Full Version: How do European Indys draw ?
A buddy of mine recently wrestled a tour of Europe but I didn't see him in a whole lot of posted results because he worked mainly for smaller indy promotions. Just wondering how indys draw out there, and how big a deal wrestling is over there. Is it the same as North America where most shows draw around the 100-150 rainge aside from a few indys of name value ? Also what kind of crowd is it ? Smarky Philly type ? Backwards Canadian fans ? Old School "cheer the faces, boo the heels" like it SHOULD be ?
From my experience as a wrestler and promoter an average crowd is pretty much how you said, with most promoter being happy if they get 200 punters.
The British scene is structured kind of weirdly as we have no 'top dog' to speak of. The biggest promotion in the country is undoubtedly All-Star, who've been running for around 40 years and run around 300 shows a year up and down the country, but they have little-to-no mainstream or even internet notoriety, but they still draw crowds of anywhere between 150 and 2000 due to long standing venue contracts and local advertising. They tend to appeal to families with lots of clear face/heel divides and crowd interaction, and although a lot of the countries best wrestlers work for them due to the heavy schedule you probably wont be seeing any hard hitting, epic battles. They tend not to bother with the internet so you don't hear much about them or see their matches online, but to be fair it works for them as they're stronger than any other British promotion going.
Underneath that you have 6-7 mid-level promotions that mostly cater to internet fans (with about 3 of those being the most notorious). These are the guys like 1PW, IPW:UK, FWA, and I'd like to say us, Triple X Wrestling, and they tend to draw between 100-500 fans, and are they guys that'll bring over American and Japanese imports. We all try to keep a high profile online as we all have groups of very loyal fans that never miss shows, but mostly survive on local casual fans, who a lot of the time have never seen wrestling shows outside of WWE. You can normaly expect high levels of quality from promotions like these, as long as you're into they type of product they're presenting. They're rosters comprise of the best guys in any given area, and these are where these type of guys tend to go 'all out'.
Then there's promotions that while they may not get talked about as much as ones mentioned above, they are arguable more successful due to their foothold in local markets. It's hard to give examples as by their very definition these are promotions that don't immediately spring to mind, but still might be drawing 300 or so fans and turning a respectable profit. The quality of these shows tend to be fairly high, although there's a few bad groups out there that survive by simple moving from venue to venue, but generally these promotions get by one word of mouth, so the quality has to be of a certain standard otherwise people simple don't talk about them.
Below that (although I hate to say below as sadly there isn't much of a curve) you have the much smaller promotions who get between 50-100 fans to shows. Quality on shows like this varies wildly, from complete shit-arse shows with glorified backyarders in jeans and cut-off tshirts, to real diamond-in-the-rough shows packed full of talented guys just on the cusp of getting noticed.
There is of course certain promoters that'd be happy with 20 paid customers, but we don't like to talk about them....
As for the fans in general it varies so wildly from town to town, much as I'm guessing it does over in the US. Some crowds are really hard work to get going and seem to want to sit on their hands all night. Some crowds will be on their feet for the entire night screaming their lungs out. Some fans will just want to heckle the crap out of you and occasionally want to fight you before you've even got in the ring, while others will treat trainees having their first match like celebrities. At TXW we have quite a different fanbase as we advertise as 'adult only'. It's not that what we do is extremely violent, but it means we attract a crowd that will enjoy a comedy match with a time traveller or a stuffed toy winning a 24/7 belt followed by a 40 minute matwork clinic. Due to the unique product the fans tend to act like Japanese fans in the first half, politely clapping for moves and reversals, and then act like drunken Memphis fans baying for blood as the alcohol starts flowing.
Europe's a little different as their wrestling scene has followed a very different path. I've wrestled a few shows in France, and while one drew about 300 at a festival, the other had the ring set up outside in the centre of a tiny village, and it seemed like all 6000 or so residents had come out to see us. I can't really speak for anyone else over there, but from what I've seen they don't have the problem of oversaturation that the British scene has, as well as a slightly more respectable back history (at least in the casual fans point of view). Scotland is a little different to as they have much fewer promotions, with a lot more fans to go around, and in my experience the quality is generally quite high.
Of course everything I've said here is a very generalised, simplified view on things, and by no means is anything I've said a hard-and-fast rule, but I hope it gives you a general feel of things over here.
