Paul Heyman a lousy businessman?

[Hugh Mungus]

I know how Paul Heyman was a brilliant booker. I've also heard that he is a lousy businessman.

Based on what I know, in the final days of ECW, Heyman was writing checks left and right to his wrestlers, only to have the majority of them bounce. He also had to fight with TNN over what may or may not appear on his show. Finally, I also heard that he took some of the money to make a cameo appearance on the 2002 movie, Rollerball.

I think that these decisions resulted in the departure of Tazz and The Dudley Boyz.

Can someone clarify it for me?

[Futureraven: Beelzebruv]

Well, that's basically it.

He wrote a lot of bad cheques, that's why pretty much anyone who got an offer from WCW or the WWF jumped at the chance to leave, so they could get paid.

[bob]

you pretty much summed up the demise of ECW

[Johnny Flamingo]

I'd say he was a massive failure as a businessman.

He had a company that was a clearly established #3 organization. Was selling plenty of tickets to shows (I believe 1 show actually broke 10,000), has a large fan base and was popular enough to get a tv show and 2 video games. And they went bankrupt.....quickly.

To me he tried to get way too big, way too fast.

Had he had someone who really understood economics I honestly believe ECW would be the solid #2 company in the US right now.

[derrtaysouth95]

His lack of business acumen and sticking to his guns is what killed the company.

The first is bad. The second....I give him credit for.

Had someone else been handling the financial side of the company and telling him what to do....they'd still be around.

[anonymousdonor]

Wait...he PAID money to be in Rollerball? I don't think that's usually how it's supposed to work.

[lordkain316]

Heyman wasn't just a lousy businessman he was an absolute PR nightmare as well.

[livetowin]

Sometimes I think what would happen if Gabe Spalowski and Paul Heyman got together.

[Mayonnaise]

May 12, 2010 22:42:03 GMT -5 livetowin said:

Sometimes I think what would happen if Gabe Spalowski and Paul Heyman got together.

...Gabe got his start under Paul in ECW.

[johnnyk9]

Not a lot of people think this, but from 1996 on the only thing that kept ECW alive was the paycheck Vince was sending them every month, the company never turned a profit in it's whole tenure and that's a fact.

[Dynamite Kid]

I've never really understood how Paul could be that bad myself either. As Nunzio said on Rise And Fall, it's not like they were wrestling in front of nobody.

[hollywood]

May 13, 2010 7:03:39 GMT -5 johnnyk9 said:

Not a lot of people think this, but from 1996 on the only thing that kept ECW alive was the paycheck Vince was sending them every month, the company never turned a profit in it's whole tenure and that's a fact.

It turned a profit early in its tenure. May not have been much, and it may not have last long. But it did.

[allenfan69]

I can only guess that the advertising revenue just wasn't there for ECW when it was on TNN. Whether it was the bad deal they had with the network or advertisers just not being comfortable with the product. If they couldn't get the big bucks from ads, the gate receipts probably wouldn't have been enought to offset the production costs of running the shows for TV.

Just my guess. I have nothing to base it on, other than Vince and Bischoff going on and on about pleasing the advertisers on the Rise and Fall DVD.

[livetowin]

May 12, 2010 22:45:11 GMT -5 Mayonnaise said:

May 12, 2010 22:42:03 GMT -5 livetowin said:

Sometimes I think what would happen if Gabe Spalowski and Paul Heyman got together.

...Gabe got his start under Paul in ECW.

I mean more than that. Like if Paul was Gabe's Todd Gordon or something.

[thereallybigshow]

Heyman was a GREAT businessman for years.

He took a cash business drawing under a 100 people and turned it into a hugely popular National Television and Pay Per View entity. They made HUGE profits on PPV, merchandise and VHS tapes that other indy promotions couldn only dream of. Even until ECWs demise they were pulling huge numbers of fans...

He wasn't a good BIG Business man. It's one thing to book a show and draw fans. It's another to have to put together a high quality show on a shoe string budget. ECW died when the wrestling industry crumbled. From 1993-2001 wrestlers paydays became hugely inflated. Production costs were hugely inflated. Every aspect of producing a show cost more.

