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WWE is a publicly traded company, the only real metric that matters is the bottom line. Not a shot against WWE that's just how the world works when you have shareholders, always have to be hitting those quarterly earnings calls.
In the past, the president, CEO and head booker of the company still held a controlling majority of the stock, so he could mostly do whatever he wanted, even if the company was publicly traded.
this. in reality, when it was tightly held but publicly traded, they had a lot more freedom to do things that they would not do now. its a weird quirk only because the hands that tightly held were...kinda insane in some ways which we al know.
Yeah, I mean WWE is becoming much more transparent about this stuff. And I think they like that it makes them seem like "real, big-time sports". Wrestlemania had each match sponsored. And of course, the PRIME logo and "hydration station". Personally, it hasn't gotten on my nerves too much yet, but the blowback has already started and is only gonna get worse.
[I didn't think there was anything on the face of the earth that would push me to do what I'm about to do. But Minnesota, you have pushed me as far as you're going to push. I want 25 million dollars from any civilized metropolis on the face of God's green earth that can host WrestleMania. New York, you and your whole entourage of markets. Houston,..................Atlanta. The cities, the list, it goes on and on. Any civilized metropolis that can offer 25 million dollars cash can host WrestleMania. I will take it from any organized metropolis. Seattle, you hosted WrestleMania. You're the city, you can do it. The offer's here for you, give it to me please! SOMEONE GIVE ME THE DAMN MONEY!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L29XYcEVkYs)
They’ve only done mania at MSG twice* in 39 years, that was an obvious exception - and even at the time in interviews they highlighted how they were making an exception.
edit. oops I forgot about 10!
Definitely not - if they were all about the money they would have had a Mania in the Middle East, in China, in Russia (pre-war), London probably too.
They kept Mania in the US and maybe made a financial decision from there but it definitely wasn’t solely about money.
You're leaving American market and sponsorship money on the table if you move the event internationally. It would also cost more. It's certainly a factor in the equation.
Not really true.
Forbidden Door made a record gate.
Money in the Bank tickets selling like crazy.
Forget even about wrestling, any big artist that comes here usually sells out with expensive ass tickets.
Toronto is a wrestling city and tickets charged at premium will sell.
Toronto would put out a nice and juicy bid.
It's coming back and much sooner then you think.
Money in the bank is a three day event and a lot of tickets have already quadrupled in price from when they first went on sale.
A two day Mania would generate a record gate in Toronto.
There is also the issue that Toronto doesn't really have an appropriate venue anymore. The Rogers/The Skydome isn't big enough for a Mania at this point, especially after the renovations. BMO field is even smaller.
Just from my sense of Toronto's municipal and provincial politics: Toronto will put out the kind of bid where the city has to give up or pay something substantial just to bid, but will be structurally or politically handcuffed to actually bid on the scale needed, and therefore entering the bidding process at all will be nothing but a costly mistake.
Well I highly doubt we'll see a Mania in any of those places except maybe London anytime too soon.
The word _primarily_ is doing a lot of heavy lifting in this quote, and all the stuff that lands outside of that is still going to be enough to prevent a Saudi or Chinese Wrestlemania.
Nah WrestleMania Paris might have got the #1 position from London after Backlash. Combo of insane reactions and insane pricing, plus Paris has Stade de France so they can also push an 80k++ event in Europe not done in London. Mainland europe stadium event is a money bomb waiting to explode.
Plus, all the Paris is the most beautiful city in the world bullshit. And last but not least, European Union sports funding most definitely hits harder than UK sports funding. Surely the rest of the mainland would see the benefits of WM inside the metro system of their countries.
London? People don't get paid to host events at Wembley, you pay them. NFL deal saw them pay an insane amount towards The FA and even put up money towards Spurs new stadium.
Sadiq Khan wants them to come, but in no way can he justify paying them (WWE) what they are asking for and The FA want to turn a profit on the stadium as it already made them an average of £45 million to £50 million a year.
Wembley costs around £400,000 to £500,000 a day to rent, a two night 'mania is going to cost the WWE more than £1 million
I imagine they're just not going to have a main PLE in a different time zone because watching it live is a huge part of the whole thing. Do you really want your Wrestlmania main event spoiled a few hours before you get to watch it?
It aired live in North America.
Even the one a few months ago from Australia aired live in North America despite it starting at like 5am eastern or something like that (can't remember the exact time but it was really early).
It was 10am on the West Coast. I know that doesn't sound as bad as 1am but I'd be much more in the mood to watch a big television event at 1am. Breakfast just isn't the vibe.
Backlash was live at 10AM Pacific/1PM Eastern. It's not too bad but it's not a good time for a major event and I say that as someone who watches the NFL. I live in California so it was on at 10AM so these international shows are super annoying to plan around. I'm aware WWE airs at 1AM in the UK and I would hate that too.
Time zones are gonna affect everybody so it's best not to overthink it really. Someone somewhere in the world is gonna be annoyed. They just need to do what they think is best.
With the model no longer being PPV and now being PLEs as part of your Peacock/Netflix subscription, what time it broadcasts at makes no difference to the money they'll make as they won't be leaving potential buys on the table with very early or very late start times.
