Eric Bischoff Addresses WWE's Plans To Reduce House Shows

Former WCW executive Eric Bischoff has provided his thoughts on WWE reducing the number of live shows, sharing insight about his experience surrounding house shows from his perspective as the Executive Director of "WWE Smackdown" in 2019.  

TKO President Mark Shapiro recently announced that WWE would be scaling back on live events, with the current plan to reduce house shows to 200 from 250. Bischoff discussed the story on his "83 Weeks" podcast and gave his reasoning as to why WWE has taken this decision.

"I remember back in 2019, when I first went to work as the Director of SmackDown, in that role, presumably, I touched every facet of the Smackdown brand including live touring," said Bischoff. "Within my first week or 10 days, sitting in a few of those meetings where live events were being discussed at that time — again this is pre-COVID, this is still 300 plus dates a year, that traditional WWE Live touring model, I guess — but even then, there was a lot of conversation about 'look these things are just not profitable. If we're lucky and we route properly and everything goes according to plan we may break even and make a couple bucks.' So it doesn't surprise me." 

Bischoff also believes that WWE would benefit from utilizing UFC's residence in Las Vegas, as stars could still gain the experience they'd be missing from not wrestling on as many house shows each week. 

Dave Meltzer has also explained that the reason for this change comes down to the cost of house shows not being feasible for TKO, especially since live events have become moderately profitable for WWE.

If you use any of the quotes in this article, please credit "83 Weeks" with a h/t to Wrestling Inc. for the transcription.