Ashley Weatherspoon and Ashley North didn’t think about their laid-back friendship would bloom right into a six-figure model, however what began as an unlikely bond on a “soccer wives” journey has grown into Ask Ashley, their extensively cherished podcast exploring womanhood, friendship, motherhood, and id with equal elements heat and wit.
With that in thoughts, we’re spotlighting their success story and shut connection for Black Ladies’s Historical past Month.
Each girls had been navigating the world of relationship skilled athletes after they first met in a world usually portrayed with glitz, glam, and shiny Instagram facades.
“We used to really feel unhealthy sharing the story,” Ashley Weatherspoon instructed BOSSIP with fun. “However now, particularly with all of the WAGs reveals, it truly is sensible.”
On a visit crammed with curated poolside picture ops and materialistic posturing, the 2 Ashleys discovered themselves craving authenticity.
“At one level, I turned to her and mentioned, ‘God, I want I had a joint,’” Ashley Weatherspoon recalled. “And she or he was like, ‘Rattling, me too.’” What adopted was a candid, sincere dialog — the primary of many — that exposed an actual connection past shared existence or social circles.
That single second sparked a deep and lasting friendship, one that might stretch throughout coasts and a long time.
At present, Ashley Weatherspoon and Ashley North, who refer to one another as chosen sisters, reside on reverse ends of the nation however keep intently tethered by fixed FaceTime calls and mutual help.
“We’re these associates you see memes about,” mentioned Ashley North. “We’ll simply sit on FaceTime folding laundry or selecting up the children. It retains us a part of one another’s each day lives.”
Their podcast Ask Ashley, now in its fourth season, has change into a sleeper hit and testomony to the facility of pure chemistry, not manufactured partnerships. In contrast to many podcast duos assembled by producers hoping to drive magic on the mic, the Ashleys’ bond was constructed off-mic first.
“We’d exit, and other people by no means needed us to depart,” Ashley Weatherspoon recalled. “One in every of our associates’ robust, no-nonsense companions truly requested dinner with us once more. That’s once we knew we had one thing. If we cracked him, we might crack a inhabitants.”
The podcast, which touches on every part from popular culture to parenting to non-public development, blossomed from that realization, in addition to North’s lingering frustration from her time on actuality tv.
“I used to be on a present about WAGs that promised I might present my profession and my life as a mother,” she defined. “However as a substitute, they painted me as a weak lady chasing marriage. That wasn’t my story.”
In actuality, Ashley North types a few of the largest names in sports activities and leisure, from Kevin Hart to Dodgers star Mookie Betts. Her profession, hustle, and motherhood deserve middle stage, and she or he knew she wanted a platform that mirrored that reality.
“Ashley had already created an area with Pricey Younger Queen,” she mentioned about Weatherspoon. “So we joined forces.”
The end result was Ask Ashley, a mix of authenticity and light-hearted perception that instantly resonated.
“We’re a very good time,” mentioned Ashley Weatherspoon. “And we’re not out right here simply speaking intercourse or participating in gender wars. We’re creating actual content material that displays who we’re.”
Their early $30,000 funding within the podcast was a leap of religion, nevertheless it paid off. Publish-pandemic shifts in media consumption, coupled with heightened funding in Black feminine voices following the 2020 racial reckoning, created a novel window for Ask Ashley to shine.
“All of a sudden, manufacturers had been on the lookout for our actual voice,” Ashley mentioned. “Not too raunchy, not combative — simply relatable, genuine girls talking their reality.”
Their voice proved magnetic. Main manufacturers took discover, and the podcast turned a uncommon monetary success in an oversaturated discipline.
“It’s surreal,” Ashley Weatherspoon mentioned “However we constructed this. We confirmed up each week. We didn’t let up.”
A lot of the podcast’s enchantment lies in its heat and its segments that permit listeners really feel like a part of the friendship. “Query Time” stays a fan favourite, an unfiltered trade that exams how properly the Ashleys actually know one another after 15 years. And for North, “TV Time” is an opportunity to indulge her inside critic.
“I’m mainly Roger Ebert,” she joked.
But maybe what resonates most deeply is the duo’s shared reverence for his or her moms, each raised primarily by robust, hardworking girls.
“Their affect comes by in every part,” Ashley Weatherspoon instructed BOSSIP. “How we guardian, how we transfer by the world, how we love.”
It’s these slices of actual life, sincere, unvarnished, and profoundly human, that make Ask Ashley greater than only a podcast and extra of a window into sisterhood and a celebration of what occurs when two Ashleys present up as their full selves.
Ask Ashley, which is a part of the Pricey Younger Queen podcast community, is on the market to stream HERE.