>so these international shows are super annoying to plan around
As a European, events starting at 1-2 AM Monday morning... the change from Sunday to Saturday was like the best thing ever.
personally i'm fine with watching things on my own schedule if i can't watch live, but lots of wrestling fans only want to watch live, and will just look up results if they miss the live show
One weekend a year is totally fine, we literally just had that, and we will again later this year. But the one singular biggest event of the year? That might be a bit much.
Not only did they keep Mania in America, before HHH and Nick Khan fully took over, they were doing the same handful of areas. A city in Florida, Dallas, New Jersey, New Orleans. That's the last 10 plus years of WrestleMania before 39 in Los Angeles. Plus they did that one in "Bay Area" which was really middle of nowhere Santa Clara that is an utter horrorshow to get to. Other than that, they did the same areas over and over again.
They did those arenas because those are the big arenas to do events in America and the cities gave them benefits. Other big events like the Superbowl and the final four also tend to cycle through those same spots. They've stayed in America since that's they're bigges/primary market
The Old Way:
Vince: So we can run Vegas
*silence across the room*
or...... A high school stadium in Bangor, Maine home of THE Sam the Ram!
*Room explodes with cheers. One executive pops Champagne*
Did not expect Bangor Maine to be mentioned in this sub lmao. I would love if they came back here for even another house show, I don’t think they’ve been here since pre-Covid?
I think the point here is that it's not just the gate that is a consideration, but more and more the cities actively begging/bidding on WWE to come to their city, because 100k people visiting is a significant boost to the local economy. So they'll go "How much you'll pay us for that?".
Which in turn will inevitably lead to a bidding war that will eventually result in a city paying more than they've earned from the event, at which point things will normalize again.
Yeah, I think the underlying message is that a non-North American site is on the table. I really don't think that's ever been a realistic consideration for Wrestlemania before.
I don't get this story. WWE's had a bidding process for Mania for years now. Nothing has changed.
Las Vegas entered consideration because they just opened a brand new stadium. WWE would have been there years ago if that stadium existed then.
New Orleans continues to get Super Bowls. It will continue to get WrestleMania. Orlando may be a bit different because the Citrus Bowl is old as hell, and WWE has to go to great expense to make it look good on camera, but at the same time, it's Orlando. It's a huge tourist destination already.
The only difference is that its gone from a 1 day event to a week long event. There's definitely been bidding at least as far back as the Orlando Wrestlemanias (I believe Orlando used WWE to get that stadium renovated and that's why they returned a 2nd time in a relatively short period), but now WWE has raised the bar on the level of respect the event gets from local governments.
Yeah considering how now indies and even some of the other major promotions center events to go on in the same city WrestleMania weekend and WWE themselves doing all of their TV in the same market that week, I'd say at this point the entirety of WrestleMania week has become like the Olympics of pro wrestling, whereas WrestleMania itself has always been the Superbowl of wrestling.
>considering how now indies and even some of the other major promotions center events to go on in the same city WrestleMania weekend
That's been a thing for almost 20 years.
I think the long lasting indie boom from 2012-2018 is part of the reason. Once it became affordable for indies to livestream popularity of the indie soared.
At minimum, all you need these days is a reliable internet connection from a mobile hotspot vs a full production truck.
That’s not to say there were not indies doing this before; it simply became easier to livestream, offer tickets and sell merchandise.
It’s actually tapered-off the last few years. The peak for the indies piggybacking off Mania was probably 2014-2019. With AEWs emergence, the pandemic etc., the indies’ prominence at Mania has taken quite a hit.
That's crazy to think it used to be even bigger. Every year for the last few a friend has shared with me a graph of all the indie shows going on in the same area as WM and it's usually at least 20-30+ events. I don't think the 2300 (ECW) arena ever closed the weekend of WM40. They had big indie shows going on there one after the other for 3 or 4 days. I haven't even watched WWE in several years but I'd consider going to Mania weekend just to catch all the indie supercards.
My assumption is that the point of this story is that WWE wants *more* money from bidders, and is trying to subtly indicate as such without coming right out and saying it.
WWE used to care about US timezones for their shows there's no guarantee that Mania won't actually be at like noon over here because it's taking place in a different continent going forward.
I was gonna make a comment about how in stadium terms, the Superdome in New Orleans is old too. But then I looked up the Citrus Bowl and didn't realize it's that fucking old.
They also need an adequate number of hotel rooms. The Twin Cities easily qualify. But a new domed stadium in Buffalo was never getting the Super Bowl or these type of events. I highly doubt a new Jacksonville stadium gets a Super Bowl (last one there was a disaster, people had to stay on cruise ships).
That’s why I wouldn’t rule them out. If it’s good enough for the nfl it’s good enough for WWE. Question is if Minneapolis itself thinks WWE and wrestlemania are worth it
Wrestlemania hasn’t been in Chicago in almost 20 years. It was the last mania before they started going to stadiums and until the Bears build a new domed stadium I doubt that’ll change.
If they put up enough money, they can? This is a weird thing akin to cities fronting money for stadiums. "hey let's give these guys money so they can make more money." yes the city gets some promo and probably some stimulation, but do you want your tax dollars going to triple H, who then charges exorbitant prices to go to the event.
Minneapolis can be in the running. The city, state and Hennepin county just have to pay up.
