Problem with AEW Ticket Sales

[mrpeacock]

Oct 20, 2023 22:01:02 GMT -5 cjb01: Limited Edition Item! said:

Oct 20, 2023 21:51:16 GMT -5 fw91 said:

wasn't talking about you. But reading this man... there's no reason to be frustrated. Critiquing something a company does comes with the territory. I can say I get frustrated with people still talking about the ending to mania 39 (just a placeholder example) but won't voice my displeasure at it. My feelings on an arbitrary wrestling company tactic aren't a primary concern that should deter others from posting what they want

It's more that for pages of this thread, we discussed what AEW could do to mediate the issue and help solve the problems, with no fights at all, and then they outwardly do that, and it's embarrassing and "Bush League"

I do not blame this response at all, honestly. Is what it is on how people feel about it in the end, but I think everything that could be said, has been by now.

Also nobody called it bush league for the record. Literally nobody used the term bush league outside of people defending AEWs cause.

[cjb01: Limited Edition Item!]

Oct 20, 2023 22:41:08 GMT -5 mrpeacock said:

Oct 20, 2023 22:01:02 GMT -5 cjb01: Limited Edition Item! said:

It's more that for pages of this thread, we discussed what AEW could do to mediate the issue and help solve the problems, with no fights at all, and then they outwardly do that, and it's embarrassing and "Bush League"

I do not blame this response at all, honestly. Is what it is on how people feel about it in the end, but I think everything that could be said, has been by now.

Also nobody called it bush league for the record. Literally nobody used the term bush league outside of people defending AEWs cause.

It was essentially the rhetoric being shouted about it, that it was low rent, embarrassing, that it made them look second rate. That's what looking "Bush League" means, dude.

If we're gonna get into semantics about that then there actively is nothing more to talk about with this thread, we're just gonna go in a circle forever.

[cjb01: Limited Edition Item!]

Oct 20, 2023 22:34:39 GMT -5 Denny Zen is Cooking™ said:

Oct 20, 2023 22:01:02 GMT -5 cjb01: Limited Edition Item! said:

It's more that for pages of this thread, we discussed what AEW could do to mediate the issue and help solve the problems, with no fights at all, and then they outwardly do that, and it's embarrassing and "Bush League"

I do not blame this response at all, honestly. Is what it is on how people feel about it in the end, but I think everything that could be said, has been by now.

I totally understand where you were coming from. This thread was completely silent for 2+ days as AEW had reasonably good attendance for TV last week and Full Gear continued to sell pretty well, then got bumped just to take the piss out of AEW for having Paul Wight advertise the Louisville show at Louisville local indy.

It doesn’t mean the people doing the critiquing aren’t true fans, or that they are coming from a bad place, but sometimes it feels like AEW only ever even generates conversation when it’s negative. It’s hard not to chime in and question the intention when almost every conversation about AEW is so fatalistic.

And given the responses here and how stuff has been twisted against anyone defending against that negativity, it really highlights to me just how aggravating this board has gotten, because no matter what side of the fence you seem to be on, there's gonna be a side that calls what you're saying or doing disingenuous or "gatekeeping".

All this over Paul Wight showing up to OVW, that's really the sticker for me, of all things to cause this implosion and argument about what we can and cannot discuss about AEW, it was Paul Wight, going to an AEW show, to give wrestling fans a ticket deal

AEW negativity and the discussions thereabouts feel like people throwing at a dart board blindfolded sometimes, and I truly mean that, I don't know how we get here sometimes lol

[06vwgti]

Oct 20, 2023 22:41:08 GMT -5 mrpeacock said:

Oct 20, 2023 22:01:02 GMT -5 cjb01: Limited Edition Item! said:

It's more that for pages of this thread, we discussed what AEW could do to mediate the issue and help solve the problems, with no fights at all, and then they outwardly do that, and it's embarrassing and "Bush League"

I do not blame this response at all, honestly. Is what it is on how people feel about it in the end, but I think everything that could be said, has been by now.

