A look at Cameo's peak during the pandemic and subsequent fall due to its trouble recruiting big stars, CEO Steven Galanis' unfocused management style, and more
the service that lets you request a personalized video from Dr. Pimple Popper or Dennis Rodman—was valued at $1 billion in 2021. All it had to do was keep growing. What could go wrong? https://www.nytimes.com/... Sapna Maheshwari / @sapna : Cameo, the celeb video greeting app, has gone from a pandemic darling valued at $1 billion, with nearly 400 employees, to a husk of its former self. @eringriffith & i chronicled the startup's boom days and stark decline to 33 staffers and a hazy future: https://www.nytimes.com/... LinkedIn: Daniel Tunkelang : Cameo had nearly 400 employees at peak. As with Product Hunt, nice idea but hard to imagine as a VC-backed company that needed so many employees. … See also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
Cameo’s pandemic-era expansion turned personalized celebrity videos into a meaningful income stream for some talent, and the company later reported substantial transaction volume and broad creator participation. Its 2021 financing at a $1B-plus valuation marked the high point of that growth narrative.
The reversal had already become visible through a 2022 staff reduction and a later round of cuts that left the company with fewer than 50 employees. This account connects that contraction to the harder operational question behind the marketplace: attracting enough high-profile talent while maintaining focused execution.
First-order effects
- Cameo is operating at a far smaller scale, with its workforce down from nearly 400 at peak to about 33, limiting the company’s capacity to pursue growth initiatives and support a broad marketplace.
- Trouble signing major celebrities weakens the supply side most likely to draw fan demand, while criticism of management puts added pressure on the company’s strategic direction.
Second-order effects
- Existing and prospective creators have less reason to treat Cameo as a dependable supplemental-income channel than during the pandemic, when it was described as a gig-economy outlet for celebrities.
- Rival fan-engagement services can compete for recognizable talent by emphasizing better economics, distribution, or operational support, while Cameo must prioritize retention and a narrower operating model.
Third-order effects
- The episode suggests that celebrity marketplaces are difficult to sustain when pandemic-era demand fades: their economics depend on repeatedly securing scarce, recognizable supply rather than simply increasing the number of available creators.
- If this pattern persists, valuations and staffing in creator-commerce businesses will be tied more closely to demonstrated repeat demand and talent retention than to peak-period marketplace growth.
The trend: Cameo is one data point in the post-pandemic reset of creator marketplaces, where durable demand and access to premium talent matter more than rapid expansion.