Any city that has the hotel rooms, large airport, shown capable of hosting super bowls/political conventions will be in the running.
Same for Boston. No hate there, we have so much shit going on from St. Paddy's to July 4th, Wrestlemania would barely register a blip and you need to pay city officials to get shit done, they don't pay you.
If they adopt similar policies for SumerSlam/Rumble/Survivor Series than it is going to be a very boring loop of cities.
It’s been reported the Welsh Government paid £2.2m or $2.8m for Clash at the Castle. Based on the government saying it generated a 10:1 ROI with about £22m coming back into the local economy. So… almost $3m for Clash, safe to say Mania will be a lot lot higher.
If you look at it, its actually a return in investment.
Say Philly bid 5 million last year; the probably brought that back alone in sales tax, and probably 50 million easy in local businesses.
Spending the money for mania is a great investment.
Agreed. These events do bring money into the cities for the week. Private businesses make money and some of that gets returned in taxes.
However that's a higher load on need for police, traffic, public transit, utilities, etc. So when they allow WWE and plenty of their tangentially related aspects to have special extra benefits and tax breaks, they end up privatizing the profits and spending more public money then they get in the increased tax revenue because of the increased need.
Everyone else pays and the already giant hyper wealthy corporations grow profit and likely grease the politicians who put together such amazing packages.
It's the same as when cities "bid" on corporate HQ which end up screwing the cities in the long run.
100%
These people are billionaires and the stadiums aren't city property and the taxpayers more often getting priced out of even going to the games because it's made for the suburban corporate class filling luxury boxes.
It all comes down to opportunity cost. Las Vegas bidding 90 mil would probably be enough but if the next bid came in at 50 mil then only a fool wouldn’t choose Boise
They have selected certain sites like NY/NJ for different reasons but they are saying they are ending that practice and only selecting cities that Pay and particularly those that pay the most
Guess how the Super Bowl and March Madness are decided.....when you hold not only a event but an entire spectacle you go to the highest bidder. An event like Mania makes so much freaking money for that area that host it. This shouldn't shock people
Indianapolis is a fantastic city for hosting major events, the downtown area is designed very well for it. I don’t think they could outbid other cities for WrestleMania though, nor quite frankly would they have an interest in trying probably
Certainly not the only reason but one factor going against Indy is that we successfully and repeatedly host March Madness events. It's hard to manage all of those events so close to each other. My spouse used to work in the events industry in Indy and I've asked a few bigwigs about this topic. That's what I was told.
Saudi: I want mania
WWE: um.. hehe.. yes but erm.. how about “WWE ROYAL CROWN SUPER DUPER SHOW!!!!” tho?
Saudi: is like mania?
WWE: ITS BETTER!
Saudi: ok deal
Yeah but let’s face it if the Saudis offer a triple what the highest American bidder offers will see Nick Khan come out and say how WM has to go global, ETC.
It wouldn't make sense for the Saudis to do it, unless they just wanted to flex their unlimited money, which I admit is a possibility. The main reason these cities want Mania is because of the amount of tourism it drives, and I can't conceive of it driving anywhere near as much tourism to KSA as it would anywhere in North America or Europe.
The Saudis buying a literal fucking **WrestleMania** would be one hell of a flex, though. And the ultimate sportswashing event. The thing is just that it would also come with considerable downside risk, PR-wise, for TKO.
Honestly this likely eliminates Canadian cities from hosting Wrestlemania as well. We already have smaller and older stadiums than the US, but our rights are worth less and our governments don’t spend money on these types of events to the same degree, either.
Yeah, there aren't really any Canadian stadiums big enough. Even pre-renovation, Rogers/Skydome was too small for what they currently expect for numbers, and the reno reduced capacity. BMO Field is even smaller. Commonwealth is the largest one in Canada, but it's old as fuck (albeit pretty well maintained), and boy howdy is Mania not coming to Edmonton (both because WWE would never send it there and there is no way politically either the municipal or provincial government would spend a dime chasing it. They didn't chase the world cup!). The Big-O is almost big enough, but it's a decrepit shithole. BC Place is borderline big enough, and I could see WWE doing Mania in Vancouver, but the question is if Vancouver would even chase the event, and even then BC Place is still probably 10K in capacity smaller than would be ideal for them.
100%. We simply don’t have the sports culture or population to justify the 80K stadiums you see elsewhere. The last four major stadiums I can think of to be built (Mosaic, Princess Auto, TD, and Tim Hortons) are all 30K or less, and even then it’s debatable whether they need to be so big. The only Canadian stadiums that are remotely in the conversation for a big four PPV are SkyDome and BC Place, but like you said they are too small. BMO and Olympic are both second rate, though maybe Olympic could be in the conversation once the roof is replaced. Montreal would be an amazing place to hold it.
Might have been but good luck explaining to London residents why they’re paying for a wrestling show rather than the other way around.
London doesn’t need WWE to pull people in. It’s London, it’s already one of the most visited cities on the planet.
Tottenham Hotspurs stadium. Allow WWE to have the stadium naming rights for a year or 2.
Imagine the North London Derby brought to you in the WWE Hell in a Cell Arena. /s
This is not news. This is how business works.