Also nobody called it bush league for the record. Literally nobody used the term bush league outside of people defending AEWs cause.

Trying to stay out of these threads for the most part and sticking to mostly live threads as the guys/girls in there make shows enjoyable to watch (both promotions), but I just had to post these quotes because is Minor Leagues that much different from Bush league? Because it has the same connotation to me.

I understand they are desperately trying to sell tickets, but doing this is pretty embarrassing for the second biggest company in the world

This aired on OVW's TV show.

Sorry, but the second biggest company in the world shouldn't need to do this on a small promotions TV show.

This makes AEW look very minor league.

Tickets aren't selling so they had to do what they had to do even if it meant lowering themselves to do it...That makes sense and is clearly what is taking place.

There's promoting, but doing something like this looks very desperate for a company with backing from a billionaire.

[mrpeacock]

Oct 20, 2023 23:01:39 GMT -5 06vwgti said:

Oct 20, 2023 22:41:08 GMT -5 mrpeacock said:

Also nobody called it bush league for the record. Literally nobody used the term bush league outside of people defending AEWs cause.

I understand they are desperately trying to sell tickets, but doing this is pretty embarrassing for the second biggest company in the world

This aired on OVW's TV show.

Sorry, but the second biggest company in the world shouldn't need to do this on a small promotions TV show.

This makes AEW look very minor league.

Tickets aren't selling so they had to do what they had to do even if it meant lowering themselves to do it...That makes sense and is clearly what is taking place.

There's promoting, but doing something like this looks very desperate for a company with backing from a billionaire.

One person said it made them look minor league? And that’s why people keep putting it in quotes like there is some mass attack? Like a couple people gave opinions and people are so quickly to shout them down with Bad Faith! Or Troll Post! Even moderators are being antagonistic for no reason.

[06vwgti]

Oct 20, 2023 23:10:21 GMT -5 mrpeacock said:

Oct 20, 2023 23:01:39 GMT -5 06vwgti said:

One person said it made them look minor league? And that’s why people keep putting it in quotes like there is some mass attack? Like a couple people gave opinions and people are so quickly to shout them down with Bad Faith! Or Troll Post! Even moderators are being antagonistic for no reason.

ok?

[EoE: Workin On My Night Cheese]

From my perspective, this fanbase is becoming cynical to the point of it being openly harmful. Like, what do you care if there’s a bit of a smaller crowd? Does that actually affect the quality of the show being put on TV? Why would it? They’re not showing you the empty seats. The crowds that ARE there are usually pretty noisy regardless. And most of these talents would put on the same great matches in front of 50,000, 5,000, 500 or 50 people.

So it can only be this 10 steps ahead paranoia of someone important pulling the plug on the money because it’s not filling a house twice a week every week. Not today or tomorrow, but eventually AEW will fall like WCW and ECW and we’ll all be stuck with just WWE again.

[Final Countdown Jones]

I am very, very certain that whatever productive conversation there is to have in this topic, it's not going to be found in pedantically litigating that CJ used quotation marks on a phrase that, despite not being verbatim a phrase somebody used today, is a synonmous way to express the sentiment multiple people expressed. That's not a discussion anymore, that's arguing the prudence of someone's punctuation.

[Chiral]

It feels like this section has been a ghost town outside of live threads the last week or so and I think the constant doomer mood is a part of that, some of which genuine concern, while some of it feels like concern trolling, but overall just gives a bad vibe. The atmosphere has just been a bummer around this section and I think a lot of us just don't want to deal with how much of a downer it's been so we've been disengaged outside of like live threads. For me at least I wanna try and like enjoy the shows and dooming about tickets and ratings and tweets and business business when you business is not very conducive to me enjoying anything (and this isn't a knock on anyone that enjoys business talk that doesn't go full doomer about it, like there's convos to be had there obviously).

