MMA Event Budgets 101

I’ve done shows large and small. From 1,200 seats to 11,000 seats. Not saying I’ve filled an 11,000 seat arena, but I’ve tried, and learned a lot from the experience.

Below is a budget breakdown of my last event in a 1,500 seat venue.

Posters and Cards: $800 (Because of the added promotion the venue offered we really didn’t need these, but I assume it helped a little and gave people something to hold onto)

Audio/Lighting: $5,500 (this is on the cheap side and basically paying cost for labor due to a partnership deal with the company that involves profit sharing)

Photography/Design: $450 (Luckily I have one of the best MMA Photographers around and he travels. Drew Reidmen)

Cage/Mat: $1,700 (Cage rental rate with a new Blue mat to be used with Full Color logos)

Mat Logos: $1,200 (Expensive, and the company botched the logos a bit, made some the wrong color and they began to peel up during the event. I’m researching another way)

John House TV Editing: $5,000 (The cost to edit 4 half hour TV shows with our own event promos to be aired weekly over the course of a month)

My64 TV Airing: $2,400 (Cost to air a half hour TV show on local My64 after the late night rerun of UFC Wired)

Gloves: $300

Ring Girl: $50 (Most girls want to be ring girls because it puts them on a pedestal and they get a kick out of the hoots and hollars they get. They will do it for free, but we pay them a little anyway)

Ticket Takers: $100

Fight Coordinator: $1,000 (Basically a friend that helps manage the fighters, preps them and gets them ready for their turn in the cage)

Title Belt: $300

Total: $18,350

This doesn’t include the Fight Card which varies greatly. Average around $5,000 + for a good Pro/Am card with a headliner.

More info coming regarding Sponsorships and profits.

Questions & Answers

I am going to be building up this blog with useful information to help budding fight promoters, however, it would be most helpful if the many of you already finding this blog were to begin asking questions to things you need help with.

I am willing to answer any and all questions be it regarding state commissions, regulations, how to handle a fight not showing up, you name it, I’m here to help.

I’m in the process of moving right now so by next week I will be up and running and available.

I am also considering adding my own blog videos. Maybe I can answer questions relating to the business in video format?

Let me know what you think would be most helpful.

Thanks!

It’s June second and a lot is going on.

So it’s June 2nd and I’m working on ten different things.

The Belterra Show on May 10th went amazingly well. Sold out, 1,700 tickets in a 1,500 seat room. It was packed, the energy was great, the fights were fantastic. Couldn’t be better. We are working things out with the Casino now to arrange for more events each year but we’ll see how that goes.

We have some executives working on landing some major sponsorship deals while establishing a basis for the MMA Big Show TV show in 4 major markets in the region.

I am also working out a new series of events in a smaller 800 seat venue in Kentucky where we will begin holding the MMA Big Show Amateur Series on a monthly basis of which will be broadcast live online with some other special perks for viewers. Nobody is doing what we are planning to do and hopefully it will catch on nationally. I’ll release that when it’s all said and done.

In the meantime, I’m working on all of these things while trying to find some of my own managed fighters some new fights that will challenge them.

May 10th Martial Fury - Belterra Casino

So I had 3 months to prepare for this event.

Gregg Hupp, a good friend of mine whom I’ve trained with personally and have known for about 2 years handled the Amateur matchmaking for me. He did an amazing job and put together some great matchups. Gregg also handled a lot of the people that came up to me wanting various things through out the night. He really earned his keep. My ultimate goal for Gregg is to get him up to speed on all facets of running a promotion so that when we begin doing events in other markets, Greg can be the point man for those markets. If things go well the MMA Big Show will be doing events in various Pinnacle Casino locations such as Reno, Louisiana and other markets.

The main event was Mojo Horne (hometown Champion at 185lbs) and UFC Veteran Josh Haynes. Mojo simply dominated Josh during 3 rounds of torture. Josh simply couldn’t handle what Mojo brought to the cage and Mojo came out with a unanimous win by decision.