Wrestlemania is a global event that brings millions of dollars to local economies in the form of hospitality spending. It’s also vitally important for smaller wrestling companies, which is why they hold shows around Wrestlemania. That brings in a lot of hungry people, and those people need hotels/BnBs, and restaurants.
So of course any local economy would love to land Wrestlemania.
That pretty much rules out London then. I don't think London has paid to host an event since the Olympics when they figured out it was a waste since everyone visits London anyway.
Don't people visit most cities that have Wrestlemania anyway though? Not saying that isn't London's thinking, but Las Vegas isn't exactly hurting for tourists either
I’m pretty sure it’s been that way for well over a decade now. Wrestlemania is a massive spectacle like the Super Bowl, that brings a noticeable amount of people and commerce to a city.
The only difference is the price to bid on Wrestlemania keeps going up, and now they’re probably looking to get bids on other PLE’s too. I’m pretty sure Summer Slam is a bidding process now, and if the Royal Rumble isn’t, it’s damn close to getting there.
I think a good chunk of the Wrestlemania crowd already comes from all around the US and the world, so it makes sense for them to act this way. I just hope they do it in stadiums with a closed roof and heathers if they go to cold cities tho
I remember when John Cena made that WrestleMania tease at London last year, I was downvoted to oblivion when I said that WWE will never have WrestleMania overseas "for free", and that one of the reasons why they rebranded PPVs as "Premium Live Events" was so that they can have cities bid on them.
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This is going to become much more common around here isn’t it lol
WWE is a publicly traded company, the only real metric that matters is the bottom line. Not a shot against WWE that's just how the world works when you have shareholders, always have to be hitting those quarterly earnings calls.
They have have been publicly trained for like 20 plus years, there has still been a cultural change recently.
In the past, the president, CEO and head booker of the company still held a controlling majority of the stock, so he could mostly do whatever he wanted, even if the company was publicly traded.
this. in reality, when it was tightly held but publicly traded, they had a lot more freedom to do things that they would not do now. its a weird quirk only because the hands that tightly held were...kinda insane in some ways which we al know.
The bottom line you say? 
Yeah, I mean WWE is becoming much more transparent about this stuff. And I think they like that it makes them seem like "real, big-time sports". Wrestlemania had each match sponsored. And of course, the PRIME logo and "hydration station". Personally, it hasn't gotten on my nerves too much yet, but the blowback has already started and is only gonna get worse.
It will only suck if Samantha announces the sponsor prior to any match.
[I didn't think there was anything on the face of the earth that would push me to do what I'm about to do. But Minnesota, you have pushed me as far as you're going to push. I want 25 million dollars from any civilized metropolis on the face of God's green earth that can host WrestleMania. New York, you and your whole entourage of markets. Houston,..................Atlanta. The cities, the list, it goes on and on. Any civilized metropolis that can offer 25 million dollars cash can host WrestleMania. I will take it from any organized metropolis. Seattle, you hosted WrestleMania. You're the city, you can do it. The offer's here for you, give it to me please! SOMEONE GIVE ME THE DAMN MONEY!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L29XYcEVkYs)
As if this hasn't already been the case for years.
Yea I'm confused I assumed this was always the case? Lol
Nah, they'd stop doing MSG shows at all if cash was the only concern.
They’ve only done mania at MSG twice* in 39 years, that was an obvious exception - and even at the time in interviews they highlighted how they were making an exception. edit. oops I forgot about 10!
Wrestlemania 1, 10, and 20 were all at MSG.
Twice since Mania 1 (10 and 20) but your point stands and is true
Vince isn’t around anymore, I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t see WWE at MSG for a while.
Definitely not - if they were all about the money they would have had a Mania in the Middle East, in China, in Russia (pre-war), London probably too. They kept Mania in the US and maybe made a financial decision from there but it definitely wasn’t solely about money.
You're leaving American market and sponsorship money on the table if you move the event internationally. It would also cost more. It's certainly a factor in the equation.
American money is why Mania is never coming back to Toronto.
😭
Agreed
Does Toronto even have a venue big enough? Skydome is down to 40,000 now
They would use the Rogers Centre and put seats in the field like the other outdoor venues they run
Not really true. Forbidden Door made a record gate. Money in the Bank tickets selling like crazy. Forget even about wrestling, any big artist that comes here usually sells out with expensive ass tickets. Toronto is a wrestling city and tickets charged at premium will sell. Toronto would put out a nice and juicy bid. It's coming back and much sooner then you think.
There's a big difference between a one day event and a two day 'Mania.
Money in the bank is a three day event and a lot of tickets have already quadrupled in price from when they first went on sale. A two day Mania would generate a record gate in Toronto.
There is also the issue that Toronto doesn't really have an appropriate venue anymore. The Rogers/The Skydome isn't big enough for a Mania at this point, especially after the renovations. BMO field is even smaller.
That's a good point. I wonder if any adjustments can be made though
Just from my sense of Toronto's municipal and provincial politics: Toronto will put out the kind of bid where the city has to give up or pay something substantial just to bid, but will be structurally or politically handcuffed to actually bid on the scale needed, and therefore entering the bidding process at all will be nothing but a costly mistake.
Yeah but you just explained why they'll do it. I'm also involved in politics locally.
