What if food media got the Puck treatment? That's the question Max Tcheyan asked and Caper is the answer. Max is the CEO and co-founder of Caper, a new food and hospitality media company built on the premise that the food world deserves the kind of serious, insider, character-driven storytelling that business gets from Puck, that sports got from The Athletic, and that Hollywood gets from Vanity Fair. The characters are there. The stories are there. The journalism just hasn't caught up yet. Max knows how to build this. He was one of the earliest employees at Bleacher Report, grew The Athletic from startup to New York Times acquisition, and co-founded Puck, the subscription media company covering Hollywood, fashion, politics, and business with a talent-led model that changed how premium media gets built. Now he's applying everything he learned to the world he loves most: food, restaurants, and hospitality. In this episode, host Sarah Perkins sits down with Max for a conversation about what Caper is, why it needed to exist, and how he's building it. The founding team is a genuine Avengers assembly: journalists from The New Yorker, the New York Times, Artnet, Eater, and Bon Appétit who are equity partners in the business, not just employees. The editorial philosophy is built around what Max calls the "power triangle" of food: the hospitality groups (producers), the chefs and restaurants (actors), and the behind-the-scenes agents, the publicists, real estate players, consultants, and advisors, whose influence on food culture nobody is covering yet. There's also an underground chef competition happening in undisclosed New York City locations that sounds like Top Chef meets an underground rap battle. And yes, a podcast and video strategy is coming. This is one of the most forward-thinking conversations about the future of food media and food storytelling we've had on The Perfect Bite. If you care about what food journalism can become, and what food entrepreneurship looks like when it's treated like a tech startup, this one is for you. In this episode, we cover: Growing up with a northern Italian mother and grandmother and the Bolognese that got frozen and shipped to collegeThe double meaning behind the name Caper: the ingredient, the adventure, and why it elevated the brandDropping out of law school to join Bleacher Report as employee number five in 2007Building growth marketing before "growth hacking" was even a termThe Athletic: building a pure subscription model that sold to the New York TimesCo-founding Puck at TPG and what the talent-led subscription model taught himWhy food media felt like sports media in 2016 and why that was the signal to buildThe "power triangle" of food: hospitality groups, chefs/restaurants, and the agent classWhy the agent class in food, the publicists, consultants, designers, and advisors, is the most underreported story in the industryBuilding Caper's founding team: Emma Orlow, Chris Crowley, and Annie ArmstrongWhy equitizing journalists changes everything and protects editorial integrityThe subscription plus advertising model and why multiple revenue streams matterPartnering with Loewe as the first ad partner and the signal it sendsUnderground chef competitions in undisclosed New York locations: the events strategyExpanding beyond New York through contributors and category-anchored storytellingThe podcast and video strategy coming in the back half of the yearHis advice for founders: the hardest thing is to start, and the journey is the reward Find Caper: Website: caper.mediaInstagram: @caper.mediaSign up for free or join as a member - two subscription tiers availableMax on LinkedIn: Max TcheyanMax on Instagram: @mtcheche Subscribe to The Perfect Bite podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen! Want to watch the entire episode? Head here to our YouTube! You can follow us on social media @perfectbitepod and sign up for our newsletter!