I don't have a good fix but it'd be nice if we could be sillier and lighter and have less "the company will die if section 230 isn't full by the end of the week" debates or if someone could just say they didn't like a thing and just have that be that without a giant stupid argument, but from AEW's inception this section has been Discourse™ heavy, IDK how to get over something that's been the section vibe since 2019. But if the section stays this downer-y all the time I imagine it's gonna stay very quiet outside of live threads and whatever drama and debates are happening during the week.

[bearned]

TK isn’t pulling the plug on the company anytime soon and that’s probably just about all that matters. As long as they aren’t running shows in completely empty arenas of course….and they do appear to at least be trying harder now to get the word out in the local markets before they roll into town.

[raymondo316]

I said I wouldn't reply but as certain people keep going on about minor comments I made I will reply

Once again this is a thread about ticket sales, if people don't want to read it because they don't like to hear anything even slightly negative, or they find it exhausting, they don't have to read or reply.

I said it makes AEW look minor league and what Big Show did was embarrassing (you will hear 100 times worse on reddit, twitter and other forums), yet the over reaction on here from some would make you think I shitted all over the company, said they were dying, going to be kicked off TNT/TBS and I had started a Deathwatch thread.

Some on here seem to have forgotten all the threads back in the day on this very forum that people were basically just shitting on TNA/Impact non-stop......didnt see people demanding those threads be shut because it was constant negativity.

I get it I will watch what I post now to make sure it isn't anyway negative...

[kingoftheindies]

Oct 21, 2023 1:20:43 GMT -5 Chiral said:

It feels like this section has been a ghost town outside of live threads the last week or so and I think the constant doomer mood is a part of that, some of which genuine concern, while some of it feels like concern trolling, but overall just gives a bad vibe. The atmosphere has just been a bummer around this section and I think a lot of us just don't want to deal with how much of a downer it's been so we've been disengaged outside of like live threads. For me at least I wanna try and like enjoy the shows and dooming about tickets and ratings and tweets and business business when you business is not very conducive to me enjoying anything (and this isn't a knock on anyone that enjoys business talk that doesn't go full doomer about it, like there's convos to be had there obviously).

I don't have a good fix but it'd be nice if we could be sillier and lighter and have less "the company will die if section 230 isn't full by the end of the week" debates or if someone could just say they didn't like a thing and just have that be that without a giant stupid argument, but from AEW's inception this section has been Discourse™ heavy, IDK how to get over something that's been the section vibe since 2019. But if the section stays this downer-y all the time I imagine it's gonna stay very quiet outside of live threads and whatever drama and debates are happening during the week.

I said it in another thread. The issue is a lot of threads and discussions of being critical start fairly well but devolve because the same couple posters doom and gloom and when they get called out for it they play victim and say people defend AEW too much. Not gonna name names but they know who they are. It makes coming here to discuss AEW not fun. And that's not saying everything has to be gum drops and rainbows, it's just exhausting to see the same couple people derail every AEW thread

[HMARK Center]

Oct 21, 2023 0:00:48 GMT -5 EoE: Workin On My Night Cheese said:

From my perspective, this fanbase is becoming cynical to the point of it being openly harmful. Like, what do you care if there’s a bit of a smaller crowd? Does that actually affect the quality of the show being put on TV? Why would it? They’re not showing you the empty seats. The crowds that ARE there are usually pretty noisy regardless. And most of these talents would put on the same great matches in front of 50,000, 5,000, 500 or 50 people.

So it can only be this 10 steps ahead paranoia of someone important pulling the plug on the money because it’s not filling a house twice a week every week. Not today or tomorrow, but eventually AEW will fall like WCW and ECW and we’ll all be stuck with just WWE again.

