Eric Bischoff spoke about AEW’s television viewership and what the company needs to do to grow during his 83 Weeks podcast:
“I’ve been saying this from the get-go. I’ve been saying from day one whether it’s about WWE or AEW, it’s a commitment to story and AEW is proving my point. The fact that they have plateaued is proving my point. You can add whoever you want to your roster and it won’t matter beyond a week or two unless the audience is engaged in a compelling story that makes them look forward to next week. Not because they’re just wrestling fans and they want to see a four-star Tokyo Dome [match], no, that’s not going to grow the audience. That’s going to satisfy the audience you already have. If you can have that phenomenal athletic match, great, and it’s the pay off to the story, that’s excellent, that’s perfect. But if you’re not building stories that people focus on, talk about, relate to, and make [the fans] want to come back every week and see where it’s going next, if you’re not doing that, I don’t give a damn.”
“You could take WWE’s existing roster, bring it over to AEW and nothing is going to happen. It’s story, and first of all, you have to have a basic understanding of how to tell a story and I don’t see it. I see it in WWE and I don’t see it in AEW.”
