| Type | Public |
|---|---|
| Traded as | NYSE: WWE |
| Industry | Professional wrestling, sports entertainment |
| Founded | 1952 |
| Headquarters | Stamford, Connecticut, U.S. |
| Key people | Vince McMahon (Chairman/CEO) Stephanie McMahon-Levesque (Executive Vice President of Talent Relations, Live Events and Creative Writing) |
| Revenue | $119.9 million USD (Q1/2011)[1] |
| Operating income | $13.2 million USD (Q1/2011)[1] |
| Net income | $45.4 million USD (2008)[1] |
| Employees | 585 (as of February 2011, excluding wrestlers)[2] |
| Website | Official Site Corporate WWE Web Site |
This is the history of WWE, a sports entertainment company dealing primarily in the professional wrestling industry.
Contents |
Roderick James "Jess" McMahon was a boxing promoter whose achievements included co-promoting a boxing match in 1915 between Jess Willard and Jack Johnson. In 1925, while working with Tex Rickard (who despised wrestling to such a degree that he prevented wrestling events from being held in the third Madison Square Garden in New York City) he started promoting boxing in the Garden. The first match during their partnership was a light heavyweight championship match between Jack Delaney and Paul Berlenbach.
A few years earlier, around 1920, former professional wrestler Joseph Raymond "Toots" Mondt had come up with a revolutionary concept. He decided to take wrestling to a higher level, bringing it out of back alleys and rough areas into sporting arenas. At the time, pro wrestling consisted primarily of mat grappling; and while the sport had flourished a decade earlier under Frank Gotch, the fans had since grown tired of the painfully deliberate pace of the bouts. However, Mondt discovered a solution that would completely transform the industry, as he convinced Lewis and Sandow to implement a new form of wrestling that combined features of boxing, Greco-Roman, freestyle and lumber-camp fighting into what he deemed “Slam Bang Western-Style Wrestling.” His next move was to form a promotion with Ed Lewis and Billy Sandow. They persuaded a lot of wrestlers to sign contracts with the newly named 'Gold Dust Trio'.
Eventually, the trio dissolved and the promotion did also, after a disagreement over power. Mondt formed partnerships with several promoters. When Jack Curley was dying, Mondt knew that New York wrestling would fall apart. Realizing this he gained help from several bookers, one of these being Jess McMahon.
Together, Jess and Mondt created the Capitol Wrestling Corporation (CWC). The company had offices in both Washington, D.C. and New York.[3] There is not a lot of information on the early days of the CWC, but it is known that it joined the National Wrestling Alliance (NWA) in 1953.
Mondt had been using Antonino Rocca as a main eventer. He was successful in the role and Mondt was pleased to have him as part of the company. Unfortunately, Mondt was unable to keep Rocca happy.
In 1953, Ray Fabiani, one of Mondt's other associates, brought in Vincent J. McMahon to replace his father Jess (this was around the time the CWC became a territorial member of the NWA). They controlled all of the Northeastern wrestling circuit.
Vince Sr. and Toots Mondt were a formidable combination: within a short time, they controlled around 70% of the NWA's booking—given what a far-reaching organization the NWA was, that was a significant achievement. Mondt taught Vince Sr. about booking and how to work in the wrestling industry. This was the start of the wrestling revolution.
In 1956, the CWC signed a deal with WTTG Channel 5 to air live professional wrestling shows.
In 1980, the son of Vincent J. McMahon, Vincent K. McMahon, founded Titan Sportings Inc. and in 1982 purchased Capitol Sports from his father and associates (Gorilla Monsoon and Arnold Skaaland were given lifetime employment with World Wrestling Federation, and all three minority holders received cash payments). The elder McMahon had already established the northeastern territory as one of the most vibrant members of the NWA by recognizing that pro wrestling was more about entertainment than sport.
The NWA was not the only wrestling outfit in operation; the American Wrestling Association (AWA) had long ago ceased being an official NWA member, and controlled the US Northern Midwest. But in neither instance did the defecting member attempt to undermine, and destroy, the territory system that had been the foundation of the industry.
The first step of McMahon's attempt to go national was to sign AWA superstar Hulk Hogan, who, due to his appearance in Rocky III had a national recognition. To play Hogan's nemesis, he signed North Carolina badboy Roddy Piper, and also Jesse Ventura (although Ventura never wrestled in the WWF at that point).
