8 Things We Learned From WWE's First Quarter 2017 Earnings
6. Network Subscriptions Continue To Grow
While WWE’s Network subscription numbers tend to fluctuate throughout the year, they've been on a constant growth curve since the service’s inception in 2014. As is always the case during WrestleMania season, the company’s latest results show a spike in total subscribers, with the number sitting at 1.95 million at the time of ‘Mania 33. This breaks down to 1.66 million paid, and 288,000 using free trials.
This makes Q1 2017 the second consecutive quarter in which WWE have presented increased subscription counts that still fall short of their targets. In this case, WWE were hoping to hit 2 million total, and still have the lofty goal of hitting 3-4 million in the future.
Barrios stated that he envisions a future where the Network will house all WWE content, and that the company are comfortable of achieving this as long as the subscription count keeps growing. WWE’s TV rights expire in 2019, and while this might seem like a convenient time to make such a move, it may come too early. Raw & SmackDown’s average viewership still sits comfortably above the Network subscription rate, and until that changes, WWE are unlikely to move all their programming onto the streaming service.