Yep, that's what I keep saying: a bunch of fans on this side of the globe have internalized that WCW, ECW, old school TNA, and even ROH pre-Khan purchase all died because (insert booking choice/choices here) instead of an array of factors that booking wouldn't really have much effect over: WCW died because a merged AOL-Time Warner didn't want wrestling on their channels anymore, ECW died because of its constant financial woes, old school TNA went away because Dixie drove away all her TV partners through her various antics, and while 2019 ROH listened too much to Bully Ray and derailed their momentum, they only went away and ended up purchased by Tony Khan because it was a company that needed to sell tickets to live shows and couldn't do that during the pandemic. We don't get that way about WWE because WWE has made itself too big to fail, but there's a fear that any other promotion is a "you booked the WRONG GUY to win the title!" decision away from death's door or something.

So now at a time when WWE's hot and AEW's numbers are either treading water (TV ratings) or have taken a dip in recent times (number of tickets sold), the parade wants to come in and say "See? AEW is doing badly because of specific things they're doing that I don't like, or things they're not doing that I would like!", instead of acknowledging that sometimes this shit goes in waves. People whined for ages that AEW "does a bunch of bangers with no story", which was never really accurate to begin with, but then AEW starts doing some pretaped vignettes or longer promos and it turns into "AEW is being too much like WWE!" instead. Next time it'll be the old "Tony Khan hates women/other groups of people" line, or that him tweeting has any real effect on the show or the vast majority of the audience's perception of it.

Meantime, WWE can book Roman to be in the same exact title match for over a literal year and have Cody kind of spinning his wheels since the Brock feud but people are marking out like mad for the two of them just bumping into one another on the ramp; that's what happens when you're hot. Had AEW done something the equivalent of Roman retaining at the last WM against Cody and then having them get into respective feuds and stories that seemed like they'd make more sense if Cody had won the title, I think they'd be getting a lot of grief for it. WWE isn't because, again, WWE's hot right now while AEW's numbers are treading water; that's not a whole "Oh, you'd love this if WWE did it/if AEW did it!" kind of thing, just how promotions getting hot impacts overall perceptions, ticket sales, and plenty of other ideas and metrics over a course of time.

Eventually, perceptions shift; the guys who were red hot cool down, a new act grabs people's attention, people rushing to get tickets six months ago becomes people not being as interested half a year later, and sometimes we don't see those numbers bear out for a little while, etc. But people want things to correlate to their own tastes and interests, so success or failure must correlate to exactly things they personally like or dislike.

[polarbearpete]

Oct 21, 2023 9:17:58 GMT -5 kingoftheindies said:

Oct 21, 2023 1:20:43 GMT -5 Chiral said:

It feels like this section has been a ghost town outside of live threads the last week or so and I think the constant doomer mood is a part of that, some of which genuine concern, while some of it feels like concern trolling, but overall just gives a bad vibe. The atmosphere has just been a bummer around this section and I think a lot of us just don't want to deal with how much of a downer it's been so we've been disengaged outside of like live threads. For me at least I wanna try and like enjoy the shows and dooming about tickets and ratings and tweets and business business when you business is not very conducive to me enjoying anything (and this isn't a knock on anyone that enjoys business talk that doesn't go full doomer about it, like there's convos to be had there obviously).

I don't have a good fix but it'd be nice if we could be sillier and lighter and have less "the company will die if section 230 isn't full by the end of the week" debates or if someone could just say they didn't like a thing and just have that be that without a giant stupid argument, but from AEW's inception this section has been Discourse™ heavy, IDK how to get over something that's been the section vibe since 2019. But if the section stays this downer-y all the time I imagine it's gonna stay very quiet outside of live threads and whatever drama and debates are happening during the week.

I said it in another thread. The issue is a lot of threads and discussions of being critical start fairly well but devolve because the same couple posters doom and gloom and when they get called out for it they play victim and say people defend AEW too much. Not gonna name names but they know who they are. It makes coming here to discuss AEW not fun. And that's not saying everything has to be gum drops and rainbows, it's just exhausting to see the same couple people derail every AEW thread

I haven’t been making “doom and gloom” posts in this thread but I do think there’s something to question about why there’s a need to “call people out for” making negative posts. Even if the posts seemed too negative or exaggerating in some respect, I don’t think the posters should be talked about as if they’re not really fans of the company or are concern trolling. That just makes people not want to post anymore.