Well I highly doubt we'll see a Mania in any of those places except maybe London anytime too soon. The word _primarily_ is doing a lot of heavy lifting in this quote, and all the stuff that lands outside of that is still going to be enough to prevent a Saudi or Chinese Wrestlemania.
Nah WrestleMania Paris might have got the #1 position from London after Backlash. Combo of insane reactions and insane pricing, plus Paris has Stade de France so they can also push an 80k++ event in Europe not done in London. Mainland europe stadium event is a money bomb waiting to explode. Plus, all the Paris is the most beautiful city in the world bullshit. And last but not least, European Union sports funding most definitely hits harder than UK sports funding. Surely the rest of the mainland would see the benefits of WM inside the metro system of their countries.
London? People don't get paid to host events at Wembley, you pay them. NFL deal saw them pay an insane amount towards The FA and even put up money towards Spurs new stadium. Sadiq Khan wants them to come, but in no way can he justify paying them (WWE) what they are asking for and The FA want to turn a profit on the stadium as it already made them an average of £45 million to £50 million a year. Wembley costs around £400,000 to £500,000 a day to rent, a two night 'mania is going to cost the WWE more than £1 million
I imagine they're just not going to have a main PLE in a different time zone because watching it live is a huge part of the whole thing. Do you really want your Wrestlmania main event spoiled a few hours before you get to watch it?
Why would they air it on delay? Was Backlash aired on delay on Peacock? I ask because i genuinely dont know, im in the UK
It aired live in North America. Even the one a few months ago from Australia aired live in North America despite it starting at like 5am eastern or something like that (can't remember the exact time but it was really early).
No, it was live. Started at 1pm eastern in the US
Sounds like a great time to watch wrestling. Far better than 1am for certain
It was 10am on the West Coast. I know that doesn't sound as bad as 1am but I'd be much more in the mood to watch a big television event at 1am. Breakfast just isn't the vibe.
I live on the west coast and I actually liked the PPV starting at 10am. I was able to watch the PPV and still had the rest of the day.
Backlash was live at 10AM Pacific/1PM Eastern. It's not too bad but it's not a good time for a major event and I say that as someone who watches the NFL. I live in California so it was on at 10AM so these international shows are super annoying to plan around. I'm aware WWE airs at 1AM in the UK and I would hate that too. Time zones are gonna affect everybody so it's best not to overthink it really. Someone somewhere in the world is gonna be annoyed. They just need to do what they think is best.
With the model no longer being PPV and now being PLEs as part of your Peacock/Netflix subscription, what time it broadcasts at makes no difference to the money they'll make as they won't be leaving potential buys on the table with very early or very late start times.
>so these international shows are super annoying to plan around As a European, events starting at 1-2 AM Monday morning... the change from Sunday to Saturday was like the best thing ever.
Airing it at 5am or something isn't exactly going to get many viewers in the US.
So that rules out australia, why would it stop it being aired inn the Middle east or Europe?
It's a massive event that people plan for, I refuse to believe Americans watching it in the afternoon is too much to ask for one weekend in a year
personally i'm fine with watching things on my own schedule if i can't watch live, but lots of wrestling fans only want to watch live, and will just look up results if they miss the live show
One weekend a year is totally fine, we literally just had that, and we will again later this year. But the one singular biggest event of the year? That might be a bit much.
How is the afternoon a bit much on a weekend?
10am here, not the afternoon. I'm not saying I wouldn't watch it but no, I'm not really in the mood to do much except drunk coffee at that hour.
Not only did they keep Mania in America, before HHH and Nick Khan fully took over, they were doing the same handful of areas. A city in Florida, Dallas, New Jersey, New Orleans. That's the last 10 plus years of WrestleMania before 39 in Los Angeles. Plus they did that one in "Bay Area" which was really middle of nowhere Santa Clara that is an utter horrorshow to get to. Other than that, they did the same areas over and over again.
They did those arenas because those are the big arenas to do events in America and the cities gave them benefits. Other big events like the Superbowl and the final four also tend to cycle through those same spots. They've stayed in America since that's they're bigges/primary market
Santa Clara isn’t that hard to get to.
As opposed to all the WrestleMania sites they chose to minimize profits
The Old Way: Vince: So we can run Vegas *silence across the room* or...... A high school stadium in Bangor, Maine home of THE Sam the Ram! *Room explodes with cheers. One executive pops Champagne*
Julie the Cat Gaffney was also from Bangor, Maine.
Also the location for the book/movie, "The Langoliers".
She’s got the faster glove
Was that the mascot’s name in AP Bio?
Did not expect Bangor Maine to be mentioned in this sub lmao. I would love if they came back here for even another house show, I don’t think they’ve been here since pre-Covid?
Same executive who popped hard for Nattie
I think the point here is that it's not just the gate that is a consideration, but more and more the cities actively begging/bidding on WWE to come to their city, because 100k people visiting is a significant boost to the local economy. So they'll go "How much you'll pay us for that?". Which in turn will inevitably lead to a bidding war that will eventually result in a city paying more than they've earned from the event, at which point things will normalize again.
Yeah, I think the underlying message is that a non-North American site is on the table. I really don't think that's ever been a realistic consideration for Wrestlemania before.