Like any business man Heyman took a huge gamble. It paid off in the short term, but in reality ECW couldn't sustain the loss of talent and huge debt. Nearly every single ECW star left the company for HUGE inflated paydays.

The whole industry almost went flat, not just ECW. WCW lost way more money than Paul Heyman could ever dream of...

[Deleted]

May 13, 2010 15:12:36 GMT -5 thereallybigshow said:

They made HUGE profits on PPV, merchandise and VHS tapes that other indy promotions couldn only dream of. Even until ECWs demise they were pulling huge numbers of fans.

Don't confuse big money coming in from all of those places with PROFITS. They were spending more money than was coming in from PPV, merchandise, VHS tapes and tickets.

[PaperStreetBrigade]

I'm sick and tired of people bashing Paul for being a "bad businessman".

Quite simply there are many, many, many failed small businesses out there that have made the same mistakes as Paul made.

I once worked for a construction company that was continually paying off their debts with loans. Each loan would have a higher interest rate then the last. This finally stopped as loan seven or eight wasn't approved.

They also sold leased equipment as though they owned it.

There are probably dozens of horror stories from working at small business who failed from the people on the boards.

[Kris Kobain]

May 13, 2010 21:27:30 GMT -5 PaperStreetBrigade said:

I'm sick and tired of people bashing Paul for being a "bad businessman".

Quite simply there are many, many, many failed small businesses out there that have made the same mistakes as Paul made.

I once worked for a construction company that was continually paying off their debts with loans. Each loan would have a higher interest rate then the last. This finally stopped as loan seven or eight wasn't approved.

They also sold leased equipment as though they owned it.

There are probably dozens of horror stories from working at small business who failed from the people on the boards.

It's not bashing. It's been well documented that he made some bad choices. The money just wasn't there anymore. I do partly believe him when he said that if ECW could have gotten another tv deal (a better one on a network that would promote the show.) that ECW would still be in business today.
Paul does take a lot of grief because he was the guy in charge. Some of the blame has to fall on the people working with him for not stepping up and helping. Considering it was the wrestlers themselves that were stepping up and helping that says something about guys like Dreamer.

[slickster]

Remember, doing live pay-per-views is extremely expensive and you don't get royalties until 6-8 months later.

The Monday Night Wars also elevated talent salaries. When ECW guys were getting picked up for $150,000 contracts by WWE and WCW, suddenly they will want to be paid a whole lot more to stay in ECW.

Also, TNN wanted ECW to improve its production quality to rival that of WCW or WWE.

[BlackoutCreature]

May 12, 2010 12:56:05 GMT -5 Hugh Mungus said:

I know how Paul Heyman was a brilliant booker. I've also heard that he is a lousy businessman.

Based on what I know, in the final days of ECW, Heyman was writing checks left and right to his wrestlers, only to have the majority of them bounce. He also had to fight with TNN over what may or may not appear on his show. Finally, I also heard that he took some of the money to make a cameo appearance on the 2002 movie, Rollerball.

I think that these decisions resulted in the departure of Tazz and The Dudley Boyz.

Can someone clarify it for me?

If you're asking what specifically his business skills have to do with the departure of Tazz and the Dudleyz, then this is what I heard -

For Tazz, during his World Title reign where he was arguably the biggest draw in ECW history, he and Heyman sat down and hammered out a new contract to keep Tazz with the company. Heyman then said he would have it mailed to Tazz within a week. A few weeks pass, Tazz gets nothing in the mail, Heyman avoids all questions Tazz asks about it, and Tazz starts reading the writing on the wall. A few interested phone calls from the WWF later and ECW loses there biggest draw ever simply because Heyman can't find time to throw something in the mailbox.

For the Dudleys, they were contacted by the WWF and offered a decent sized contract. They didn't seem to want to take it, but wanted to know they were appreciated by Heyman for there ECW work. They went to Heyman and asked him for as little as a $1 raise. He refused, took it as a sign that there hearts were no longer with the company, and told them to sign with the WWF.