Money dear boy....

[Lionhat]

Something I was wondering about for a while and I can't see good articles on is how well are other wrestling companies are doing money wise and I thought I would ask the board and get their thoughts on it.

 

I keep reading about how successful New Japan is.

 

Well How successful How much are they taking in per annum.

 

How much are the top talent rumored to be earning. Is it as rosy as it looks at the moment?

 

What about the other mayor companies in Japan

 

AJPW, NOAH, Dragon Gate, DDT, BJW, Wrestle -1 Stardom

 

Are any of these companies is profit?

 

Also how is the scene in Mexico money wise last year I kept reading articles that top talent was not paid, has this continued into this year.

 

Thanks

Lionhat

 

 

 

[KingofSports]

Someone may be able to come up with figures, but I'm wondering where the question comes from really. All Japan & NOAH - business down massively with the former, I would imagine, hanging on by the skin of its teeth. Wrestle-1 doesn't seem to be doing too well and just trudges along. I don't think STARDOM has ever been portrayed as a money-making Promotion. They had 1 Budokan show 3 years ago for Yuzuki Aikawa's retirement and occasionally get decent sized Korakuen attendances, but also regularly play to audiences in the low hundreds and their roster's fractured, with a shit-tonne of rookies & has no real stars. Io Shirai & Kairi Hojo are probably their top draws, but neither are Akira Hokuto. I don't follow DDT or Dragon Gate, but they've generally been; 4th, 5th or whatever in the pecking order. The New Japan thing confuses me. Prior to 2 or 3 years ago, it barely got a mention, all of a sudden it's like wow, this new Japanese Company, which is as ridiculous as suggesting WWE is a new Promotion (because 'you've' just discovered it). New Japan was estalished in 1972, did huge business in the 70s, 80s & 90s and even the early 00s by current standards. The last two Dome Shows combined attracted smaller crowds than any single Dome show in the 90s, continuing a downward trend. They pay well, but not superstar-well. Historically, Inoki (NJPW) & Baba (AJPW) were known for 'looking after' Gaijin talent, but neither are around / involved any more.

[PowerButchi]

I think a lot of NJPW being taken notice of over here the past few years is Gedo Americanising it a lot in it's booking with all the run-ins and shite. ALthough people did give a shit about it in the 90s, if I remember rightly. They people just seemed to massively stop caring at some point in the 2000s (Possibly during Inoki's bigger than normal MMA hardon period with Sapp winning the IWGP and stuff)..

[KingofSports]

 ALthough people did give a shit about it in the 90s, if I remember rightly.

I didn't have the internet back then (had to rely on Eurosport), but yeah in addition to people attending the shows, I would imagine there was a buzz in the 'commumity' during that boom era and I guess we're now a couple of fandom-generations on from there. With a few exceptions, 2000-06 are pretty much lost years for me, in terms of NJPW. As you say, the Inoki MMA thing wasn't really working, Hashimo & Mutoh gone, general downturn in business...but at the same time Tokyo Dome shows were still drawing massively. I'd say it's been a decent Promotion again since '08. Tana, Nakamura & others having great matches both prior & subsequent to that. I guess the difference makers now are; technology & social media, where pretty much anything is available free to view more or less immediately, generally in decent quality. Little research or effort required, no DVDs to purchase (unless that happens to be your thing), no need to be 'invested' in the Company, brand or style. The one thing that did surprise me, particularly given the levels of knowledge on this board, was the general ignorance of Nakamura's history & levels of performance, as he's been one of the best workers & coolest muthafuckas on the planet for so long. Perhaps it took a few silly hand gestures and a red suit to get him over. Mind you, my ignorance of WWE post-2003 performers is on a similar level, albeit I can't avoid knowing most of the characters, by name at least. Doesn't really help to answer the question, but I'm not entirely sure that the question's terribly valid anyway, aside of the financial specifics, which in the main are unlikely to be known. Wasn't it unearthed that NOAH at one time had Yakuza backing? Similar suggestions about another Promotion too, if I remember correctly. Anyway, cue air_raid.

[Benno]

You can probably attribute a good portion of the buzz in the West to the Bullet Club being a cool act, in addition to the other American talent and the ROH relationship. I'm not sure it's the actual Americanism in the booking, as the interference and the nonsense seems to be most often panned by pretty much everyone.

 

For me it's more access than anything, I was made up to be able to pay 20 quid per show on UStream when they started doing that, nevermind NJPW World.

[IANdrewDiceClay]

Its also a mix that the American indy scene had taken parts of the Japanese scene (Dragon Gate and Pro Wrestling NOAH especially in the mid-2000), adding to Gedo being a big fan of Jim Crocket Promotions and the nWo and ECW and a lot of other old US variations. It seems in 2016, both the US indies and New Japan have met in the middle somewhat. Both have taken a lot from each other. Stylistically, New Japan was onto a real winner with the Bullet Club. Such a winner, ROH, WWE and New Japan currently have a version of that stable working angles on their TV. Its happened gradually, but the wrestling world has never been smaller.

