TNA President Dixie Carter recently joined Sky News Radio to discuss a variety of topics. Below are the highlights:
How TNA can genuinely compete with WWE:
"I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t think we were capable of that and more. But I think to do so, we have to grow the wrestling fan base, we have to do things differently, we have to go after a different audience maybe than they even have. So, and it’s not about going after the old WCW audience, it’s really about creating new type of programming, doing different things worldwide and even expanding beyond what our current base is, to find new fans and innovative ways of getting there. We have every intention of doing that."
On her first meeting with Stephanie McMahon:
"It was actually a very sad meeting. We met at the church at Ric Flair’s son’s funeral. She and Hunter were there, and the three of us had never met before. I was there with Sting and we were just kind of put in this back room waiting for each other. It was a very interesting meeting. They’re lovely people; I just wished them luck personally. They had a big weekend with WrestleMania coming up, and I did so publicly. Look, I have a different philosophy than maybe other people do. I think competition is healthy; I think to not want to have competition is absolutely ludicrous. I think it’s better for the fans, it’s better for the product and it makes us all work harder. And if we want to grow wrestling to be as big as it can be globally, I think that’s important. So, she did respond. I think there were a lot of tweets between the fans, but she did respond in a very kind manner."
How TNA can genuinely compete with WWE:
"I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t think we were capable of that and more. But I think to do so, we have to grow the wrestling fan base, we have to do things differently, we have to go after a different audience maybe than they even have. So, and it’s not about going after the old WCW audience, it’s really about creating new type of programming, doing different things worldwide and even expanding beyond what our current base is, to find new fans and innovative ways of getting there. We have every intention of doing that."
On her first meeting with Stephanie McMahon:
"It was actually a very sad meeting. We met at the church at Ric Flair’s son’s funeral. She and Hunter were there, and the three of us had never met before. I was there with Sting and we were just kind of put in this back room waiting for each other. It was a very interesting meeting. They’re lovely people; I just wished them luck personally. They had a big weekend with WrestleMania coming up, and I did so publicly. Look, I have a different philosophy than maybe other people do. I think competition is healthy; I think to not want to have competition is absolutely ludicrous. I think it’s better for the fans, it’s better for the product and it makes us all work harder. And if we want to grow wrestling to be as big as it can be globally, I think that’s important. So, she did respond. I think there were a lot of tweets between the fans, but she did respond in a very kind manner."