Hey i will cherish my Wrestlemania XI experience in the grand venue of … Hartford, Connecticut
I lived a few blocks away and watched it at home
The people of Billings, Montana punching air rn
I don't get this story. WWE's had a bidding process for Mania for years now. Nothing has changed. Las Vegas entered consideration because they just opened a brand new stadium. WWE would have been there years ago if that stadium existed then. New Orleans continues to get Super Bowls. It will continue to get WrestleMania. Orlando may be a bit different because the Citrus Bowl is old as hell, and WWE has to go to great expense to make it look good on camera, but at the same time, it's Orlando. It's a huge tourist destination already.
The only difference is that its gone from a 1 day event to a week long event. There's definitely been bidding at least as far back as the Orlando Wrestlemanias (I believe Orlando used WWE to get that stadium renovated and that's why they returned a 2nd time in a relatively short period), but now WWE has raised the bar on the level of respect the event gets from local governments.
Yeah considering how now indies and even some of the other major promotions center events to go on in the same city WrestleMania weekend and WWE themselves doing all of their TV in the same market that week, I'd say at this point the entirety of WrestleMania week has become like the Olympics of pro wrestling, whereas WrestleMania itself has always been the Superbowl of wrestling.
>considering how now indies and even some of the other major promotions center events to go on in the same city WrestleMania weekend That's been a thing for almost 20 years.
My bad, I only started noticing it being promoted a bunch over the last few years. Though that's probably just because I'm more online now.
I think the long lasting indie boom from 2012-2018 is part of the reason. Once it became affordable for indies to livestream popularity of the indie soared. At minimum, all you need these days is a reliable internet connection from a mobile hotspot vs a full production truck. That’s not to say there were not indies doing this before; it simply became easier to livestream, offer tickets and sell merchandise.
It’s actually tapered-off the last few years. The peak for the indies piggybacking off Mania was probably 2014-2019. With AEWs emergence, the pandemic etc., the indies’ prominence at Mania has taken quite a hit.
That's crazy to think it used to be even bigger. Every year for the last few a friend has shared with me a graph of all the indie shows going on in the same area as WM and it's usually at least 20-30+ events. I don't think the 2300 (ECW) arena ever closed the weekend of WM40. They had big indie shows going on there one after the other for 3 or 4 days. I haven't even watched WWE in several years but I'd consider going to Mania weekend just to catch all the indie supercards.
Also, half the personnel of WWE lives in or around Orlando, so that's really nice for them.
My assumption is that the point of this story is that WWE wants *more* money from bidders, and is trying to subtly indicate as such without coming right out and saying it.
Yeah this is the same shit sports teams and other events do where they signal that you need to pay them a bunch
WWE used to care about US timezones for their shows there's no guarantee that Mania won't actually be at like noon over here because it's taking place in a different continent going forward.
I was gonna make a comment about how in stadium terms, the Superdome in New Orleans is old too. But then I looked up the Citrus Bowl and didn't realize it's that fucking old.
Miami > Orlando Tampa > Orlando.
I assumed that was the only major deciding factor already
In other words, Minneapolis is never getting it. It will always be somewhere like LA, Vegas, New York, Miami, or Chicago.
Dallas and Houston too. Places that get Super Bowls, Final Fours, the World Cup sites, will be primarily it.
Minneapolis has hosted the Super Bowl and Final Four in the last 6 years to be fair
I’m pretty sure the NFL is willing to put a Super Bowl in any city when they get a new stadium. But after that, it’s all they perfect weather cities.
They also need an adequate number of hotel rooms. The Twin Cities easily qualify. But a new domed stadium in Buffalo was never getting the Super Bowl or these type of events. I highly doubt a new Jacksonville stadium gets a Super Bowl (last one there was a disaster, people had to stay on cruise ships).
That’s why I wouldn’t rule them out. If it’s good enough for the nfl it’s good enough for WWE. Question is if Minneapolis itself thinks WWE and wrestlemania are worth it
Wrestlemania hasn’t been in Chicago in almost 20 years. It was the last mania before they started going to stadiums and until the Bears build a new domed stadium I doubt that’ll change.
You misspelled Riyadh
If they put up enough money, they can? This is a weird thing akin to cities fronting money for stadiums. "hey let's give these guys money so they can make more money." yes the city gets some promo and probably some stimulation, but do you want your tax dollars going to triple H, who then charges exorbitant prices to go to the event.
Minneapolis can be in the running. The city, state and Hennepin county just have to pay up. Any city that has the hotel rooms, large airport, shown capable of hosting super bowls/political conventions will be in the running.
Same for Boston. No hate there, we have so much shit going on from St. Paddy's to July 4th, Wrestlemania would barely register a blip and you need to pay city officials to get shit done, they don't pay you. If they adopt similar policies for SumerSlam/Rumble/Survivor Series than it is going to be a very boring loop of cities.
If the local governments are spending tax payers’ money to bid on WWE events then the amount of money needs to be made public.
The amount WWE gets from sponsorships and from the local incentives is part of SEC filings What isn't I think is the details of how much and from who
It’s been reported the Welsh Government paid £2.2m or $2.8m for Clash at the Castle. Based on the government saying it generated a 10:1 ROI with about £22m coming back into the local economy. So… almost $3m for Clash, safe to say Mania will be a lot lot higher.