[The King Of Swing]

 

ALthough people did give a shit about it in the 90s, if I remember rightly.

 

I didn't have the internet back then (had to rely on Eurosport), but yeah in addition to people attending the shows, I would imagine there was a buzz in the 'commumity' during that boom era and I guess we're now a couple of fandom-generations on from there. With a few exceptions, 2000-06 are pretty much lost years for me, in terms of NJPW. As you say, the Inoki MMA thing wasn't really working, Hashimo & Mutoh gone, general downturn in business...but at the same time Tokyo Dome shows were still drawing massively. I'd say it's been a decent Promotion again since '08. Tana, Nakamura & others having great matches both prior & subsequent to that. I guess the difference makers now are; technology & social media, where pretty much anything is available free to view more or less immediately, generally in decent quality. Little research or effort required, no DVDs to purchase (unless that happens to be your thing), no need to be 'invested' in the Company, brand or style. The one thing that did surprise me, particularly given the levels of knowledge on this board, was the general ignorance of Nakamura's history & levels of performance, as he's been one of the best workers & coolest muthafuckas on the planet for so long. Perhaps it took a few silly hand gestures and a red suit to get him over. Mind you, my ignorance of WWE post-2003 performers is on a similar level, albeit I can't avoid knowing most of the characters, by name at least. Doesn't really help to answer the question, but I'm not entirely sure that the question's terribly valid anyway, aside of the financial specifics, which in the main are unlikely to be known. Wasn't it unearthed that NOAH at one time had Yakuza backing? Similar suggestions about another Promotion too, if I remember correctly. Anyway, cue air_raid.

Don't know the details but I'm fairly certain that NOAH was caught up in some sort of Yakuza scandal at some time. Think it may have played a part in losing a TV deal.

 

Also I think HUSTLE's parent company was done in partly because of shady business connections.

[air_raid]

 

Anyway, cue air_raid.

 

You're alright actually mate.

[the_mole]

Hustle was DSE, who also owned Pride.

 

The Yakuza scandals have affected almost every "combat sport" from K1, Sumo, Pride/other MMA and pro wrestling.

 

As profitable as NJPW is aren't they still much smaller compared to where they were in the 90's.

 

K1 & Pride were both on free TV live doing massive numbers for a time, probably pro wrestling was as well in the 80's & 90's. Isn't New Japan only on some combat sports channel and the occasional really late night spot tape delayed several weeks? Which is still better than everybody else.

[KingofSports]

I genuinely have no clue, but seem to recall that Kojika was rumoured to be affiliated (maybe past tense) in some way to those naughty Yaks. That's what I was actually alluding to earlier. Didn't realise there'd been a virtual epidemic of it.

 

The only other (unrelated) thing I can add, if it's still the case, was that Oz Academy had a money mark backer, but Oz is pretty meh now anyway.

 

 

Image searching "naughty yak" turned out to be a bad idea. Mind you most picture searches end up with battyboys battying...sooner or later

[the_mole]

The Yakuza is a bunch of splintered rival groups, they don't all get on. There was a time when you needed the Yakuza to do any business in Japan, the police and media have been pursuing them a lot more over the last decade or so, something that was basically ignored for years.

[Refused]

Has there been any decent articles looking into the relationship between the Yakuza and pro wrestling?

I watched the Yakuza Papers series of films recently, which featured Yakuza backstage at a wrestling event. This was shot back in the 70s. Could be a lot of interesting untold stories.

[Guest]

Most of these small promotions must have some kind of dodgy ties. Either that or most of the roster is paid a fiver per match. Probably a bit of both

 

New Japan was an absolute monster of a company in the mid-90's, able to draw 4-5 30,000 plus crowds in a calendar year. As written before Inoki's MMA obsession nearly killed the promotion but the bubble was always going to burst eventually. Tanahashi, aided by some great booking from Gedo and Jado, to single handedly pull the company back from the abyss. The first ever Sumo Hall show I went to was 2006, Tana's first ever title defence against a not quite broken yet Tenzan. Building was 3/4 full if I'm being generous, crowd fairly meh. Last year's G1 final, couldn't get a sniff of a ticket and the atmosphere outside Sumo Hall before the start of the show was fantastic. Clearly NJ have attracted a new audience

 

Now clearly this is nowhere near their mid-90's boom and to be honest they may have reached a peak of doing at best one big show a month and smaller shows which essentially cover the guys wages. Outside of the top talent nobody is getting rich. It's basically a normal day job. Hence the Japanese job for life ethos keeping guys like Tiger Mask or Manabu Nakanishi employed. They may not be getting rich but at least they can pay the bills

 

I would argue that DDT and DG are comparable in size to NOAH and AJ. They can certainly draw bigger crowds to their annual big shows. I'm guessing most of the respective rosters work part-time jobs. Case in point, the DDT guys work in a couple of places in Shinjuku, Tokyo. One a small restaurant, the other a bar on an upper floor of the same building where infatuated girls come to see their favourite wrestlers serve behind a bar and spend a shit ton of money on drinks for the chance to sit down and talk with them for a couple of minutes. Or in the case of a girl I was sitting next to last week, stare at them, fail to say anything and then burst into tears.

