by Carrie Dunn
“The other thing is make the show a rollercoaster, so take the audience on an emotional journey, so there’s highs, there’s lows, there’s times when the audience should feel sad, there’s times when they’ll feel anxious, there’s times when they’ll feel ecstatic, and there’s that whole range of emotions throughout the show. And we did that. We absolutely nailed it. All those things put together, that is how you book a show.”
Chapter 12:
In the spotlight – looking west
THE Midlands scene features two promotions run by the same team – AMP, a family-friendly series of show, and Triple X Wrestling, which is its very own adults-only cult.
Triple X took a bit of a break after losing their regular venue, returning to the scene in the summer of 2012.
“Losing the Jolly Beggar and having to cancel a show really set us back,” says promoter James Meikle. “Life outside of wrestling was also getting a bit hectic for both of us. We were still doing stuff with AMP but Triple X takes a whole lot more work that we couldn’t give to it. As strange as it might seem for the show that books stuffed toys and zombies, all we really had was our reputation and I’d never jeopardise that by doing Triple X half-arsed.”
“The truth is we never really intended for Triple X to be away as long as it did,” admits co-promoter Nick Bakewell, “and it was always something we wanted to return to.”
Their decision to return when they did was made partly based on the talent available for the show – particularly Zack Sabre Jr, who was back in the UK between his engagements in Japan.
“We both talked a lot about it in the meantime and fans and wrestlers never let us forget about it – especially Zack,” says Meikle. “The timing felt right with Zack being back from Japan, a new venue that fit with us and just missing that buzz we always get from it.”
Interestingly, Meikle and Bakewell tend to use AMP as a testing ground for Triple X, giving less experienced wrestlers the chance to perform on a show.
“Because we don’t tend to market AMP to the internet crowd it gives us a chance to work with a completely different set of fans, which gives us a chance to try out new characters and test out potential chemistry between workers,” says Bakewell. “We rarely bring anyone new into Triple X without evaluating them in AMP first so we can determine how best to use them.”
“You’ll see a lot of familiar faces,” adds Meikle. “We use the more experienced guys to help out the next generation. A lot of our future Triple X guys will be the current AMP talent. A lot of the guys have hands in various training academies and recommend their best up and comers for AMP. Guys like Mark Andrews, Wild Boar and the Dunnes are all breaking out now and they’ve been with AMP since the start so I like to think we have a pretty good eye on UK talent.”
AMP continued during Triple X’s hiatus, but aren’t and have never been quite as high profile – probably because there’s less internet buzz about straightforward family-friendly shows.
“A lot of people don’t know it’s happening because we don’t have as strong an online presence,” agrees Meikle. “The truth is, we’re close to selling out shows on local reputation alone. AMP is a very strong brand.”
It all sounds like a lot of work – but AMP and Triple X are still part-time ventures for Meikle and Bakewell.
“To be perfectly honest, it did start out just for fun – and it was a lot of fun,” says Meikle. “The truth now is that we would both love to make it a full-time deal. We’ve had some unique ideas in the last few months about expanding the business and we’re working on that. We’re always coming up with new merchandising ideas and we’ve had DVD orders from around the world. We’re often called a niche product and that is pretty fair.”
“We’ve been lucky enough to garner a huge amount of loyalty and passion from our fans, many of whom can claim to have attended every one of our shows to date, so it’s very important to us that we repay them by putting on the best shows we can and treating it as professionally as possible,” says Bakewell. “It does become a full-time commitment pretty quickly, but at the same time we both love what we’re doing, and we’re prepared to do whatever it takes to continue with it.”
With a promotion like Triple X, and an audience consisting solely of over-18s, that gives wrestlers a lot of freedom to push the boundaries of what they present in the ring. However, Meikle and Bakewell concur that they never go too far.
“It’s a common misconception that that’s what Triple X is about,” says Bakewell. “We’ve only ever actually held a handful of hardcore matches, and usually it’s in a comedy vein. I sometimes think that with a name like ours that we don’t go far enough, but really it’s not that sort of thing that people come to our shows to see. We use the name and brand more as a way of attracting the types of customers that we think will be the most responsive to our product, and it’s worked very well in that respect.”
And fan expectation plays a part in what’s presented.
“I think if you aren’t booking for your crowd then you’re doing something wrong,” says Meikle. “Swerving the crowd and surprising them is OK, but I think some promotions are constantly trying to waggle a finger at their audience saying ‘AHA!’ like they want to outsmart their fans all the time. People don’t want to feel stupid.”
“We also have very high expectations for the shows ourselves, which pushes us to constantly improve on what we’ve achieved,” says Bakewell. “We also like to keep in mind that any show will be at least one fan’s first show, so while we like to explore long-term stories and character development that reward return fans, we try to present it in a way that won’t confuse or alienate new fans.”