The British scene is structured kind of weirdly as we have no 'top dog' to speak of. The biggest promotion in the country is undoubtedly All-Star, who've been running for around 40 years and run around 300 shows a year up and down the country, but they have little-to-no mainstream or even internet notoriety, but they still draw crowds of anywhere between 150 and 2000 due to long standing venue contracts and local advertising. They tend to appeal to families with lots of clear face/heel divides and crowd interaction, and although a lot of the countries best wrestlers work for them due to the heavy schedule you probably wont be seeing any hard hitting, epic battles. They tend not to bother with the internet so you don't hear much about them or see their matches online, but to be fair it works for them as they're stronger than any other British promotion going.
Underneath that you have 6-7 mid-level promotions that mostly cater to internet fans (with about 3 of those being the most notorious). These are the guys like 1PW, IPW:UK, FWA, and I'd like to say us, Triple X Wrestling, and they tend to draw between 100-500 fans, and are they guys that'll bring over American and Japanese imports. We all try to keep a high profile online as we all have groups of very loyal fans that never miss shows, but mostly survive on local casual fans, who a lot of the time have never seen wrestling shows outside of WWE. You can normaly expect high levels of quality from promotions like these, as long as you're into they type of product they're presenting. They're rosters comprise of the best guys in any given area, and these are where these type of guys tend to go 'all out'.
Then there's promotions that while they may not get talked about as much as ones mentioned above, they are arguable more successful due to their foothold in local markets. It's hard to give examples as by their very definition these are promotions that don't immediately spring to mind, but still might be drawing 300 or so fans and turning a respectable profit. The quality of these shows tend to be fairly high, although there's a few bad groups out there that survive by simple moving from venue to venue, but generally these promotions get by one word of mouth, so the quality has to be of a certain standard otherwise people simple don't talk about them.
Below that (although I hate to say below as sadly there isn't much of a curve) you have the much smaller promotions who get between 50-100 fans to shows. Quality on shows like this varies wildly, from complete shit-arse shows with glorified backyarders in jeans and cut-off tshirts, to real diamond-in-the-rough shows packed full of talented guys just on the cusp of getting noticed.
There is of course certain promoters that'd be happy with 20 paid customers, but we don't like to talk about them....
As for the fans in general it varies so wildly from town to town, much as I'm guessing it does over in the US. Some crowds are really hard work to get going and seem to want to sit on their hands all night. Some crowds will be on their feet for the entire night screaming their lungs out. Some fans will just want to heckle the crap out of you and occasionally want to fight you before you've even got in the ring, while others will treat trainees having their first match like celebrities. At TXW we have quite a different fanbase as we advertise as 'adult only'. It's not that what we do is extremely violent, but it means we attract a crowd that will enjoy a comedy match with a time traveller or a stuffed toy winning a 24/7 belt followed by a 40 minute matwork clinic. Due to the unique product the fans tend to act like Japanese fans in the first half, politely clapping for moves and reversals, and then act like drunken Memphis fans baying for blood as the alcohol starts flowing.
Europe's a little different as their wrestling scene has followed a very different path. I've wrestled a few shows in France, and while one drew about 300 at a festival, the other had the ring set up outside in the centre of a tiny village, and it seemed like all 6000 or so residents had come out to see us. I can't really speak for anyone else over there, but from what I've seen they don't have the problem of oversaturation that the British scene has, as well as a slightly more respectable back history (at least in the casual fans point of view). Scotland is a little different to as they have much fewer promotions, with a lot more fans to go around, and in my experience the quality is generally quite high.
Of course everything I've said here is a very generalised, simplified view on things, and by no means is anything I've said a hard-and-fast rule, but I hope it gives you a general feel of things over here.
100-200, in my experience. (Which isn't too shabby, considering the complete lack of pro-wrestling in our popular culture. There's barely any on TV (apart from "This Week in WWE", which stinks) and when you say pro-wrestling, people basically think of Hogan (which makes them think of the reality show).) Depending on how rabidly you promote, though, it probably should be possible to fill up one of the venues in central Amsterdam with 500 folks or so. (Not that any of us in the Dutch scene could afford to book that.)
PWH had a blazing show yesterday with about 125 people, I'd estimate. We always run houses based on the 100-200 number, meaning that anywhere we run, 200 basically guarantees a super no vacancy full house experience and something like 125 looks (and sounds) very respectable. Another way to deal with small crowds is to make sure there is no way people can watch seated and to invite everyone to gather around the ring. I don't know if you've ever seen wXw footage, but that's the type of underground atmosphere that works really well when you draw what we do. (We actually use that old wXw ring too, hah.)
The fun thing about the crowd is that 95% of people here are virtually completely unfamiliar with wrestling (and the other 5% consists of 3% regular fans and 2% insufferable know-it-all internet smarks, for the record). While they might miss some stuff, or not respond like you'd expect, most of the time they are just exemplary little fans who cheer and boo when they are supposed to. That's nice. There are also plenty of marks and smarks around to start chants and hit the apron and whatnot.
