Per Show Handshake Deals: Merchandise

[SirMichaelJordan]

Workers should demand way more cut of their merchandise on these deals.

 

It’s how they make their money in real life if they are not on a written monthly contract.

 

It’s robbery to pay someone $20 for a booking fee and keep 75% of their merchandise.

 

As a tiny company, it doesn’t make sense to sign anyone outside of a per show deal because a per month handshake deal will skyrocket the price up.

 

$20 per show on a handshake deal is great but workers should be at least asking for 50% merchandise at the minimum.

 

Per month handshake deal (salary) it make sense for the merchandise cut to favor the company.

 

Pay a worker $4000 a month and get a better % of merchandise or pay a worker $20 and get little to none of the merchandise sales. That’s a better balance than what it currently is.

[thadian]

Workers don't value their own percentage of Merch Sales enough. If they did, we might see a lot more workers demanding 50%-70% or asking for larger sums, which might normalize the issue with Merchandise giving lots of money. Of course, for some products such as non-advertiser friendly ones, this advertiser revenue is one of the few things they can lean on until they buy their own broadcaster.

[Teh_Showtime]

In small companies who use handshake deals, their merchandise levels are so low that the talent themselves sells their own merch, so they don’t have any company merchandise to get a cut from.

 

It’s not until level 4 or 5 that merch is developed for individual wrestlers and I think not until 6 or 7 that’s it’s for the entire roster (as opposed to stars). This is already handled in game pretty well. By the point you’re affording merch for every wrestler you have, you could have them locked down on exclusive deals and a decent wage.

[LloydCross]

Have you actually seen a case in the game where someone on a $20 per show deal was selling enough company merch to have the percentage actually be something significant? I've noticed that by the time their pop (and the company merchandise level) are high enough for this to be a lot they have had a pretty large number of pay raises. There is kind of a gap where you have someone on a pretty high paying per show handshake deal because they're super over but they still have the 10% merch cut because they can't ask for merch cut raises, only pay.

 

I do agree in general that contract negotiations could be more give and take and merchandise cut seems like a great place for improvements. The percentages requested do seem lower than I would have expected.

 

Merch cut increases in the same vein as pay raises for handshake deals might be a nice touch as well.

[SirMichaelJordan]

In small companies who use handshake deals, their merchandise levels are so low that the talent themselves sells their own merch, so they don’t have any company merchandise to get a cut from.

 

It’s not until level 4 or 5 that merch is developed for individual wrestlers and I think not until 6 or 7 that’s it’s for the entire roster (as opposed to stars). This is already handled in game pretty well. By the point you’re affording merch for every wrestler you have, you could have them locked down on exclusive deals and a decent wage.

 

Well yea, if I was running a RTG my income from merchandise would be probably under $50. But with the change it means that the $50 wouldn't end up in my bank.

 

Now if I’m a tiny or small company with the funds to upgrade merch levels, I am going to make bank. While in reality, I am better off not investing in such merch because all I’m doing is making product with my company logo on it but most of the profit is going to the wrestlers and not me. Unless I pay them more upfront and take more of a cut from their merch sales.

 

Overall, workers should value their merch much better than they currently do in the game.

[SirMichaelJordan]

Have you actually seen a case in the game where someone on a $20 per show deal was selling enough company merch to have the percentage actually be something significant? I've noticed that by the time their pop (and the company merchandise level) are high enough for this to be a lot they have had a pretty large number of pay raises. There is kind of a gap where you have someone on a pretty high paying per show handshake deal because they're super over but they still have the 10% merch cut because they can't ask for merch cut raises, only pay.

 

I do agree in general that contract negotiations could be more give and take and merchandise cut seems like a great place for improvements. The percentages requested do seem lower than I would have expected.

 

Merch cut increases in the same vein as pay raises for handshake deals might be a nice touch as well.

 

$20 worker was just an example. Same applies for a worker who demands $100 a show.

 

The problem is that you can get a worker for criminally cheap on a per show basis vs per month basis with nothing really being different between the two.

 

So not only I can get a big discount of choosing to sign someone to a per show vs a per month, i can make money off of him if he’s popular enough.

[Self]

There's something to be tweaked here. Maybe "merchandising rights" need to be a part of contracts. On by default with Written. Off by default with Handshakes. If you want to make merchandise of someone for your own profit, you need to sweeten the deals or get something in writing, because it's sketchy.

[thadian]

Different companies have different operations of merchandise.

 

Merchandise is an industry that revolves around acquiring materials, processing them into units, storing the units, shipping the units - all of this has different costs. Sometimes, a company will want to own its own entire operation, to fine tune their product, and control the business relationships of their supplier. Other companies just want to outsource everything. So, the first question should be, what parts of the merch industry is the company invested in? Are they running their own shop like WWE, or using a supplier like AEW?

 

The second question would look at the cut-and-sale. In AEW, I would expect workers get a bigger share of their merch cut, retain ownership of intellectual property rights, and possibly share in the costs of producing their own merch and designing their own merch, and selling it. While in WWE, I would expect the WWE to have "creative" determine all elements of the art, own all intellectual property, corporate determine all elements of quality, and the company to manage the sales of the merch. The worker might get a combination of a smaller cut, and some personal merch to sell on their own.

 

So, how can the game represent these differences? A company that handles its own merch should give the worker less of a cut, 10%-25% range is more than fair. A company that gets the worker involved in the labor/management of the merch should pay the worker a much bigger cut, maybe 30%-60% range, depending on the size of the company and hotness of the product.

 

Lastly - I did propose that the attributes "Easily Marketable" and "A Marketing Dream" should cause a worker to seek a higher cut by default, but it shouldn't be enough that it nullifies the attribute.