Other promoters were furious when McMahon began syndicating WWF television shows to television stations across the United States, in areas outside of the WWF's traditional Northeastern stronghold. McMahon also began selling videotapes of WWF events outside the Northeast through his Coliseum Video distribution company. Wrestling promoters nationwide were now in direct competition with the WWF. The WWF bought off talent all around Canada and U.S. including the likes of the British Bulldogs and The Hart Foundation who were based with Stampede Wrestling. Eventually in the 1980s, WWF was able to sign Dusty Rhodes who had been a legend during the regional territory days.
The younger McMahon had an even bolder ambition: the WWF would tour nationally. Such a venture, however, required huge capital investment; one that placed the WWF on the verge of financial collapse. The future of not just McMahon's experiment, but also the WWF, the NWA, and the whole industry came down to the success or failure of McMahon's groundbreaking sports entertainment concept, WrestleMania. WrestleMania was a pay-per-view extravaganza (most areas of the country saw WrestleMania available on Closed-circuit television) that McMahon marketed as being the Super Bowl of professional wrestling.
The concept of a wrestling super card was nothing new in North America; the NWA had been running Starrcade a few years prior to WrestleMania, and even the elder McMahon had marketed large Shea Stadium cards viewable in closed circuit locations. However, McMahon wanted to take the WWF to the mainstream, targeting the public who were not regular wrestling fans. He drew the interest of the mainstream media by inviting celebrities such as Mr. T and Cyndi Lauper to participate in the event. MTV, in particular, featured a great deal of WWF coverage and programming at this time, in what was termed the Rock 'n' Wrestling Connection.
There were attempts in the Deep South to keep the legacy of the regional territory system alive. Several regional territories in the Deep South merged together to form Jim Crockett Promotions (JCP). Starrcade and The Great American Bash were the Jim Crockett Promotions version of WrestleMania. However JCP had trouble competing against the WWF. JCP even ran a few shows outside its regional base. The promotion was sold off becoming WCW, which ended up becoming the main competition for the WWF until 2001.
The new formula of what McMahon deemed sports entertainment was a resounding financial success at the original WrestleMania in 1985. The WWF did incredible business on the shoulders of McMahon and his All-American babyface hero, Hulk Hogan, for the next several years, creating what some observers dubbed a second golden age for professional wrestling.
In addition to Hogan, there were other muscular singles stars who were making their mark in the WWF including "Macho Man" Randy Savage , the Ultimate Warrior, Ricky Steamboat, and Paul Orndorff. Not only did WWF have a dominant singles division, the tag team division had a myriad of excellent teams such as The Rockers, Demolition, The Hart Foundation, The British Bulldogs, and The Fabulous Rougeaus. In 1987, the WWF would also add more to the company's success and produced what was considered to be the pinnacle of the entire 1980s wrestling boom, WrestleMania III.[4] Thanks to the success of WrestleMania, additional pay-per-views were produced such as SummerSlam, Royal Rumble, and Survivor Series. The Survivor Series stressed the elimination tag format. The Royal Rumble had a 30-man battle royal which, in 1993, would stipulate where the winner faces the WWF Champion at that year's WrestleMania. SummerSlam became the major hit of the summer. This era was noted for some of its excellent matches. Some memories included the Hogan vs. Warrior bout at WrestleMania VI in the SkyDome, Steamboat vs. Savage Intercontinental Title match at WrestleMania III and Hogan vs. Andre the Giant at that same pay-per-view.
Under Eric Bischoff, World Championship Wrestling, the new name for NWA super territory Jim Crockett Promotions after its purchase by Ted Turner in 1988, began using its tremendous financial resources to lure established talent away from the WWF. In 1995, Bischoff upped the ante, creating WCW Monday Nitro, a cable show on Turner's TNT network, to directly compete with the WWF's flagship show, WWF Monday Night RAW. Eventually, on the strength of its newly-acquired WWF talent and the groundbreaking nWo storyline, WCW overtook the WWF in television ratings and popularity.
