There has been a noticeable increase in sponsorships this year featured in WWE programming, even predating the UFC merger. Brands like Cinnamon Toast Crunch were attached to matches at WrestleMania 39, and earlier this year, we saw LA Knight and the late Bray Wyatt facing off in a Mountain Dew-sponsored match. Corporate names have also been attached to segments on Raw and SmackDown.
Earlier this year, WWE President Nick Khan said WWE is “open to business” for ring sponsorships, as UFC also has corporate-sponsored logos across their octagon. Nothing has come of this since, but with the merger being completed, perhaps it’s not far away.
During the Endeavor Q3 earnings call this week, CEO Ari Emanuel answered a question about WWE replicating UFC’s usage of octagon sponsors by revealing that Vince McMahon is now very open to the idea (h/t Fightful for transcription).
Vince [Vince McMahon] has been very open….before he was clean in the ring and around. He is now very open to increasing the inventory that we can work with like we increased the inventory at the UFC, very happy about that and we think there are huge opportunities around the stadium. That’s a good sign. We are starting, in some territories, looking at a Friday night, Saturday night, and Monday night for both WWE, UFC, and WWE again. That will give us an indication of our ability to put that on. Once we can prove that model, I think we can take it globally and move it domestically pretty easily.
I’ll re-emphasize that there is a ton of inventory now that Vince and the team are opening up at the WWE for us.
WWE can easily make money by featuring sponsors on the ring, as it did with previous partnerships for those matches.
The main concern, however, is how these logos would be displayed and how much they take away from the action in the ring, especially if the logos are not colored black and white. Nonetheless, ring sponsorships seem inevitable, so let’s see who will be the first to have their brand prominently showcased inside the ropes.