PWH had a blazing show yesterday with about 125 people, I'd estimate. We always run houses based on the 100-200 number, meaning that anywhere we run, 200 basically guarantees a super no vacancy full house experience and something like 125 looks (and sounds) very respectable. Another way to deal with small crowds is to make sure there is no way people can watch seated and to invite everyone to gather around the ring. I don't know if you've ever seen wXw footage, but that's the type of underground atmosphere that works really well when you draw what we do. (We actually use that old wXw ring too, hah.)
The fun thing about the crowd is that 95% of people here are virtually completely unfamiliar with wrestling (and the other 5% consists of 3% regular fans and 2% insufferable know-it-all internet smarks, for the record). While they might miss some stuff, or not respond like you'd expect, most of the time they are just exemplary little fans who cheer and boo when they are supposed to. That's nice. There are also plenty of marks and smarks around to start chants and hit the apron and whatnot.
Norway is a... special case in wrestling. The scene there has a nine and a half year history. Apart from a really stupid show a touring promotion did in 1990 (featuring a main event of Tony Atlas and... someone being introduced and then brawling directly to the back), our first show in October was the first ever wrestling show in Norway, and certainly the first ever Norwegian wrestling show (as in, featuring actual Norwegians).
We regularly draw 120-150, with an all-time record (paying) crowd of some 500 people. We only do about 10-12 shows a year, so most wrestlers go balls out when they get the chance, allowing for some highly energized and pretty stiff matches. The crowd is... interesting. A fairly large fanbase cheer vocally for the heels, but not really for the "smark" reasons. The Norwegian crowd mostly cheers those who entertain them, and this happens to largely be the heels. If you are charismatic and makes things happen, they will cheer. With a few exceptions, Norwegian crowds also doen't really know how to boo, making effective (as in, they hate you) heel work mostly accompanied by silence or louder cheers for the other guy. It's pretty surreal until you get used to it - you do heel work, and the crowd either cheers you, or they are silent - but then explode when you get beat up. We don't really care - if they care about the feud or the match, that's what matters.
The most interesting thing is really how good the talent is compared to the available pool of people. We're based around Oslo, meaning we've got MAYBE a million people living within an area practically possible to draw to our school for wrestling training. Out of that we've got an actice pool of 16 wrestlers or so, with five or six trainees on the way and nine wrestlers on sabbatical or retired. We've exported people to England (Wales especially), Paraguay, most scenes on the Continent, and got to see Erik Isaksen (founder and head trainer) invited to Japan. Of course, operating the wrestling school explicitly to recruit people for the fed (thus not accepting all or even most comers to the school) and not allowing people into the ring on shows before they're ready is probably a good help :)
The scenes in Finland and Denmark are apparently similar, and similarly healthy :)
We regularly draw 120-150, with an all-time record (paying) crowd of some 500 people. We only do about 10-12 shows a year, so most wrestlers go balls out when they get the chance, allowing for some highly energized and pretty stiff matches. The crowd is... interesting. A fairly large fanbase cheer vocally for the heels, but not really for the "smark" reasons. The Norwegian crowd mostly cheers those who entertain them, and this happens to largely be the heels. If you are charismatic and makes things happen, they will cheer. With a few exceptions, Norwegian crowds also doen't really know how to boo, making effective (as in, they hate you) heel work mostly accompanied by silence or louder cheers for the other guy. It's pretty surreal until you get used to it - you do heel work, and the crowd either cheers you, or they are silent - but then explode when you get beat up. We don't really care - if they care about the feud or the match, that's what matters.
The most interesting thing is really how good the talent is compared to the available pool of people. We're based around Oslo, meaning we've got MAYBE a million people living within an area practically possible to draw to our school for wrestling training. Out of that we've got an actice pool of 16 wrestlers or so, with five or six trainees on the way and nine wrestlers on sabbatical or retired. We've exported people to England (Wales especially), Paraguay, most scenes on the Continent, and got to see Erik Isaksen (founder and head trainer) invited to Japan. Of course, operating the wrestling school explicitly to recruit people for the fed (thus not accepting all or even most comers to the school) and not allowing people into the ring on shows before they're ready is probably a good help :)
The scenes in Finland and Denmark are apparently similar, and similarly healthy :)
Sounds awesome! Interesting to get a unique perspective on da biz
QUOTE(Airk @ Apr 28 2010, 07:01 PM) 
Norway is a... special case in wrestling. The scene there has a nine and a half year history. Apart from a really stupid show a touring promotion did in 1990 (featuring a main event of Tony Atlas and... someone being introduced and then brawling directly to the back), our first show in October was the first ever wrestling show in Norway, and certainly the first ever Norwegian wrestling show (as in, featuring actual Norwegians).
