The WWE PG Era Has to End!

As a Marketing Major, I have recently, against my own wishes, become and absolute nerd for the business and marketing side to everything I'm interested in. I have found my interest in pro-wrestling temporarily ruined by my desire to analyse their product in a business sense. This brought me to wondering, why is the WWE so adamant in their claims that PG is the way forward for the company.

About a week ago, I found myself wandering the wrestling opinion pages and came across a link to watch the Annual General Meeting of the WWE. In this meeting sat Vince McMahon along with the head of each of his departments: Accounting, Marketing, Talent Relations etc., along with several board members- many of whom are hardcore wrestling fans it seems.

In this meeting the business plan was discussed and I couldn't help but notice that this whole PG thing was greatly emphasized by McMahon and in particular his daughter Stephanie along with the Marketing head, whose name escapes me. They had announced a deal with Matel to bring out a range of action figures which we, according to the marketing guys, are selling at an alarming rate. There are also plans to have John Cena, Triple H and Undertaker toys put in McDonald's 'Happy Meals' this August. It would seem that the WWE is very much positioning itself and targeting towards kids.

I later read in Jim Ross' blog that he thinks that "PG is the way forward." Why is this? Is it that we have changed so much in the last 10-15 years that there are no more adult wrestling fans? At the AGM the reason they gave was that WWE fans of the 'Attitude Era' have now grown up and had children, and now want to share wrestling with their kids, and so WWE have altered their product to allow for this.

But I have to stress that making the Whole WWE PG, I believe is not what the fans want. During the Attitude Era as I recall, there were two shows and wrestlers were featured on both shows. Smackdown was always a more PG show. Smackdown was usually shown on Saturday mornings where I come from and it was aimed at kids anyway. Raw was always more edgy and aimed more toward the adult audience. So why change?

The WWE could very easily keep both sides happy by having Smackdown aimed at children and Raw aimed at adults. In fact, today when there are rosters exclusive to both shows, Smackdown could have a PG roster with Raw having an edgier product. Why not fill Smackdown with the likes of Cena and others that the kids love and allow Raw to head towards a more adult orientated product in the mould of the attitude era? Why? Because they don't need to, Vince McMahon is a business man, first and foremost.

So here is where my Business orientation and my Wrestling-fan orientation clash. I am a big fan of an exciting edgy wrestling product: the Monday Night Wars were perfect. But Vince with no competition (sorry TNA, I'm a fan, but you're not competition), sees no reason to change the product back. I would love to see Vince realize himself that maybe on this one, he should give the fans what they wan't and risk his little McDonalds deal. He is a wrestling guy, this is obvious. If he was solely a businessman he probably wouldn't have become and on-screen character, he clearly loves the wrestling 'biz.' I think that wrestling fans around the world would love to see a return to the golden era of 98-02(ish). 

On Raw this Monday, edge was asked about the so-called 'Rated-R' show he was about to hold. he said basically that despite the WWE being PG that he was always going to be Rated-R. This is merely an angle, nothing is changing. But I would like to draw your attention to the crowd reaction when he said he is not going to be PG, there weer huge cheers. The WWE fans don't want it to be PG. Even the kids probably think it's boring at this stage! It's a post watershed show, it wouldn't be hard to censor it if it was shown pre-watershed.

Kids today, I feel are too protected anyway. We all watched Stone Cold giving the finger and DX telling people to suck it and I think we turned out ok! I think it's time to change back to what the WWE used to be, great entertainment aimed at the 18-35 male bracket. I watch TNA and find the product edgier even if the storylines often suck! I just wish that the wrestling company that I grew up watching could bring back the reasons I started watching in the first place.

Thanks for listening if you made it this far!