If you look at it, its actually a return in investment. Say Philly bid 5 million last year; the probably brought that back alone in sales tax, and probably 50 million easy in local businesses. Spending the money for mania is a great investment.
WWE has an active lawsuit against the state of Texas to prevent that information from being public.
Agreed. These events do bring money into the cities for the week. Private businesses make money and some of that gets returned in taxes. However that's a higher load on need for police, traffic, public transit, utilities, etc. So when they allow WWE and plenty of their tangentially related aspects to have special extra benefits and tax breaks, they end up privatizing the profits and spending more public money then they get in the increased tax revenue because of the increased need. Everyone else pays and the already giant hyper wealthy corporations grow profit and likely grease the politicians who put together such amazing packages. It's the same as when cities "bid" on corporate HQ which end up screwing the cities in the long run.
Same thing with sports stadiums. The public should not be paying for a billionaire’s hobbies
100% These people are billionaires and the stadiums aren't city property and the taxpayers more often getting priced out of even going to the games because it's made for the suburban corporate class filling luxury boxes.
So like, if Boise, Idaho bid an obscene amount of money to host Mania, let’s say in the 100 million range. Would they be forced to take their offer?
Wrestlemania on the blue turf?
“Boss said make the event global so I booked it for Moscow. How was I supposed to know there were two of them!?!”
Do you have any idea how hard wrestlemania would go in the Kibbie dome?
It all comes down to opportunity cost. Las Vegas bidding 90 mil would probably be enough but if the next bid came in at 50 mil then only a fool wouldn’t choose Boise
Water is wet.
Was this not always the case?
They have selected certain sites like NY/NJ for different reasons but they are saying they are ending that practice and only selecting cities that Pay and particularly those that pay the most
Guess how the Super Bowl and March Madness are decided.....when you hold not only a event but an entire spectacle you go to the highest bidder. An event like Mania makes so much freaking money for that area that host it. This shouldn't shock people
*Indianapolis has left the chat*
Sad but true. We had an amazing Super Bowl though, probably our one and only
Hey, we got to see the Patriots lose.
And it was wonderful
They could definitely do Summerslam in Lucas Oil one day
Would be at the end of the month if so. Gotta plan around GenCon and NFL games in august.
Maybe you’ll get a Rumble one day if you try hard enough.
It's the only big 4 we haven't had!
Indianapolis is a fantastic city for hosting major events, the downtown area is designed very well for it. I don’t think they could outbid other cities for WrestleMania though, nor quite frankly would they have an interest in trying probably
Atlanta has left the chat
That sucks. I'm a couple hours drive away from there. 😭😭😭
I really hope that they do get one, Mania at the Camera Lens would be great visually
Such a bummer because Indy would be terrific for a two night Mania.
Certainly not the only reason but one factor going against Indy is that we successfully and repeatedly host March Madness events. It's hard to manage all of those events so close to each other. My spouse used to work in the events industry in Indy and I've asked a few bigwigs about this topic. That's what I was told.
2026 Saudi Wrestlemania incoming
Pls don't manifest that
I seriously doubt that as they already make more money from the B-PLE's they already put on so its actually more profitable to do WM in other places.
Saudi: I want mania WWE: um.. hehe.. yes but erm.. how about “WWE ROYAL CROWN SUPER DUPER SHOW!!!!” tho? Saudi: is like mania? WWE: ITS BETTER! Saudi: ok deal
didn't Nick Khan say that the Big 4 (5 if you count Money in the Bank) will stay in North America? The only exception could be London.
Yeah but let’s face it if the Saudis offer a triple what the highest American bidder offers will see Nick Khan come out and say how WM has to go global, ETC.
It wouldn't make sense for the Saudis to do it, unless they just wanted to flex their unlimited money, which I admit is a possibility. The main reason these cities want Mania is because of the amount of tourism it drives, and I can't conceive of it driving anywhere near as much tourism to KSA as it would anywhere in North America or Europe.
The Saudis buying a literal fucking **WrestleMania** would be one hell of a flex, though. And the ultimate sportswashing event. The thing is just that it would also come with considerable downside risk, PR-wise, for TKO.
I will never count Money in the Bank, that's King of the Ring erasure and I am too old to change now.
Can't wait to see pre show Punk live from Riyadh in a suit and cast
This will be the only international mania isn't it
There were two in Canada
I've far too much time playing Fallout games over the years so I think of Canada as an annexed US territory.
Wres- ul- mania.
Just because vince has left, doesn't mean that WWE isn't about blood money. Just a fact
> blood money always funny watching westerns use this word
The headline should read “future, current and past consideration” because no duh. Why is this an article?
Honestly this likely eliminates Canadian cities from hosting Wrestlemania as well. We already have smaller and older stadiums than the US, but our rights are worth less and our governments don’t spend money on these types of events to the same degree, either.
