Podcast creator Alex Cooper, best known for her successful Call Her Daddy podcast, is pushing further into original video with the launch of a self-produced competition format that will debut directly on YouTube, underlining her ambitions for the Unwell brand and the broader shift in how premium unscripted content is being financed and distributed.
Cooper’s media company, Unwell Network, is set to premiere Unwell Winter Games, a four-part reality competition rolling out daily from April 6. The series brings together 16 reality personalities and digital creators for a short-run format filmed at a chalet in Park City, Utah, where contestants compete in physical and mental challenges over four days.
Hosted by Adam Waheed (pictured), the show blends established reality talent with internet-native figures, including Anna Delvey and Dakota Mortensen, alongside alumni from franchises such as Love Island, The Bachelor and Dancing with the Stars. Contestants are split into teams, with both collective and individual cash prizes at stake.
While the format itself draws on familiar reality competition themes, its distribution strategy is more notable. Rather than launching through a broadcaster or streamer, the series is being released on YouTube, marking Unwell’s first fully in-house, platform-first production.
Unwell said the project forms part of a wider strategy to scale “self-produced premium content” delivered directly to audiences, while continuing to partner with traditional buyers on separate titles. The company already has projects with subscription platforms, including Love Overboard on Hulu and a forthcoming series for Netflix.
For the wider industry, the project highlights how creator-led businesses are increasingly operating across both sides of the market: supplying shows to streamers while also building owned-and-operated distribution channels. In this case, YouTube is being used not just as a marketing funnel but as a primary release window for the reality series.
Cooper’s strategy for the Unwell brand is at an early phase. The Call Her Daddy podcast has 2.1m subscribers on YouTube, and Cooper’s own YouTube channel has another 308,000 subscribers. By contrast, the dedicated Unwell channel currently has just 13,700 subscribers – despite launching in 2023. It will be interesting to see what impact the new Winter Games show has on the Unwell channel’s subscriber count.
