Brandon Thurston of Wrestlenomics recently revealed some interesting stats from WWE by digging up some KPI documents on Google Drive. The information pertains to the attendance figures at WrestleMania. You can see the information below and also check out Brandon’s explanation of why these numbers are accurate. There is a spreadsheet link in the below tweet that you can open that shows even more specific and in-depth information.
To summarize, WWE obviously flubs the numbers on a yearly basis. They take into consideration staff, security, and the WWE superstars themselves. We can now get a more in-depth look at the actual number of paid fans that are coming through the gates. As you can see below WWE has been over-exaggerating the number more and more each year with the exception of 2016 when WWE significantly increased the number in an effort to break the all time record.
From 2008 to 2013 they generally increased the announced attendance by 10,000 compared to the actual attendance but in recent years they have been increasing it by nearly 15,000 with the exception of Orlando in 2017. WrestleMania was in East Rutherford in 2013 and they announced the attendance as 80,676 compared to an actual number of 68,900. It will be interesting to see what they do with the numbers this year as the event is in East Rutherford yet again. This year’s event realistically has a chance to be the 3rd highest attended WrestleMania in WWE history.
Take a look at the full report and summary below and check out the links for more information.
Wrestlemania attendance, 2008-2018. WWE's announced attendance vs. what their own financial reporting implies.
Data: https://t.co/qfUxsviNJz pic.twitter.com/CPzlHPlxga
— Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) March 16, 2019
How we know these numbers:
Each year since 2008 for the quarter containing Wrestlemania, WWE reports in its KPI document an avg attendance number including and excluding WM.
Doing the math shown in the spreadsheet we deduce a range of what the paid attendance must have been.
— Brandon Thurston (@BrandonThurston) March 16, 2019
