Professional Wrestling has almost always followed one simple rule. You build to Pay-Per-View events and put your biggest and best matches on these events to increase the buy rate and make money. This age-old system may no longer apply for the WWE and it may benefit them to scale back on PPV’s or even abolish them altogether. You may think we’re crazy for even daring to suggest that WWE do away with Fastlane but let’s explain our rationale
Television Is Where The Money Is
According to their 2005 Annual Reports, WWE’s North American TV deal was worth just $53.2 Million. The most recent TV deal with Fox alone is worth $2.35 billion over its 5-year duration. Add in the fact that Pay-Per-View buys are now a fraction of what they once were, a WWE created problem with the WWE Network, and it just seems ridiculous for WWE to hold off it’s biggest matches for PPV events that are making them a fraction of the money. Television deals are the biggest source of Revenue the WWE has and if they want to keep making that money they need to keep ratings up for RAW and SmackDown. The way to keep ratings up is to run big matches on television, Sasha Banks vs Bayley recently drew 2.5 million viewers on SmackDown which further proves our point.
But What About The Network?
You may wonder what would happen to the WWE Network without PPV’s. Well, the WWE Network will be absolutely fine. Without the PPV’s people will still subscribe for the historical libraries, the original content, the documentaries, and in some cases to see RAW, SmackDown, and NXT. No matter how good the WWE gets it’s unlikely to ever see a huge jump in subscribers, similarly no matter how poor it is they will likely always stay at roughly one million subscribers. The WWE Network money they would leave on the table by scaling back on Pay-Per-View events is minute compared to how much they could make if they can get their ratings up and sign new mammoth TV deals. Keep in mind too the costs of the network, not everything they make from subscribers turns to profit while TV money has lower costs attached.
What About Ticket Revenue?
You have a point here, the money made from WrestleMania weekend is nothing to be sniffed at and it’s no doubt that ticket sales from Mania, Royal Rumble, and other big events is a big part of WWE’s money-making. This is where we think scaling back on PPV’s is more likely than complete abolishment. WWE can still run their biggest events and the fact that these kinds of shows would be rarer would no doubt lead to better ticket sales.
What you also have to keep in mind though is how costly it is to produce these kinds of shows. WWE saved a lot of money this year by scaling back their production costs and no longer having to transport their entire set and staff to shows. If WWE were to run successful TV out of the ThunderDome or PC they could make more money than if they travel.
Another point is that they could easily run TV specials similar to IMPACT Wrestling, NXT, and All Elite Wrestling. All three promotions have had success running special editions of TV that often do well in the ratings, and if fans were allowed at shows they would no doubt sell more tickets than a standard episode. WWE running a special WrestleMania edition of RAW and SmackDown could easily replace WrestleMania weekend and would have both shows packed to the rafters while also drawing mega ratings on TV. How many people would tune in to see the Royal Rumble take place on RAW? We can bet it would be enough to have USA and advertisers very impressed.
While it’s unlikely to happen and it would require fans and analysts to adapt to a new style of wrestling programming we believe that the most efficient way forward for the WWE would be to scale back on Pay-Per-View’s, or preferably abolish them, and make their money through TV and running their biggest matches on RAW and SmackDown.
Stay tuned to the Last Word on Pro Wrestling for more on this and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world, as well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world. WWE fan? You can check out an almost unlimited array of WWE content on the WWE Network.
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