[markymark]

SRS said AEW has been booking arenas well in advance (maybe even a year), which means it has been planned before Jarrett joined the company and (as much as this is already beating a dead horse) when Punk still employed, TK giving him power and his full trust on him to establish Collision is imo why we are getting attendances like the Memphis one

[Jedi-El of Tomorrow]

Finally saw a commercial for the Collision in Wichita on November 4, during the UCF vs Oklahoma game.

[fw91]

Oct 21, 2023 11:37:38 GMT -5 HMARK Center said:

Oct 21, 2023 0:00:48 GMT -5 EoE: Workin On My Night Cheese said:

From my perspective, this fanbase is becoming cynical to the point of it being openly harmful. Like, what do you care if there’s a bit of a smaller crowd? Does that actually affect the quality of the show being put on TV? Why would it? They’re not showing you the empty seats. The crowds that ARE there are usually pretty noisy regardless. And most of these talents would put on the same great matches in front of 50,000, 5,000, 500 or 50 people.

So it can only be this 10 steps ahead paranoia of someone important pulling the plug on the money because it’s not filling a house twice a week every week. Not today or tomorrow, but eventually AEW will fall like WCW and ECW and we’ll all be stuck with just WWE again.

Yep, that's what I keep saying: a bunch of fans on this side of the globe have internalized that WCW, ECW, old school TNA, and even ROH pre-Khan purchase all died because (insert booking choice/choices here) instead of an array of factors that booking wouldn't really have much effect over: WCW died because a merged AOL-Time Warner didn't want wrestling on their channels anymore, ECW died because of its constant financial woes, old school TNA went away because Dixie drove away all her TV partners through her various antics, and while 2019 ROH listened too much to Bully Ray and derailed their momentum, they only went away and ended up purchased by Tony Khan because it was a company that needed to sell tickets to live shows and couldn't do that during the pandemic. We don't get that way about WWE because WWE has made itself too big to fail, but there's a fear that any other promotion is a "you booked the WRONG GUY to win the title!" decision away from death's door or something.

So now at a time when WWE's hot and AEW's numbers are either treading water (TV ratings) or have taken a dip in recent times (number of tickets sold), the parade wants to come in and say "See? AEW is doing badly because of specific things they're doing that I don't like, or things they're not doing that I would like!", instead of acknowledging that sometimes this shit goes in waves. People whined for ages that AEW "does a bunch of bangers with no story", which was never really accurate to begin with, but then AEW starts doing some pretaped vignettes or longer promos and it turns into "AEW is being too much like WWE!" instead. Next time it'll be the old "Tony Khan hates women/other groups of people" line, or that him tweeting has any real effect on the show or the vast majority of the audience's perception of it.

Meantime, WWE can book Roman to be in the same exact title match for over a literal year and have Cody kind of spinning his wheels since the Brock feud but people are marking out like mad for the two of them just bumping into one another on the ramp; that's what happens when you're hot. Had AEW done something the equivalent of Roman retaining at the last WM against Cody and then having them get into respective feuds and stories that seemed like they'd make more sense if Cody had won the title, I think they'd be getting a lot of grief for it. WWE isn't because, again, WWE's hot right now while AEW's numbers are treading water; that's not a whole "Oh, you'd love this if WWE did it/if AEW did it!" kind of thing, just how promotions getting hot impacts overall perceptions, ticket sales, and plenty of other ideas and metrics over a course of time.

Eventually, perceptions shift; the guys who were red hot cool down, a new act grabs people's attention, people rushing to get tickets six months ago becomes people not being as interested half a year later, and sometimes we don't see those numbers bear out for a little while, etc. But people want things to correlate to their own tastes and interests, so success or failure must correlate to exactly things they personally like or dislike.