“In terms of the quality the fans expect, wrestling is like any other product on offer,” adds Meikle. “You have to maintain your standards or people won’t buy it anymore. We know the standard we set for talent and booking is high and we have to keep delivering. We couldn’t suddenly start booking Urban Warrior vs Cage Tyler in main events after you’ve had Zack Sabre Jr vs Daniel Bryan [Bryan Danielson – a match that took place in March 2008]. That, combined with keeping up with what other companies in the UK are doing these days – the bar just gets higher.”
Elsewhere in the Midlands and the south-east, Ben Auld of Southside Wrestling promotes shows with the very best of British talent – and few imports. Sure, he’s a wrestling fan – as are most promoters who go into the business – but he treats his shows with admirable common sense while at the same time not stinting on spending. He seems to be one of the promoters who have learnt from the errors of those olden-day big spenders, putting on impressive shows featuring great talent, but never losing sight of the fact that a successful company should make money.
“There’s probably four people in the country who spend as much on their shows as I do,” he admits.
He says drawing a crowd and having a good atmosphere are his priorities on show days – although making back his expenditure is crucial, he’s usually confident that tickets combined with merchandise sales will cover it.
“We have a hell of a lot of merchandise on sale; if the show only breaks even [with ticket sales], I can still go home with a grand or something,” he says. “Our DVDs are being quite well received. So it’s not always the worst thing in the world if I only break even on the door, to be honest; if you have 200 people there and they all spend a fiver each on average on merchandise, that’s £1,000, and if they have photos in the ring with a star, or we do a meet and greet, or if the show’s really good and the atmosphere’s really good and the DVD is for sale after. I haven’t run a show and not made money for a long time.”
Perhaps this is partly because his day job is in banking. Is he one of those tabloid demons who command huge bonuses at the nation’s expense?
“Definitely, definitely not. Although,” he adds, thoughtfully, “if I were, I’d probably spend it all on promoting and put on more really, really good shows.”
Wales
Wrestlers Mark A
ndrews and Pete Dunne now run their own promotion, ATTACK! Pro Wrestling, in South Wales and the Midlands – primarily in their home towns and the environs. Andrews is completely honest about the way they operate.
“We just figured it would be cool to do shows in both Birmingham and Cardiff, because not many promotions are travelling that far away; we were even considering trying to get a show in Ireland, just to have the whole performing in different countries and different counties and stuff.
“We’re quite lucky with ATTACK! When it comes to overkilling a venue and that type of stuff, the crowd are pretty persistent. Most of them are just my family and friends, to be honest, it’s not a family and friends show [ie a show where the audience is made up just of people brought along by the wrestlers], but I’ve got a lot of people in Cardiff who are always ‘I want to come and see you wrestle!’, loads of friends, high school friends, uni friends, the trainees from Newport, they all want to see shows.
“We don’t really worry too much about being able to draw, because I’m pretty sure we’ll sell out – with 100 [capacity in the venues in which they run], it’s quite easy to sell out each time, to be honest. We’re not going to overkill it, we won’t do shows every month or anything, but maybe every three or four months, get shows three or four times a year, but there’s not really a solid time in between each show that we do, we just do it as we please.
“I’m not a promoter. People always give you s*** – ‘Oh, you’re just booking yourself in the main event.’ These shows wouldn’t work if I wasn’t in the main event. When 50 per cent of the crowd are your friends, that’s the way it’s got to be, to be honest, the same way as when Pete used to run up in Birmingham, he would be in the main event all the time because all of his friends were in the crowd and he was just the best draw,” he says.
“Our first show, we made about 500 quid for charity, which we were pretty pleased with for 100 people in the door, and then the second show, all the workers got a good wage, and we made a tiny bit of money. We thought: ‘You know what, we can keep doing this, we’re not taking it out of anyone else’s pocket.’ We’re just building a little bit on the Cardiff scene.”
After having to travel to Kent in order to get a decent training at Hammerlock, Andrews is quite scathing about the breadth of wrestling available to fans in Wales. He thinks that almost anything new there would be a positive addition, as would collaboration between promotions.
“A few years ago when I first went up to Scotland, I was so astounded to see how cool they all were with each other,” recalls Andrews. “The scene up in Scotland is incredible, especially compared to Wales.”
Andrews highlights the work done by Alan Ravenhill of Welsh Wrestling, who runs regular shows in towns all round the country, relying on his usual roster and his company’s excellent reputation. “It’s cool that he does that, but that’s literally it,” says Andrews. “You’ve got the DragonPro Academy, they’re more of a training academy than anything, but for trainees there’s no light at the end of the tunnel, there’s hardly any shows on the go, so that’s annoying.
“I’ve always focused, in my individual career, individual wrestling stuff, to try and break out of Wales, because there’s nothing here to do. I don’t want to be working camp shows for the rest of my life. I think the best way to progress is to break out and go to England and Scotland, even Europe. Staying in your comfort zone, you’ll stay there forever.”
Chapter 13:
The marketing
“IT’S no longer six degrees of separation; it’s now one degree of separation via Twitter or Facebook,” says Nigel McGuinness. “The world is changing. It used to be that professional wrestlers had to maintain that degree of superstarness. Now people want to see the real person.”
