Rumored NY Post reporter says he’s hearing UFC PPV buys are way down

[TorontoTO]

 

[Human Bass]

Chandler Pimblett shall save the ufc

 

[JakePaulMMA]

Make Condom Depot Great Again

 

[sonhow]

What a shock! You mean the new breed of champs dont hold much box office appeal?

 

[JonnyBonesPharmacist]

And.......water is wet!
No shit, they have no stars anymore

 

[TriangleMonkey]

So this is it, we can confirm UFC is dead yo

 

[Only Here for Attachments]

Good, hopefully this means ESPN is losing ton of money and they'll force UFC to start booking better fights

 

[Bubzeh]

Time to bring the 12/12’s down to 8/8 me thinks.

 

[TempleoftheDog]

At some point there was going to be blowback. Shit cards generally equal shit numbers.

 

[CobraCobretti]

Give them time. WMMA, Belal, Merab and Ankslaev will bring the Ppv audience back again

 

[PrideNverDies]

And people laughed at me in my thread stating UFC viewership is at all time lows lmao

 

[wufabufa]

When you have to shell out $1,200 per year to watch watered down PPVs full of Pretender Series and TUF bums then you're going to see slimmer margins, and rightfully so. Now lets add in 5+ years of economic uncertainty and we'll have some real numbers to consider.

Russian link will always be undefeated.

 

[Hymen Crusher]

When you have to shell out $1,200 per year to watch watered down PPVs full of Pretender Series and TUF bums then you're going to see slimmer margins, and rightfully so. Now lets add in 5+ years of economic uncertainty and we'll have some real numbers to consider.

Russian link will always be undefeated.

Don't forget your nominal espn plus fee

 

[Hymen Crusher]

It's the espn plus part. Why make buying something have a barrier. It's insane to me they did that

 

[Bend NvR Break]

This isn't new. Viewership has been dropping for years.
But but but the UFC has but record numbers of revenue.
Simpletons still have yet to accept the fact that the UFC DOES NOT RELY on the ppv model anymore. The UFC charges Disney/ESPN A FLAT FEE for every event it puts on. Not all events are made the same thus the UFC can charge different amounts. For a free Apex event (made up numbers to keep it simple) the UFC might charge Disney 5K. Disney pays the UFC that and then it makes money on advertising. They might make 10K off the event because of advertising. For a Jon Jones vs Alex fight before Alex lost the UFC could charge Disney 100K for the event and then Disney would charge to view the ppv. If the ppv sells well then Disney makes money and everyone is happy. If the ppv doesn't sells well then the UFC is still getting paid whatever negotiated amount they agreed upon but Disney still takes losses because the ppv underselled meaning they lost money.

The UFC has consistently been getting paid extremely well by Disney but Disney has been losing money because ppv sales have plummeted since they peaked in the mid 2010s. Same reason FOX got out the UFC business. Same reason Reebok got out the UFC business. They pay the UFC top dollar but they aren't making money are supposed to and are actually losing money. ESPN is feeling this burn now as we speak.

So yes 2 things can be true. The UFC can be setting attendance records and breaking revenue records. But ESPN can also be losing money at the same time on the UFC deal.

 

[andgonsil]

People are getting poor under the Trump administration

 

[MRT]

The UFC probably doesn't care as much as anyone might think...remember how the revenue sharing plan works with ESPN. UFC cares more about the gate and other revenue sources than PPV buys.

All the PPV numbers will obviously need to be provided to potential broadcast partners anyway...no one is negotiating blind...but does anyone think that reduced numbers will prevent the UFC from scoring a monster new deal, especially if non-PPV options like Netflix are in the mix?

 

[Cherry]

They've needed to cull the roster for years. There was a golden age where you could know and have some investment in every fighter on every card top to bottom and didn't have to be a complete shut in nerd to accomplish that. Nowadays I have to imagine even the staunchest supporters struggle

Not ppv but today's card is for sure in contention for worst they've ever put together. I can't say it's the actual worst since I'm sure there are others just as bad that I've completely forgotten about

 

[aerius]

When you make it harder to legally buy a PPV than pirating the damn thing, WTF do you think is gonna happen?

 

[jeff7b9]

For the first time recently I heard members of the UFC or WME team.publicly entertaining the idea of moving past the PPV model into a subscription service which seemed to be similar to the DAZN $20/mo idea.

They have the reach to get enough numbers to make this feasible and their cards are such watered down trash that hopefully they can't afford NOT to ditch the extremely dated PPV model.

Remember UFC is a company STILL running their business model based on what worked in 2005. For fucks sake they still do seasons of a reality television show, TUF.


After the ESPN+ deal times out they should go with a UFC app, flat monthly or annual fee which has everything on fightpass and ESPN+. Make it like Netflix, Prime Video, HULU, etc and target it as just another recurring expense half their customers probably won't even remember that they are being charged for.
We have a culture of waste and frivolous spending, this is the way.