McMahon responded by stating that he could create new superstars to regain the upper hand in the ratings war, and at the same time tightening contracts to make it harder for WCW to raid WWF talent(implementing a 90-day no-compete clause). Shawn Michaels and Bret Hart were elevated to the top of the card, gaining popularity based mostly on the excellence of their in-ring abilities, a far departure from the Hogan era. Despite this, the WWF was losing money at a rapid rate. WCW's reality-based storylines drew attention away from the WWF's.
However, from mid 1990s until the early 2000s, The WWF gained the upper hand mostly with big stars like The Rock and Stone Cold Steve Austin, as well as big factions like D-Generation X. That era during the WWF was known as the "Attitude Era."
In 2004, WWE published a DVD entitled The Monday Night War, which chronicles the battle between the two organizations.
On May 23, 1999, WWF wrestler Owen Hart fell to his death in Kansas City, Missouri, during a WWF pay-per-view event. Hart was in the process of being lowered into the ring from the rafters of Kemper Arena when a malfunction occurred. He fell 78 feet, landing chest-first on the top rope, throwing him into the ring. Hart was transported to Truman Medical Center in Kansas City, where he was pronounced dead on arrival.
The WWF aired a special broadcast the next night, entitled Raw Is Owen, where many wrestlers broke character and expressed their grief over Hart's death. Hart's widow filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the company.
The Attitude Era is considered to have ended after WrestleMania X-Seven following a slow decline in ratings.[5] Despite this, the WWF kept most of their audience in this transitional period, fueled with a combination of new factors leading to a fresh product. For one, Chris Kreski took over head writer duties after Vince Russo left for WCW. Kreski was admired by many for heading a creative process that had well-planned storylines. Some of the more remembered angles from this time were Triple H vs. Cactus Jack feuding over the WWF Title, the Triple H/Kurt Angle/Stephanie McMahon love triangle, and the TLC feud between the Hardy Boyz, Edge and Christian, and the Dudley Boyz. At the same time, injuries to Steve Austin and the Undertaker allowed WWF to focus on new stars such as Eddie Guerrero, Chris Benoit, Chris Jericho, Kurt Angle, The Dudley Boyz, The Hardy Boyz, Rikishi, and Edge and Christian.
In late 2000, WWF Raw is War moved from the USA Network to TNN. This coincided with the return of Steve Austin, after being out for close to a year due to injury. Despite having their biggest star back, the WWF's ratings started to slowly decline. Chris Kreski left the company, and Stephanie McMahon became the head writer. Despite this, the WWF presented what is considered by many to be one of their greatest single cards of all time, WrestleMania X-Seven, headlined by the Rock vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin for the WWF title. At the end of the show, Vince McMahon helped give Steve Austin the win, turning him heel in the process. Austin went on to form a union with Triple H called The Two-Man Power Trip, which carried WWF storylines for most of the Spring. But just as the next phase of the WWF began, the WWF lost two of their top stars, Triple H and Chris Benoit, to injuries. It was during this period that ratings took a serious blow, arguably due to the deaths of WCW and ECW, Steve Austin's heel turn and the absence of some big names.
In the InVasion storyline, Shane McMahon acquired World Championship Wrestling (WCW) and WCW personnel invaded the WWF. For the first time since the Monday Night Wars, the WWF's purchase of WCW had made a major American interpromotional feud possible, but the InVasion (as it was called) turned out to be a disappointment. One reason was that many of WCW's big name stars were under contract to WCW's old parent company, AOL Time Warner, rather than WCW itself, and their contracts were not included in the purchase of the company. These wrestlers chose to sit out the duration of their contracts rather than work for the WWF for less money.
On July 9, 2001, the stars of WCW and Extreme Championship Wrestling (acquired by Stephanie McMahon in a related storyline) joined forces, forming "The Alliance" with WCW owner Shane McMahon and the new owner of ECW Stephanie McMahon, and supported and influenced by original ECW owner Paul Heyman. After months of feuding, at Survivor Series 2001, the WWF finally defeated WCW and ECW in a "Winner Takes All Match" and this concluded the angle.
In the aftermath of the Invasion angle, the WWF made several major changes to their product. Ric Flair returned to the company as a "co-owner" in storylines, feuding with Vince McMahon. Jerry "The King" Lawler returned to the RAW broadcast booth, after quitting earlier in the year. Several former Alliance stars were absorbed into the regular WWF roster, such as Booker T, The Hurricane, Lance Storm, and Rob Van Dam.