Listen, you make a lot of sense here. I'm not going to dispute that. What I am trying to say is that there should never be a calling out and shaming of posters. Hell, that's really the only time I chime in these boards. And I'd argue that anything negative posted when AEW is/was hot was still talked down to whereas in WWE it's always felt allowed no matter how they are doing. And listen I'm not even all that high on WWE right now so this isn't "FW being a shill," just noticing things that causes posters to become unhappy and reach out in the way ed was implying in his post.

[mrbananagrabber]

To recap:

Two pages of: discussion about a problem with AEW ticket sales.
Twenty eight pages of: no u

[cjb01: Limited Edition Item!]

Oct 21, 2023 16:58:02 GMT -5 mrbananagrabber said:

To recap:

Two pages of: discussion about a problem with AEW ticket sales.
Twenty eight pages of: no u

These posts aren't helping literally anything about this thread

And no, this thread was extremely civil before the Paul Wight Tweet and reaction, we all plenty acknowledged there were some issues and kept discussing them and seeing updates about the arenas and how well or not they were doing. A breaking point was clearly reached.

[cjb01: Limited Edition Item!]

Oct 21, 2023 8:44:11 GMT -5 raymondo316 said:

I said I wouldn't reply but as certain people keep going on about minor comments I made I will reply

Once again this is a thread about ticket sales, if people don't want to read it because they don't like to hear anything even slightly negative, or they find it exhausting, they don't have to read or reply.

I said it makes AEW look minor league and what Big Show did was embarrassing (you will hear 100 times worse on reddit, twitter and other forums), yet the over reaction on here from some would make you think I shitted all over the company, said they were dying, going to be kicked off TNT/TBS and I had started a Deathwatch thread.

Some on here seem to have forgotten all the threads back in the day on this very forum that people were basically just shitting on TNA/Impact non-stop......didnt see people demanding those threads be shut because it was constant negativity.

I get it I will watch what I post now to make sure it isn't anyway negative...

Trying to equate this to TNA is such a false equivalency, you know exactly why TNA got clowned the way they did and why people aren't ready to shit on AEW just as easily as that company in its Deathwatch days, and it is nothing even close to what was presented in this thread.

You weren't the only one calling it embarrassing, multiple people did, and then multiple people responded WELL BEFORE ME about how BS it was that it was getting that response. Even in my response where my words got taken the wrong way (And I should have been more specific), you took it like I was only talking about you in this thread, and I wasn't, and no one else was singling you out specifically either far as I can see, they were singling out this narrative that what Paul was doing was embarrassing. Not just here but even on that Tweet itself.

This "Damn I guess I have to watch myself because I can't say anything negative" rhetoric is killing this forum, flat out. There is plenty of criticism outwardly expressed in AEW, there was nothing wrong with this thread for MONTHS as you shared and expressed your concern about ticket sales. Much like anywhere else negativity is expressed.

When people are ready to pile onto a literally harmless moment of Paul Wight in OVW offering a ticket deal to wrestling fans who love wrestling, something actively trying to help the very situation this thread has posed, forgive me if people took an issue with the goal posts being shoved again, and then being annoyed that people cry that they can't be negative because "X clearly equals Y" and... it doesn't, at all. 

I have zero issue with you on this forum and I imagine everyone else with a problem is the same. No one here acted like you or anyone else was saying AEW was going to die or it was going to turn into a "Deathwatch" thread, they were and are annoyed that something so insignificant was conflated into something we should call out as embarrassing, when it just wasn't. People wanted to try and make it a thing, and a bunch of other people said no, and thought it was hypocritical to the entire point of what this thread's purpose was trying to serve.

I hope you have a good rest of your day, I'm not trying to pile on here, but I needed to get this off my chest. I don't doubt your fandom, I don't doubt your passion, and I'm certainly not telling you how to be, but it's a public forum where everyone is not gonna feel the same way you do, so if you're gonna conflate something to be a big deal, and people don't agree or get mad about it... that's what we all signed up for tbh.