We regularly draw 120-150, with an all-time record (paying) crowd of some 500 people. We only do about 10-12 shows a year, so most wrestlers go balls out when they get the chance, allowing for some highly energized and pretty stiff matches. The crowd is... interesting. A fairly large fanbase cheer vocally for the heels, but not really for the "smark" reasons. The Norwegian crowd mostly cheers those who entertain them, and this happens to largely be the heels. If you are charismatic and makes things happen, they will cheer. With a few exceptions, Norwegian crowds also doen't really know how to boo, making effective (as in, they hate you) heel work mostly accompanied by silence or louder cheers for the other guy. It's pretty surreal until you get used to it - you do heel work, and the crowd either cheers you, or they are silent - but then explode when you get beat up. We don't really care - if they care about the feud or the match, that's what matters.
The most interesting thing is really how good the talent is compared to the available pool of people. We're based around Oslo, meaning we've got MAYBE a million people living within an area practically possible to draw to our school for wrestling training. Out of that we've got an actice pool of 16 wrestlers or so, with five or six trainees on the way and nine wrestlers on sabbatical or retired. We've exported people to England (Wales especially), Paraguay, most scenes on the Continent, and got to see Erik Isaksen (founder and head trainer) invited to Japan. Of course, operating the wrestling school explicitly to recruit people for the fed (thus not accepting all or even most comers to the school) and not allowing people into the ring on shows before they're ready is probably a good help :)
The scenes in Finland and Denmark are apparently similar, and similarly healthy :)
We regularly draw 120-150, with an all-time record (paying) crowd of some 500 people. We only do about 10-12 shows a year, so most wrestlers go balls out when they get the chance, allowing for some highly energized and pretty stiff matches. The crowd is... interesting. A fairly large fanbase cheer vocally for the heels, but not really for the "smark" reasons. The Norwegian crowd mostly cheers those who entertain them, and this happens to largely be the heels. If you are charismatic and makes things happen, they will cheer. With a few exceptions, Norwegian crowds also doen't really know how to boo, making effective (as in, they hate you) heel work mostly accompanied by silence or louder cheers for the other guy. It's pretty surreal until you get used to it - you do heel work, and the crowd either cheers you, or they are silent - but then explode when you get beat up. We don't really care - if they care about the feud or the match, that's what matters.
The most interesting thing is really how good the talent is compared to the available pool of people. We're based around Oslo, meaning we've got MAYBE a million people living within an area practically possible to draw to our school for wrestling training. Out of that we've got an actice pool of 16 wrestlers or so, with five or six trainees on the way and nine wrestlers on sabbatical or retired. We've exported people to England (Wales especially), Paraguay, most scenes on the Continent, and got to see Erik Isaksen (founder and head trainer) invited to Japan. Of course, operating the wrestling school explicitly to recruit people for the fed (thus not accepting all or even most comers to the school) and not allowing people into the ring on shows before they're ready is probably a good help :)
The scenes in Finland and Denmark are apparently similar, and similarly healthy :)
I want to see that crowd in action. Someone get a match online.
QUOTE(Airk @ Apr 28 2010, 05:01 PM)
our first show in October was the first ever wrestling show in Norway, and certainly the first ever Norwegian wrestling show (as in, featuring actual Norwegians).
Really!? I could've sworn I've been seeing then name Erik Isaksen (wrestling on shows in Norway) for a long time.
QUOTE(Cameron Swift @ May 4 2010, 02:25 PM)
QUOTE(Airk @ Apr 28 2010, 05:01 PM)
our first show in October was the first ever wrestling show in Norway, and certainly the first ever Norwegian wrestling show (as in, featuring actual Norwegians).
Really!? I could've sworn I've been seeing then name Erik Isaksen (wrestling on shows in Norway) for a long time.
When I had a quick interview with Isaksen and I asked for his background, he said this:
Erik Isaksen: I became a wrestling fan in the mid-1980s, and almost immediately, I started dreaming about becoming wrestler myself. In 1995, I moved to England for marketing studies, and at the same time I found a gym which was run by a former wrestler. I started training there and later made my debut for Europe's biggest wrestling promotion, All-Star Promotions run by Brian Dixon, on the 15th March 1996. When I moved home to Norway, I started instructing wrestling which led to Norway's first wrestling promotion in 2001: The Norwegian Wrestling Federation (NWF).
So from what I pick up he started wrestling outside of Norway, and when he returning in 2000/2001 he started his own promotion which I am assuming is the same one that Airk is part of.