Engaging with people via social media is a big interest of lots of the UK’s best-known indy wrestlers and promotions – and it’s probably obvious why. It’s an immediate – and free – method of communication – what’s not to like?
Phil Ward, who has a keen interest in the psychology of marketing, enthuses: “Because it’s free, the only investment is your time. It’s just such an effective medium. People who are using it well are the ones who are putting in that investment of time.”
One of the most successful uses of Twitter in British wrestling came in mid-2012, when Jimmy Havoc started a campaign using the hashtag #bookhavoc, haranguing the founders of PROGRESS Wrestling to use him on their second show. But, of course, using a hashtag meant that others could easily join in, creating a big buzz around both
And thus a feud developed, with PROGRESS taking to Twitter to denounce Havoc’s back catalogue of work, and Havoc urging them to take a chance on him. It culminated with PROGRESS agreeing that if Havoc could prove himself as a technically adept wrestler, then they would consider him for their next card.
This led to Havoc adopting Danny Garnell as his ‘trainer’, and the pair created a hilarious montage training video, a la Rocky, in which Havoc had to be weaned off automatically resorting to battering his opponent with a steel chair.
Of course, it was all a storyline. But even those close to the scene – and who know Havoc himself – weren’t quite sure at first.
“At first, I was like ‘oh, it’s a work’ – they’re too professional to actually cuss someone out on Twitter, it’s got to be a work,” says Phil Ward, who has worked with Havoc at promotions including FPW. “But then they had some real close to the bone things, and I was like: ‘Is this still a work, or have we moved past the work bit?’
“I loved it, I thought it was brilliant. It’s one of those things, it was genuinely entertaining. They say you can’t work a worker, but they had me going. That’s what’s interesting about it. People couldn’t tell, and if I couldn’t tell, and I was fairly close to it, and I was expecting it to be a work all along, and I still couldn’t tell, then that’s got to be good.”
The #bookhavoc campaign is a classic of the genre, and though many wrestlers and promotions may want to build a storyline via social media, it needs to be unique and engaging enough to capture a fan’s interest. It is a tough balance to strike between giving enough information about characters and the forthcoming show and the possibility of over-exposure – which may put people off to the extent that they stop following the account.
Then there’s also the tough issue around kayfabe. Do wrestlers need to always update their social media in the persona of their in-ring character? Can they strike a balance between the ‘real’ them and the role that they play? Or do wrestlers simply need to have two separate social media accounts – one to chat to their ‘real-life’ friends and one for their fans? It’s a dilemma that each performer has to decide for themselves – as independent contractors, with the freedom to work all over the country (and the world), they don’t have social media guidelines handed down to them in order to guide their online conduct.
Ward suggests that access to the internet and social media tools allows wrestlers and wrestling promotions to target fans and potential fans with much more accuracy. “The internet’s revolutionised everything. There’s no two ways about it,” he says. “It’s easier to find people who are interested in the things that you’re interested in.
“There was a show a while back that some of my friends were handing out fliers for, and that is just such a scattergun approach. It’s basically putting leaflets through doors, and hoping against hope that there will be a wrestling fan living there, but there’s no guarantee. There’s no intelligence behind that, it’s just sheer hard work, going from door to door. To me that’s like gambling. You might as well flip a coin. You might as well put it all on red or go to the blackjack table with the money, if you’re looking to make money out of it.
“To me, you need to find people who are interested in the things we’re interested in, and this is why I have a Facebook page and a Twitter account and a blog and all the rest of it, because I want to try and concentrate wrestling people, wrestling fans, to where I’
m already at, and I’ll go to the places they’re already at, like Facebook and Twitter, and find them, and eventually you’ve got a big community of people who you know are wrestling fans.”
And it helps to create links between wrestlers and with promotions. “You want to get as much work as you can and you do end up going all over the show, you keep in touch with these people,” says Rhia O’Reilly. “It’s weird, the social networking, you get to know people a lot better than you think you do. You’ll meet once and then become friends online, and then talk online, and then you’re best friends the next time you see each other because you know so much from Twitter and Facebook. I think that’s changed the dynamic a lot as well.
“Wrestling’s definitely grasped on to social media. WWE are all over Twitter, but over here I think it’s become a really good tool. Twitter’s really good for popping those things out there nice and quick, everyone’s on board, they’re re-tweeting; Facebook as well, all the fan pages, and to be honest I get 90 per cent of my bookings through Facebook.”
“I think this is the way the world in general is going, not just in wrestling!” says Lionheart, aka Adrian McCallum. “How many people would you be in touch with from school or college if it weren’t for Facebook? How many people from your old job years ago would you keep in touch with? The world of social networking has grown rapidly and will continue to do so in all circles.
“Ninety-nine times out of 100, a promoter will message me on Facebook or Twitter, I’ll never get an e-mail or a phone call. It’s the way we live now, and obviously it’s great to keep in touch and up to speed with friends and colleagues who you don’t see as often as you’d like.”