’s title, when does the drinking start?
“We record on Thursday morning at 9am, I’m not going to have a beer at that time,” says Steve Holloway, co-host of Between Two Beers.
Alongside Seamus Marten, the podcast started in their garage with a $200 microphone. What links them? Twenty-five years of friendship, starting in high school.
Holloway, a former journalist and Marten, who dedicated his time to football administration, were craving something creative.
The reason for a podcast? The friends wanted to have a point of difference by doing something longer-form in a digital world swarming with bite-sized bits on TikTok and Instagram Reels.
At first, they invited friends who they played football with – including Aaron Scott, who also happens to play for the All Whites. Next, they invited their high school football coach Paul.
“We realised that putting a microphone on a table and inviting someone to talk about their life, it just created these epic conversations,” says Holloway.
“Now it’s kind of got to a place five years later where it’s our full-time job. We have a big audience of around 160,000 listeners a month. And have over four million downloads. It’s just a snowball that has kept building and building. We now talk to the most interesting and exciting and successful people in New Zealand.”
Big stars on the mic
The podcast has moved away from the pair’s inner circle. Now it features interviews with some of Aotearoa’s biggest stars, including Dame Lisa Carrington, ex-All Blacks star Marc Ellis, international model Rachel Hunter and rugby coach extraordinaire Sir Wayne Smith.
Air New Zealand CEO Greg Foran recently featured. He was even indoctrinated into the “Hambassador club”, an exclusive gang the pair started. Any guest with the slightest link to Hamilton is made an honorary ambassador of the city.
The podcast is popular, but it took a while to see a return.
How long did it take to make the $200 back from the microphone? Holloway says, despite the success, they didn’t start making money until three years in.
“We would’ve lost money across those first three years,” he laughs.
“But we just did it because we loved it, it became our favourite part of the week.”
Switching partners
Realising the opportunity for monetisation, the pair looked at joining the Alternative Commentary Collective (ACC), a sports entertainment company owned by several commentators.
Between Two Beers was able to access the ACC’s large following and partner on a revenue-sharing model, taking a percentage of any profit.
Later, the podcast left ACC and moved to iHeartRadio, part of NZME, after realising that the show had extended its boundaries and no longer aligned with the sports entertainment brand.
“A big part of why the show is where it is today is because of the help NZME gave us along the way. That shop window was able to grow bigger and bigger,” Holloway says.
During the podcast’s tenure at iHeartRadio, Holloway and Marten realised they could run the podcast themselves.
An opportunity to grow
Having already been selling themselves, doing the marketing and paying themselves, the pair realised they didn’t need a large media company supporting them.
“What we needed NZME for initially, but didn’t need it quite so much three years in,” he says.
“One of the things that held us back a little bit was that we were under the NZME umbrella. In the New Zealand media industry, it can be quite competitive with other media outlets, so we couldn’t do stuff with organisations.”
At the end of 2024, the pair were approached by Ryan Lamont, Senior Podcast Development Manager for Acast (Aus/NZ), a global podcast company that sees itself as a marketplace that builds technology to connect creators, advertisers and listeners.
Holloway explains that the podcast at that stage fit well with Acast and their offering.
Between Two Beers and Acast are now under an arrangement where Marten and Holloway can continue selling to clients and sponsors how they see fit while Acast sells the backend.
This was a win-win for both partners. Onboarding Between Two Beers was exactly what
Acast needed as it continues to grow in Aotearoa.
“Marten and Holloway are the ideal partners for Acast in terms of audience scale, podcast quality and host authenticity, with them acting as the keystone for our expanded focus on the New Zealand market,” says Lamont.
Podcasting: a place to thrive
“New Zealand’s media landscape has gone through a drastic period of change. As we’ve seen news shows end and jobs lost, owning your own IP, format and audience in the podcast space is more and more appealing.
“You don’t need a network or production company to greenlight your concept, it’s a medium that independent creators thrive in.”
Though it is the beginning of their partnership, the opportunities for Between Two Beers are endless.
With the backing of Acast, Marten and Holloway are more equipped than ever to continue their journey on their own terms, even if it means finding more Hambassadors to start promoting the city globally.
“Hamilton might be a harder sell in America, but they won’t know about it, so we can say whatever we want.”
This story was published in NZ Marketing magazine issue 82, March-April 2025. Why not subscribe? Get four issues a year delivered for just $50 if you autorenew. Essential marketing intelligence. Don’t miss it.
