Rey Katz moved Amplify Respect from Substack to Ghost in June 2025. On 10 June they told readers the public URL would stay amplifyrespect.com. Two weeks later they published the cutover note: the newsletter was now running on Ghost.
They said the switch was trickier than they expected. They also said they paid more than they expected.
If you are looking at the same route, start with the Substack → Ghost playbook. Rey’s public posts are the field report for the reader-facing parts. The rest of their how-to is now members-only, so this write-up stays with what anyone can open.
Why they left
They wanted people who signed up to land on their email list, not Substack’s user base. Hosting a free newsletter on Substack had cost them nothing. Once paid subscriptions grew, the 10% cut started to grate. They were sending money from people they care about to Substack.
They preferred a flat hosting fee. They were planning more paid content.
Ghost is open source. They said their values lined up better with that organization, and they felt better about where the money goes.
The later post added the lock-in they felt. Substack is a for-profit company. Rey expects it to go public or get bought. A signup is a Substack user, not just a subscriber to Amplify Respect. The company needs those users.
They also pointed at Lucy Werner’s Hype Yourself wipe. In May 2025 Lucy tried to remove a podcast from settings. The whole publication disappeared. More than 180 posts. About 13,000 subscribers. Paid subscriptions included. Substack later sent a CSV that was short about 500 free and 30 paid names. Rey called that a nightmare and said they do not believe Substack is running on robust software.
They also said Substack has funded transphobic and neo-Nazi speech, and they did not want to keep posting primarily there.
How they told readers
The 10 June post was the heads-up. Readers did not need to click anything. Email would keep arriving. The site URL would not change.
Paid subscriptions would move to Ghost. Rey warned that some people might see a cancellation message. Ignore it. They would check each subscription themselves.
They were not walking away from Substack as a social space. They planned to keep the account and keep posting on Notes. The Substack publication is still up as an archive.
They knew the risk. Some people only read newsletters inside the Substack app, so Rey was hoping those readers would follow the email.
Ghost Pro after a self-hosted detour
They started on Ghost Pro’s 14-day trial. Then they tried self-hosted Ghost. They landed on Ghost Pro’s Creator plan.
Ghost is free as in speech, not free as in beer. That is their phrasing. You pay for Ghost Pro, or you pay for a server and Mailgun.
They said they paid more than expected. They still felt better about the platform.
They promised a walkthrough of DNS, design, and deliverability, and why Pro beat the cheaper self-hosted path. That section sits behind a member gate now, so those steps stay out of this post.
Ghost’s own hosting page is enough to see the trade. Pro includes email delivery, a CDN, backups, and weekly updates. Self-hosting means you buy those pieces. Ghost says Pro often costs less once you add them up, though a lightweight blog can go the other way.
Rey writes a paid newsletter, so they need Stripe and mail that lands. Creator was the Ghost Pro plan that included paid subscriptions in 2025. Ghost has since renamed that paid-membership tier to Publisher. I am not quoting a current price as if it is what they paid.
What they gained
They said the biggest change was feeling like they have their own website again. They are not writing “a Substack.” They are growing their own email list.
amplifyrespect.com is on Ghost today. The homepage still carries the same publication.
They wanted a flat fee instead of 10%. Ghost does not take a cut. Stripe still does. Ghost also documents that Substack’s 10% can stay on existing paid subscriptions until you ask Ghost to help remove it. If the fee is why you are moving, check that path before you count the savings.
What they left behind
Comments did not come over. Rey said so in the announcement. They transferred the posts. They left the threads on Substack. They were still deciding whether to copy some by hand.
Ghost’s Substack migrator matches that. It imports content and members. It does not claim comments, Notes, or the recommendation graph.
Ghost also has no Substack-style built-in social feed. Rey said that up front. They kept Notes on Substack to hold onto some of that network.
Old /p/ links need a redirect. Substack uses /p/slug. Ghost uses /p/ for previews. The docs give a negative-lookahead rule so historic links move and preview URLs still work. Rey kept the custom domain, so this rule matters.
A new custom sending domain needs DNS plus DMARC. Ghost warms it for about six weeks. Until then some newsletters still go out from ghost.io.
What I would copy
Send the announcement before the cutover. Warn paid readers they might see a cancellation email. Then check the Stripe customers one by one, the way Rey said they would.
Connect the same Stripe account before you import paid members. Ghost is explicit about this.
Keep the Substack site up as the comment archive until you decide what to do with the threads.
Try Ghost Pro before you self-host. Rey did the detour and still paid for Pro. If you do self-host, budget for Mailgun, DNS, backups, and the time to keep the box updated.
Add the /p/ redirect before you point the domain. Ask Ghost about the leftover 10% on old subscriptions. Substack recommendations and Notes do not come with you.
The Substack → Ghost playbook is the checklist I would run. Use Rey’s public posts for the reader-facing parts. The importer docs cover the files.