How hard is it to be a promoter?

Promoters pay the following charges BEFORE a show goes on:
>Promotional fee to (State) Commission...in GA its $5,000
>Venue rental, plus insurance on venue
>Lighting and Sound
>Seating
>Ring and accesories (stools, stairs) + pay for it to be set up
>Viable and approved emergency personal with approved equipment (stretcher, braces, crutches).
>Securing the fighters 9also securing stand by fighters)
>Paying for their hotels, airline, etc.
>Making sure ALL Fighters have medical, license, etc
>Marketing the fight, distribution of flyers, ads on media outlets, etc.
>Securing approved gloves for fighters
>Pay the ticketing agency fees to list, print & sell tickets
>Ring Card girls and ring cards
>Security (usually off duty police)
>Have Commision inspectors
>Get judges, referees, timekeepers, etc
>Coordinate with fighters and thier respective team of said commision rules, regulations
>Get license to sell beer, liquor and food
>Provide financial proof that fighters will be paid

 

You have be a natural born liar, not everybody can do it. :yep

 

:thumbsup Great post

 

It costs a lot of money to stage fights, and promoters tend not to cover expenses through ticket sales. They only make a profit when they succeed in building their fighters up over time, and then sell them to PPV, HBO, or Showtime (or something like that).

You can guess from what I describe above that, financially, promoting is very dicey, and there's always the possibility that over time, the promoter may not make his investment (accrued expenses) back.

The only way for promoters to stay on top of the game is to be able to sign the best, or near best, talent. But this takes lots of working capital, to pay for signing bonuses, to pay for the fighter's expenses, etc. Not many promoters have that kind of backing. This means that their potential is limited, and their operation may fold sooner or later.

The big question is, if a guy is a promoter, where is his seed money and his operating capital coming from? That question has to be addressed before anything else.

 

Regarding how King and Arum became promoters, both broke into boxing when closed circuit broadcasts were the rage. King was originally a concert music promoter, and somehow (I don't know exactly how) he shifted to boxing, doing essentially the same thing business-wise, and reaping a profit by selling his big fights to closed circuit broadcasting operations.

From the beginning, King operated on a big scale financially. It's not like he started out as a small time promoter and worked his way up to the big leagues. That almost never happens. A guy like King got his financial backing first (major financial backing) then invested it in big name fighters making big time fights.

Bob Arum was originally a federal prosecuting attorney, specializing in tax fraud cases back in the 1960s. I believe that through this legal work he was exposed to the Ali-Chuvalo fight in 1966, and this led Arum to realize how much money he could make promoting fights that could be sold to closed circuit broadcasters. So Arum found financial backing and switched careers.

Now, the big "pot of gold" at the end of the rainbow in boxing is not closed circuit broadcasting. It's big TV, like HBO and Showtime, and it's PPV.

 

Sadly, there's a lot of truth in what you say. That's why it's important for industry figures -- fighters, agents, managers, promoters, et al -- to have a good boxing lawyer representing them.

 

On top of this, if I understand things correctly, the promoter pays his house fighters' purses, which can be expensive. My understanding is that the managers of the "A" side fighters compensate the promoter for the opponents' ("B" side) purses, so that's not necessarily a burden for the promoter.

This is correct, yes?

Another expense for the promoter is if his leading fighters are getting into the ratings. In order to do this, the fighters' need to have alphabet regional title belts, just to qualify for a top 20 or top 15 ranking. The promoter has to pay sanctioning fees to the alphabets for these belts, which run into the thousands of dollars per fight.

But I'm sure you know better than I do...

 

Nah, Gary Shaw has Geale, but other than that, you are right. DiBella does find those hidden gems. Isaac Chilemba, Thomas Oosthuizen, Olusegun Ajose, gave Macklin a shot at the middleweight crown, etc.

 

What about paying to bring in judges and referees? If these officials are flown in from out of state, the promoter pays for their flights, hotel rooms, and meals beforehand, correct?

Or does this money get funneled through the state commission, so that the commission deals exclusively with the officials, and the promoter is kept at "arms length" from them?

This is one of the most controversial issues in pro boxing, I believe.

 

Damn their goes my latest pipe-dream of being a promoter.

 

What, are you kidding me? It's just as hard as being a fighter...

 

If you are that easily discouraged, then yes.

 

I was joking man, I never had any intentions of being a promoter. I'm the manager of a Amish furniture warehouse, and have 7 children, so having to have a ton of money might be a issue anyway lol.

 

Sorry, I thought you were the thread starter. I wasn't paying attention. Seriously, if someone has a dream they owe it to themselves to at least research the subject on a serious level before making judgements.

 

No problem homie.