
#142 - Soph Greiner & Bella Filacuridi (Dome): How Two Young Founders Created Australia's First Ever Podcast Festival
Sweat CapitalShow Notes
In this episode of Sweat Capital, we sit down with Sophie Greiner and Bella Filacuridi, co-founders of Dome, to unpack what it actually takes to build a business inside one of the fastest-moving corners of media – the $130bn global podcast industry.
Podcasts have quickly become one of the most powerful vehicles for community, identity, and cultural conversation in the world, and yet the commercial value of genuine fandom has still not been fully recognised.
Enter: DomeFest – Australia's first-ever podcast fan festival, held earlier this year at Sydney's Hordern Pavilion.
We dive into how two founders with zero event experience convinced the country's biggest podcast talent, and the team behind Lost Paradise, to back their vision, and why the turnout (with attendees flying in from across Australia & New Zealand) convinced them the IRL opportunity might be even bigger than the platform itself.
We also explore the commercial thesis driving Dome, why an engaged audience of 10,000 diehard listeners is worth more to a brand than a show reaching the masses, why podcast hosts are trusted more than influencers, and why the next wave of value in the industry will flow to communities, not download counts.
For founders, creators, marketers, or anyone thinking about community, media, or how to carve out a category in an industry dominated by legacy players, this episode is a rare look at how two young operators in their early twenties are turning shared obsession into commercial opportunity by building something Australia has never seen before.
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This episode was recorded on 17 April 2026.
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