Overall, this event was so routine and fluid and with the aided marketing support from the Casino, the event was sold out before I even opened the doors. I had the new blue fight mat covered in sponsors and the show made our first real profit. Now I’m waiting for the casino to give me the rest of the dates for 2008 and we can really begin building some solid momentum.

Pictures coming soon of the event.

Initial Marketing

Marketing

Now the fun stuff.

Your marketing should consist of the following:

Flyers/Posters

Print Ads

Radio Spots

TV Commercials

Websites

Press Release/Interviews

Your flyers and posters will run you about a grand to print. 15,000 post cards and 300-500 posters should be plenty. This will be your first phase of marketing that will go alongside your press releases. You will post these (or pay someone else) all over your city and event surrounding cities or suberbs. Distribute the flyers at mall parking lots by sticking them on cars. Flyer mailboxes. Public restrooms. You name it. If you can put a flyer somewhere, do it. You should begin your flyering approx 1 month or so before the event. Postering 6 weeks.

Some of your local print shops will give you a nice discount if you let them place their company name and contact info on your materials. It’s worth it to save some money and its not too intrusive as to take away from the message of the piece.

Your print marketing shouldn’t be too cluttered with information. Try to restrain yourself from putting every little detail on your posters. You want the date and location to be big and bold to be seen at a distance with your main event and event name. Put your website on their or a phone number to order tickets. All of the other detailed information should be on your website.

Some great print shops I use are either www.jakprints.com or www.seemlessdesign.com

Print Ads should run approx two weeks leading into the event. Your print ads will run in your local Alternative Newsweeklies. Just about every major city has them. There is a website that lists all of the newsweeklies in the country by city. www.aan.org

Your flyers and print ads should feature your main event fighters, your special guests and everything else pertaining to your event.

Some newspapers will do a 50/50 trade. Meaning, they will quote you on the price of the ad and then charge you half the rate in cash and the other half in tickets they can give away to readers or advertising clients.

Radio Spots are fun. Your radio station will put something together for you and send you examples before they air. When you are buying radio time, make sure you approach the radio station as a sponsor first. In other words, don’t quote a budget up front. Let them know what you are doing and that you would like them to sponsor airtime for your event in exchange for tickets to give away and placement on all of your print marketing and at the event etc. Chances are they will come back at you and say if you buy in for x amount of radio time, they will double it and give you a bunch of additional live mentions etc. It’s a nice way to get your local radio station to support you more and it will help add some credibility to your event.

TV Commercials… You will run your commercials on your local cable network during shows such as ESPN Classic, Kickboxing and SPIKE TV’s UFC events. It works and its pretty cheap depending on your market and how much of your market you want to reach. Expect to spend $2,000 to $3,000 on TV marketing, much more in much bigger cities. Most spots will range from $30 to $500 each. It really depends on the time slot and network.

Website marketing is pretty easy to do. Just look for some local websites with cheap banner spots and run them for a couple weeks. Don’t spend too much. Think of your banner ads as a reminder but not a deal maker. Too many people just ignore banner ads to spend a ton of money on them. One site that seems to help draw fighters and fans a like is www.mma.tv It’s a pretty good resource to get your word out. It’s $99 a month with a two month minimum but its worth it.

Your Press release is extremely important. This is something you will want to spend time on and make sure its perfect. This is your entry into newpapers and local news channels and its free! So don’t screw this up.

Your press release will have all of the key elements relating to your fight show. Location, time, date, main event, special guests, costs, where to get tickets and anything else you can throw in that is new worthy. Don’t be afraid to hype things a bit.

Once you have put together a complete news, newspaper and radio list for you to submit your news release to, send it off. Wait a about a week and follow up via email. Then wait another week and follow up with anyone else remaining. Some will want to do interviews with you as the promoters, some will want to invterview the fighters. Either way, its free promotion!

Lighting/Audio

Lighting/Audio

Lighting and audio can be tricky. Most places will ask you what you are doing and know what setup you need. Expect to pay around $10,000 to $30,000 for a big production of 3,000 people and up. The same setup for 10,000 people, it just depends on the venue size and your desired results.

