AEW reportedly made a “very small” profit in the month of April, according to the Wrestling Observer Newsletter.
AEW’s costs were reduced for the month with TV not being taped each week due to the coronavirus pandemic. With that said, the reduction of costs is not enough to offset the loss of the live gates from what would’ve been five Wednesday night events for AEW Dynamite tapings. The reduction does help to offset that loss, but AEW still did slightly better than break even for the month.
AEW was able to turn the profit between the money they receive from TNT for TV, online merchandise sales, and costs being down by doing all the Dynamite and Dark TV tapings over two days in Georgia.
While AEW taped several weeks worth of TV in just two days in Georgia, the company still paid all staff and talent, and the production crew, the same as they would have for five weekly shows. There were more cost savings from doing two shows where everyone was flown in and out at once, instead of paying for everyone to make five trips to various locations.
It was noted that AEW likely would’ve had a big month if COVID-19 never hit. The company was expecting strong houses for Dynamite in Milwaukee, St. Louis, Boston, Philadelphia, and Houston, which were all cancelled or postponed due to the pandemic. Rochester and Newark were expected to be two more high-grossing events, with Newark possibly setting AEW’s all-time record for an event.
This period is where AEW hoped to start making back some of the financial losses from the first of this year.
AEW President & CEO Tony Khan appeared on the AEW Unrestricted podcast earlier this month and addressed the lost revenue from not holding live events.
“What’s great for me is that we’ve been able to recreate an audience out there,” Khan stated. “We’ve had some semblance of an audience. By far the worst thing is losing our fans. Our fans are the best thing about our company. We talk about all the wrestlers that have been missing, but we’ve been missing all of these fans.
“You go from 12,000 tickets in Newark sold and once having 10,000 people out there to now 10 people around the ring, but 10 is much better than none. Wrestling in front of your peers and reffing in front of a crowd, I think it makes a difference. I’m a big fan of the territory, the studio wrestling and the small audiences. Frankly, those are bigger audiences than what we’ve had but at least in some kind of ball park to what we’re doing, and I’m glad there were people out there to watch Cody and Darby and then Lance Archer vs. Dustin to see these matches and give it some energy, but I would have loved it if we had those matches in front of 10,000 people.”
Khan talked more about the plans that AEW had, and where they were following Revolution. He said they expected to do really strong business in between Revolution and Double Or Nothing.
“In fact, those matches would have been on schedule if we done that there in Houston,” Khan said. “You mention the gates, like I said, I’ve tried to do the right thing by people. Things were going so well for us. They are going well. I’ve been counting our blessings, we’re doing really well, and the situation here is good. I’m so blessed we signed a long extension with our partners in TNT. We’ve talked a lot about what it took to put the show on, but let’s be honest with why we’re doing it. For TNT, putting on great shows is our revenue stream right now because we’re not doing the big events. In 2019, per show, the number one attendance in the world, in the wrestling business, was AEW. Now we don’t do so many shows. We’re just doing the one show a week compared to several shows a week, and we don’t do house shows, so it’s on a very small basis, but last year, we led the world in per show attendance. So we get really good crowds, and we were on our best run. The run through Revolution is the best stuff we’ve done. I love Revolution, and I loved where we were. It felt like we were on such a high. Then a couple of weeks later, obviously, the shut down happened, but like I said, we’re in a great position because we have this partnership with TNT that’s such a great partnership.
“We were on a really good run. What was happening in between Revolution and Double or Nothing, this was going to be the best run of business we’ve ever had, and we’ve lost millions and millions of dollars in live events. I don’t take it lightly, but I can’t take it out on the people that work here because it’s not their fault. We’ve really not let anybody go here as a company, and look, I’m gonna be honest, there’s gonna come a day where somebody, we’re gonna have to, but now is not the time. This is a hard time for everybody. It’s a hard time for us, but I have to look at the bigger picture. In the big picture, we’re in such good shape. We’re the second healthiest wrestling company in the world, and that’s a really great place to be. And we haven’t let a single person go to do it.”
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