After the WWF bought WCW in 2001, Vince McMahon brought back Hulk Hogan, Kevin Nash, and Scott Hall as the nWo, at the No Way Out 2002 pay-per-view on February 17, 2002. Over time, more members joined the nWo such as X-Pac (formerly known as Syxx in WCW), Big Show (formerly known as The Giant in WCW), Booker T, Shawn Michaels and Ric Flair and Goldust as semi-members.
In the late 1980s, the World Wrestling Federation's parent company, Titan Sports, filed for international trademark of the initials "WWF", which was disputed by the World Wildlife Fund. In 1994, the two companies had entered into an agreement over the rights to the usage of the initials.[6] However, the Federation's continued usage of the initials internationally led to a lawsuit.
The 2000 lawsuit was settled in 2002, and on May 6, 2002, the company changed its name to World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc., or WWE, and eliminated all elements that used the term "Federation". This forced the company to issue new licensed merchandise such as apparel, action figures, video games, and home videos with the new WWE logo. Additionally, older footage which used the company's "scratch" logo or the spoken initials "WWF" had to be re-edited to eliminate such content. To facilitate public awareness of the change, for a short while, WWE adopted the slogan Get the "F" out.
In the aftermath of the Invasion storyline, Vince McMahon lobbied WWE's television carrier, TNN, for time on its schedule for a new show featuring the WCW brand. Reports say this idea was rejected owing to McMahon's failure with non-WWE projects, the XFL in particular.
Faced with a surplus of talent, even after the departure of several undercard wrestlers from both organizations, April 2002 saw the WWE undergo a process McMahon called the Brand Extension. The WWE was divided into two de facto wrestling promotions with separate rosters, storylines and authority figures. RAW and SmackDown! would host each division, give its name to the division and essentially compete against each other.
Wrestlers would become show-exclusive, wrestling for their specific show only. At the time this excluded the WWE Undisputed Championship and WWE Women's Championship, as those titles would be defended on both shows. In August 2002, WWE Undisputed Champion Brock Lesnar refused to defend the title on Raw, in effect causing his title to become exclusive to SmackDown! The following week on Raw, General Manager Eric Bischoff awarded a newly created World Heavyweight Championship, with a design similar to the WCW World Heavyweight Championship belt, to Raw's designated number one contender, Triple H.
Following the Brand Extension, a yearly Draft Lottery was instituted to exchange members of each roster and generally refresh the lineups.
The Legends program began informally with the return of the WWE Hall of Fame ceremony in 2004, held annually during WrestleMania weekends. The introduction of WWE 24/7, WWE's on-demand television service, and the success of career retrospective DVDs such as The Ultimate Ric Flair Collection, Roddy Piper: Born to Controversy, and Brian Pillman: Loose Cannon has invested WWE's present product with a sense of heritage, and allows a new generation of wrestling fans to witness matches and events they may only previously have heard of.
On the morning of November 13, 2005, Chavo Guerrero checked into a hotel with his uncle, Eddie Guerrero, in Minneapolis, Minnesota where they were both scheduled be a part of a planned Raw and SmackDown! "Supershow" (a show where both Raw and SmackDown! would take place the same night in the same arena). After Eddie missed a wake-up call, security opened his hotel room and Chavo found his uncle unconscious. Chavo attempted CPR, but 38-year-old Eddie was declared dead at the scene. Vickie Guerrero, Eddie's wife, later announced that an autopsy ruled the cause of death to be massive heart failure.
Guerrero's death fell on the day that he had been scheduled to compete in a match for the World Heavyweight Championship versus Batista and Randy Orton. The company held tributes to Guerrero on both Raw and SmackDown during the week following his death. On April 1, 2006 at the WWE Hall of Fame induction ceremonies during WrestleMania 22 weekend, Guerrero's wife Vickie accepted his posthumous induction into WWE Hall of Fame by Rey Mysterio, Chris Benoit and Chavo Guerrero.
