AEW's Cody Rhodes On Why The 18-49 Demographic Matters
Cody Rhodes speaks on the all-important 18-49 demographic and what it means to AEW Dynamite.
Cody Rhodes' recent appearance on Talk Is Jericho saw 'The Prince of Pro Wrestling' touch on all kinds of topics during his conversation with AEW's self-appointed 'Demo God,' including the importance of the 18-49 demographic when assessing television ratings.
Here's what Rhodes had to say (h/t Wrestling Inc. for the transcriptions):-
“We joke about the demo, but it’s not a joke. There’s a potential, this is for any show, if you don’t look at that, you’re going to age out. One of the reasons I’ve turned my act around into a bit of a squeaky clean act is because it’s really not an act anymore. I want to engage a young fan base and not just the young and affluent and cool. I want to engage kids because the show has a lot of grittiness, a lot of violence [and] a lot of adult content. I want to make sure they know, hey, there’s guys doing right, and there’s guys doing wrong."
AEW Dynamite has continually outdone pre-launch ratings expectations since arriving on TNT, prompting the network to hand the show a bumper $175 million television contract just over three months into its lifespan.
Beating NXT in the 18-49 demo is almost elementary at this point, with the WWE property not outdoing Dynamite amongst viewers in this group since 18 December 2019. As the television industry ranks shows by the demo, not overall viewership, it is therefore accurate to say that NXT hasn't beaten Dynamite in the Wednesday Night Wars in over a year.
50+ is the one demographic in which NXT enjoys routine success over its rivals. To this, Cody said the following:-
“The youth we have and the demo is really not a joke at all. Anyone who’s not scared and I’m not talking about our competitor. I’m talking about any show. If you’re not in the youth, in terms of if they’re not watching your show, you should absolutely be terrified. 50 plus means you’re losing your audience. Again, this is about TV in general not about WWE and not about AEW because we see all 50 shows.”
AEW Dynamite and WWE NXT were both impacted by the heightened political situation in the United States last week. News shows dominated the night, with AEW outdoing WWE by only 0.25 to 0.16 in the demo.