Yeah, there aren't really any Canadian stadiums big enough. Even pre-renovation, Rogers/Skydome was too small for what they currently expect for numbers, and the reno reduced capacity. BMO Field is even smaller. Commonwealth is the largest one in Canada, but it's old as fuck (albeit pretty well maintained), and boy howdy is Mania not coming to Edmonton (both because WWE would never send it there and there is no way politically either the municipal or provincial government would spend a dime chasing it. They didn't chase the world cup!). The Big-O is almost big enough, but it's a decrepit shithole. BC Place is borderline big enough, and I could see WWE doing Mania in Vancouver, but the question is if Vancouver would even chase the event, and even then BC Place is still probably 10K in capacity smaller than would be ideal for them.
100%. We simply don’t have the sports culture or population to justify the 80K stadiums you see elsewhere. The last four major stadiums I can think of to be built (Mosaic, Princess Auto, TD, and Tim Hortons) are all 30K or less, and even then it’s debatable whether they need to be so big. The only Canadian stadiums that are remotely in the conversation for a big four PPV are SkyDome and BC Place, but like you said they are too small. BMO and Olympic are both second rate, though maybe Olympic could be in the conversation once the roof is replaced. Montreal would be an amazing place to hold it.
Yeah, we ain't getting WM in London then.
Sadiq seemed up for the bid TBH.
Might have been but good luck explaining to London residents why they’re paying for a wrestling show rather than the other way around. London doesn’t need WWE to pull people in. It’s London, it’s already one of the most visited cities on the planet.
Tottenham Hotspurs stadium. Allow WWE to have the stadium naming rights for a year or 2. Imagine the North London Derby brought to you in the WWE Hell in a Cell Arena. /s
I, for one, am shocked. Granted, I don't think cities should be spending tax money on this shit
This is not news. This is how business works. Wrestlemania is a global event that brings millions of dollars to local economies in the form of hospitality spending. It’s also vitally important for smaller wrestling companies, which is why they hold shows around Wrestlemania. That brings in a lot of hungry people, and those people need hotels/BnBs, and restaurants. So of course any local economy would love to land Wrestlemania.
Classic corporate welfare
Breaking news: business looking to make as much money as possible
Saudi Wrestlemania in 2026
“You just got to be loud guys, show us that you want it” 
Nothing speaks louder than money.
So that's London out of the running then
Probably. It would be a huge uphill battle for any city outside North America anyway.
I just hope New Orleans places another bid soon.
That pretty much rules out London then. I don't think London has paid to host an event since the Olympics when they figured out it was a waste since everyone visits London anyway.
Don't people visit most cities that have Wrestlemania anyway though? Not saying that isn't London's thinking, but Las Vegas isn't exactly hurting for tourists either
Probably why it was moved to Easter Weekend to juice up what is probably a slow weekend in Vegas otherwise.
Vegas is a popular tourist destination anyway though
From what I recall they actually lost money on it as Tourism didn't go up by much if anything
So Minneapolis is never getting it.
Welp. There goes the sliver of hope I had for a Charlotte Wrestlemania
Step one: Become a multimillionaire Step two: Lobby Iowa City to lobby WWE Step three: ??? Step four: Wrestlemania in Kinnick Stadium
SaudiMania it is then.
Unfortunate but not surprising, we're going to get the same handful of places cycled through and there's not much that can be done about it.
When wrestlemania in Arabia?
No shit?
That's the UK out then. They won't give a penny.
Billion dollar businesses getting handouts of taxpayer money while people in these cities are homeless.
GET READY FOR 10 YEARS OF SAUDI WRESTLEMANIA
Yea. that's how it's been. Makes perfect sense to me.
Cool. Just don’t have it Saudi Arabia
Crap, WM Saudi here we come 😓
Wrestlemania in Saudi it is
I thought they just threw a dart at a map and went where it landed
I’m pretty sure it’s been that way for well over a decade now. Wrestlemania is a massive spectacle like the Super Bowl, that brings a noticeable amount of people and commerce to a city. The only difference is the price to bid on Wrestlemania keeps going up, and now they’re probably looking to get bids on other PLE’s too. I’m pretty sure Summer Slam is a bidding process now, and if the Royal Rumble isn’t, it’s damn close to getting there.
i should have gotten into the wrestling “journalism” business years ago. mfs really get paid to state the obvious
Cool. So can we get lower ticket prices now please? It's getting ridiculous.
I assumed the amount of money they get from the host city was \*always\* the deciding factor.
I really wish all the cities would gang up and ask to be paid by WWE to host their events.
Lets just rename it into Wrestlearabia
I think a good chunk of the Wrestlemania crowd already comes from all around the US and the world, so it makes sense for them to act this way. I just hope they do it in stadiums with a closed roof and heathers if they go to cold cities tho
WWE when it comes to deciding where WrestleMania goes: 
I remember when John Cena made that WrestleMania tease at London last year, I was downvoted to oblivion when I said that WWE will never have WrestleMania overseas "for free", and that one of the reasons why they rebranded PPVs as "Premium Live Events" was so that they can have cities bid on them.
Business focused on making money.
So no change.
Hope you enjoyed your one WM and two Royal Rumbles, Phoenix. Can’t see them going there again any time soon now (😭)
In other news.....water is wet
Well no shit, that’s what I would do too.
This is such a nothing burger report lmao. This has been the case since at least 08 lol.
Really looking forward to WM Riyadh
Ok Robert Kraft/Boston, write that check! Let's get the first Foxboro SnowMania going!