Following Guerrero's death, Vince McMahon announced a new drug policy under which performers would be subject to random drug tests by an independent company and would receive regular medical physicals with an emphasis on cardiovascular health.[7]
By 2005, WWE began reintroducing ECW through content from the ECW video library and a series books, which included the release of The Rise and Fall of ECW documentary.[8] With heightened and rejuvenated interest in the ECW franchise, WWE organized ECW One Night Stand on June 12, a reunion event that featured ECW alumni.[8] Due to the financial and critical success of the production, WWE produced the second ECW One Night Stand on June 11, 2006, which served as the premiere event in the relaunch of the ECW franchise as a third WWE brand, complementary to Raw and SmackDown.[9]
On May 26, 2006, WWE officially announced the relaunch of the franchise with its own show on NBC Universal's Sci Fi Channel, later to be known as Syfy, starting June 13, 2006.[9] Despite initial concerns that professional wrestling would not be accepted by Sci Fi's demographic, network President Bonnie Hammer stated that she believed ECW would fit the channel's theme of "stretching the imagination".[10] Syfy is owned by NBC Universal, parent company of USA Network and exclusive cable broadcaster of WWE programming.
On June 13, Paul Heyman, former ECW owner and newly appointed figurehead for the ECW brand, recommissioned the ECW World Heavyweight Championship to be the brand's world title and awarded it to Rob Van Dam as a result of winning the WWE Championship at One Night Stand 2006. Under the WWE banner, ECW was presented in a modernized style to that when it was an independent promotion and was produced following the same format of the other brands, with match rules, such as count outs and disqualifications, being standard. Matches featuring the rule set of the ECW promotion are now classified as being contested under "Extreme Rules" and are only fought when specified.[9] The brand would continue to operate until February 16, 2010.
In 1997, Shane McMahon helped form WWE's digital media department and launched WWF.com (now known as WWE.com), a site that receives more than seven million visitors a month.
On September 25, 2006 WWE announced the creation of the official Japanese WWE website, and has stated that they may start a number of other official WWE websites in foreign languages in the future [1].
On November 17, 2006, WWE.com reported that WWE officials and officials of DSE, the parent company of Pride Fighting Championships, had a meeting at WWE global headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut. The meeting focused on the possibility of the two groups doing some form of business together in the future [2] . But on March 27, 2007, Nobuyuki Sakakibara, president of DSE, announced that Station Casinos Inc. magnate Lorenzo Fertitta, also one of the co-owners of Zuffa, the parent company of the UFC, had made a deal to acquire all the assets of PRIDE FC from DSE after Pride 34: Kamikaze in a deal worth about USD$70 million, and therefore the deal between DSE and WWE has reportedly been called off.[3]
On November 19, 2008, WWE.com announced the launch of its next generation video player. Since its launch, video viewing has increased 77% on the site and video ad impressions are up 95%.
World Wrestling Entertainment began broadcasting in high-definition video (trademarked WWE-HD) in 2008, starting with its Raw show on January 21, followed by ECW on Syfy the day after, then Friday Night SmackDown on January 25, with the 2008 Royal Rumble being the first wrestling pay-per-view event to be presented in HD.[11][12][13]
On November 19, 2008, WWE.com officially launched their online social network, WWE Universe. It silently appeared in April as WWE Fan Nation, and adopted its current name a few months later. WWE Universe was similar to MySpace, with blogs, forums, photos, videos, and other features.[14][15]Despite a heightened popularity the site was shut down on January 1, 2011.
On February 23, 2010 launched a new Program on SyFy, called NXT. This reality-like show was based on new stars being mentored by their Pros. The last episode of the NXT Season 1 was on June 1, 2010. The winner of the season was Wade Barrett. Six days after the end of the first season, the Rookies interfered in the Raw main event match between John Cena and CM Punk, attacking both competitors as well as the announcing team before dismantling the ring area and surrounding equipment.[16] During the segment, Bryan strangled ring announcer Justin Roberts with the announcer's own tie, which WWE reportedly felt was too violent for their TV-PG programming. As a consequence, WWE announced via their official website four days later that Bryan had been (legitimately) released from his contract.[17][18] The following episode of Raw, the storyline continued with general manager Bret Hart (kayfabe) firing Barrett, revoking his contract and guaranteed title match, as a consequence to the previous week's incident.[19] A week later, WWE chairman Vince McMahon fired Hart and announced the hiring of a new general manager, who changed the decision, hiring all seven rookies and reinstating Barrett's title shot. During an in-ring promo later that night, the rookies announced that they had formed an alliance called Nexus.[20]
In 2011, WWE announced they are planning to establish a network of their own some time in 2012.
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