[the_mole]

Aren't some of those companies helped as well by the relatively small size of Japan but its massive population?

 

Tokyo has one of the most highly populated density in the world, over 13 million, so drawing 4,000 or whatever, is a very small percentage and that's not including tourist's.

[Maikeru]

There is no doubt that NJPW should be considered the no. 2 promotion in the world by most measures. After the dark days of the MMA period ended in 2006 (with Simon Inoki finally ousted in March 2007) it began its rise to the top again. It was only after the purchase by Bushiroad in Feb 2012 that its growth really accelerated though, with profits tripling in the two to three years following that I believe. 

 

I lived in Japan from April 2007 till March 2009 and NJPW was an excellent product even then, but hardly anyone overseas was watching it. 

 

It only started getting attention in Western countries after its first internationally broadcast iPPV in October 2012 (which then continued almost monthly till New Japan World started up two years later in December 2014). However, there were never more than a couple of thousand regular viewers of those iPPVs outside of Japan and I doubt New Japan World has many more than that now. 

 

For a much more detailed read on all of this I recommend Lion's Pride: The Turbulent History of New Japan Pro Wrestling by Chris Charlton. 

 

In terms of financials, just to put things in perspective, WWE's revenue in 2015 was $658 million. New Japan's was $27 million.

 

At the start of this year WWE Network had over 1.2 million paid subscribers (now around 1.5 million). New Japan World had 36,000 (and that was around the time of its biggest show of the year); I doubt it's gone up much if at all since then. 

 

WWE's total live attendance for 2015 was 2,264,135. NJPW's was 335,536 (bear in mind they ran only about 30% of the number of shows that WWE did). Ticket prices were similar across both companies. 

 

So with New Japan, you are looking at a company with about 15% of the live attendance, maximum 3% of the network subscribers and just over 4% of the revenue of WWE.

 

New Japan almost certainly would have beaten WWF on both live attendance and revenue every year in the early to mid 90s. 

 

So no, it's nowhere near what it was even 15 years ago (just before the downturn began), or even a patch on WWE, but still a very profitable company (around $3 million net profit predicted for last year when the figures are finalised) - which is a lot more than any other wrestling promotion on the planet can say. Their top stars likely earn well above $500,000 a year now, with even prelim wrestlers getting a decent 'regular man's' salary. 

 

As for the other Japanese groups you mentioned; NOAH is owned by New Japan's parent company (who likely saved them from going under after the yakuza scandal). I doubt they're making much of a profit with the houses they are getting but I'd be surprised if any of their roster wasn't making a semi reasonable full-time living with the 100+ shows they do a year. 

 

All Japan seems to be in a very bad way now; Meltzer reported a week or two ago that they are no longer offering monthly guaranteed salaries and are instead only paying by appearance (which has led to some of their roster leaving). They have also started to run less shows. 

 

Dragon Gate have a very sound business model of running a massive number of shows (around 170 a year) at venues they can fill and cut down a lot on staff costs by having the wrestlers setting up and taking down the ring and selling the merch etc. I reckon all of their talent wrestling full time are making a half decent salary without having to do other jobs. 

 

DDT have become a lot hotter in the last couple of years and are running a lot more shows with very good houses; I wouldn't be surprised if at least the upper half of their roster are making a full time living now (with maybe just the prelim workers moonlighting in the DDT bar). 

 

Big Japan run a lot of shows too and a lot of their talent are probably making ok money, but I remember seeing on their website a few years ago that you could hire some of the roster as home removal men (the thought of a half naked and scarred from head to toe Jaki Numazawa turning up at my door to move my stuff made me shudder). 

 

Wrestle-1 and Stardom don't run enough shows (each maybe 5 per month) for most of their talent to make a full-time living I'd say; but I'm sure some of their top guys do so by taking outside bookings. Same with Zero 1. 

 

With groups like Michinoku Pro, K-Dojo (both at the upper end of the 'true' indies) there's probably a hand full of the rosters who don't need to do other jobs. I guess it'd be groups like Freedoms, Heat Up, Guts World, Secret Base, Osaka Pro, Ice Ribbon and Sendai Girls where you might be hard pressed to find more than a couple of talents who don't work another job on the side.