The first ever mask vs. mask match in Holland drew about 130 this weekend. Shabby it was not.
QUOTE(Cameron Swift @ May 4 2010, 07:25 PM)
QUOTE(Airk @ Apr 28 2010, 05:01 PM)
our first show in October was the first ever wrestling show in Norway, and certainly the first ever Norwegian wrestling show (as in, featuring actual Norwegians).
Really!? I could've sworn I've been seeing then name Erik Isaksen (wrestling on shows in Norway) for a long time.
Sorry, I neglected to add the rather important "In 2001" behind that October... So we are both right:)
Kevin Wilson is right on the money.
What about Nu Wrestling in Italy I don't know how they draw but they have had Orlando Jordon, Rob Van Dam, Ultimate Warrior, Rikishi, even Mr. Anderson.
They've have T.V deals in Italy on La7 and then Odeon T.V in the UK they were broadcast on The Fight Network and even France they were broadcast on Direct 8. Onlineworldofwrestling.com has them listed as active but the last I heard about them was when Warrior faced Jordan a while back.
It sounds like they should be in contention but then again their also a touring promotion so who knows.
They've have T.V deals in Italy on La7 and then Odeon T.V in the UK they were broadcast on The Fight Network and even France they were broadcast on Direct 8. Onlineworldofwrestling.com has them listed as active but the last I heard about them was when Warrior faced Jordan a while back.
It sounds like they should be in contention but then again their also a touring promotion so who knows.
Rikishi (and his crew of guys) cut ties with NWE last year. I don't know if the two things are related but soon after that NWE stopped running shows. Their last tour (well, actually it was just two shows) was last fall in Malta with Mr. Anderson versus Chuck Palumbo as the main event where Anderson won the NWE belt. They haven't run any shows since then. At their peak they were doing very well though. Their whole whole deal was find a European country where wrestling is hot at the moment, run a ton of shows there and then move to another country when the wrestling boom in the previous country is over. First it was Italy, then Spain and finally France. They were drawing very well most of the time, especially in Spain a couple of years ago when they did multiple shows in the 3,000-6,000 range and 2-3 shows with 15,000 in attendance. They also had TV deals in a bunch of countries.
Another touring promotion that has done some solid business throughout Europe is Ireland's American Wrestling Rampage. They've done shows in Ireland (attendances being in the 300-1,000 range), Switzerland (a single show of 1,000+), France (2,000-3,500), Germany (300-500), Romania (just one event with about 1,000) and Bulgaria (again, just one show - 700). After NWE slowed down AWR picked things up and started running 2-3 big tours per year usually with RVD as the main attraction and several other names to go along with him (Rene Dupree - the current AWR champ, Sabu, X-Pac, Raven and Sid Vicious did one tour, Bret Hart made some appearances too, Scotty 2 Hotty, Eugene, Tatanka, Test used to wrestle for them, Joe E Legend, Portia Perez, Pac, El Generico, etc.). Sadly this year things seem to have slowed down for them as well and they have only one scheduled tour later this year and so far it's only shows in France (their best market). Since RVD is in TNA now they've got Scott Steiner as the main attraction (as of right now). A La Resistance (Dupree & Grenier) is also scheduled for the France tour as well as NOSAWA & Pac. It will be interesting to see what other names will pop on the France tour later this year.
Another touring promotion that has done some solid business throughout Europe is Ireland's American Wrestling Rampage. They've done shows in Ireland (attendances being in the 300-1,000 range), Switzerland (a single show of 1,000+), France (2,000-3,500), Germany (300-500), Romania (just one event with about 1,000) and Bulgaria (again, just one show - 700). After NWE slowed down AWR picked things up and started running 2-3 big tours per year usually with RVD as the main attraction and several other names to go along with him (Rene Dupree - the current AWR champ, Sabu, X-Pac, Raven and Sid Vicious did one tour, Bret Hart made some appearances too, Scotty 2 Hotty, Eugene, Tatanka, Test used to wrestle for them, Joe E Legend, Portia Perez, Pac, El Generico, etc.). Sadly this year things seem to have slowed down for them as well and they have only one scheduled tour later this year and so far it's only shows in France (their best market). Since RVD is in TNA now they've got Scott Steiner as the main attraction (as of right now). A La Resistance (Dupree & Grenier) is also scheduled for the France tour as well as NOSAWA & Pac. It will be interesting to see what other names will pop on the France tour later this year.
AWR are also advertising Booker T, Tajiri, Tommy Dreamer, Sandman, Tatanka, Big Daddy V and Lita for their French tour.
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