WWE Looking to Cut Multiple Costs: Roster Cuts, PPV News, UK

WWE is currently implementing a ton of cost-cutting measures. Some noticeable differences in the WWE shows, such as the lack of pyro lately, are being made to save money. That does not appear to be changing anytime soon either. Dave Meltzer commented on the issue on the latest edition of his Wrestling Observer Radio show by stating that WWE is doing whatever it takes at the moment to help boost their profits in 2017. The company allegedly “promised everyone” that they were going to be collecting much larger profits in 2017 than they were in 2016. The second quarter of 2017 just came and went, and the company is supposedly nowhere close to coming through on that claim.
It’s not just pyro and minimal expenses that have been cut lately. Just recently, we have heard news about Talking Smack, Unfiltered, The Edge & Christian Show, and a planned game show featuring R-Truth all having future episodes on the WWE Network cancelled. WWE reportedly hasn’t even gotten to some of the major cutbacks that they will be making soon, According to Meltzer, “So last year’s profits were about $30 million and this year we’re about halfway through. I don’t have the exact numbers in front of me but it’s like five or six million. Which means there’s a lot of catching up to do. They’re not in any financial trouble but the Network subscriber number is a genuine disappointment. The growth coming out of WrestleMania that would have been expected wasn’t there.”
Also, Meltzer made a statement on WWE’s current attempts of expanding their programming via the brand split. The decision for WWE to run bi-weekly pay-per-views has created a ton of damage and the subscriber count on the WWE Network has not been growing large enough to sustain those costs. Meltzer also said that these cutbacks have been the reason why WWE’s UK exclusive show has not premiered yet. The cost to tape and produce yet another weekly wrestling show, even if they tape multiple shows once a month, is just too much for them to handle right now. Finally, Meltzer said that, among multiple other cuts, it is possible that roster cuts could be made.