A typical layout will be placing the cage in the middle with light/speaker rigs flown above and depending on the venue size and seating it doesn’t hurt to have 4 big screen projectors flown above the cage for everyone to see more easily. It also adds a great deal to the producion “ooohs and aahs!”.

When you are dealing with audio and lighting you can easily negotiate a better price. Take the first price the company gives you and explain you are planning a monthly or quarterly event. You will be surprised at how much a company will knock off knowing they can rely on repeat business.

You will want a flashy stage production as well. This is where the fighters enter the arena and make their big appearance before the fight. Flash and Trash as they call it should consist of some lights, fog machines and a big screen or something behind the fighter with something playing to add to the awe factor. The bigger you can make your fighters appear, the bigger everything else will appear. Put your fighters in the spotlight, always.

Check out Thunderbolt Systems based in Cincinnati, OH. They can handle everything from small events to Woodstock size outdoor concerts.

The Cage

The Cage

The cage is of course one of the most important parts of your MMA event. You can either rent a cage or simply buy one. A cage rental will run around $800 to $1,500 for the event, take about 3 hours to setup and setup fees are included in the rental price. To purchase a cage will run you around $8,000 or more depending on where you get it and how its built. If you are planning on doing a monthly or quarterly event its worth it to buy the cage and pay a couple guys to setup and tear it down.

Buying the cage is great too because you can have your own logos and such on the posts. Even if you rent a cage, most cage renters will allow you to place your own custom fight mat with sponsor logos and such. A custom fight mat will run you around $500 to $1,000…they look great, but aren’t worth doing unless you have sponsors to pay for it and are filming for a DVD or TV show.

www.SinisterAngelCages.com for rentals.

General Staffing

Staff

Your staff will be very important to your event. You want people you trust to handle their roles such as friends and family who can handle simple tasks. Some staff will be professionals regardless such as EMT’s, Police, Security, Doctor etc etc.

Little things such as the person who open and closes the cage before and after fights. Someone to check the fighters for mouthguards and groin protectors. Ushers to place people in seats depending on how seating is arranged. If its general admission stadium seating then you wont need ushers too much.

Some venues will tie Police, EMT’s and Ushers etc into the rental price which is great. Police add up in cost especially if you need 3 or more over several hours. You are looking at around $25-$35 an hour per officer.

Judges, Doctors, Referee

Judges

Finding judges for an amateur event is pretty easy. Its common to have special guest judges, MMA trainers, coaches, pro fighters etc judge an event. It all varies by state. Some states have no commission so you are free to do as you please be it a pro or amateur show. Other states require you to hire their judges for pro and or amateur shows. It just depends. You will typically pay a judge $50 to $100 for their time unless it’s a special guest judge in which case it varies.

Doctors

Don’t get a lazy doctor! Make sure you get a boxing doctor and make sure they are qualified and eager. You don’t want a doctor to just come in, scan everyone over and send them on their way if there is indeed a problem. You can call your local hospital or look them up online. You want a general practitioner.

Referee

Referees can be tricky. You want to have someone who knows the sport extremely well and the rules for the state you are holding your event. In Ohio, amateur fighters aren’t allowed to knee or kick to the head and other limitations, however in Kentucky, you can follow the official UFC rules where limitations are pretty much, well, limited.

It is very common to have a well known UFC fighter ref an event. I’ve had UFC Ultimate Fighter Series 2 fighter Jorge Gurgel ref one of my events and it went very well. Typical cost for a special guest referee is around $1,500 to $2,000 depending on who it is. A really huge UFC name wont even do it on most occasions, which leads me into special guests.

Special guests are pricey for a current big name. Someone like The Iceman Chuck Lidell can cost around $15,000 whereas someone like Dan “The Beast” Severn will run you a couple grand. I had Dan Severn as the commentator for an event and it went extremely well and it killed two birds with one stone. I was able to promote Dan as being part of the show and I was able to feature him on my DVD’s. It worked out great.

The Fighters

You are most likely setting up an amateur event. It’s cheaper, its much easier to setup and there is a great deal less red tape and regulations.

MMA Big Show has over 300 registered fighters from all over the US including Canada and that list grows daily. In amateur MMA we match fighters by record and experience evenly. If you have a fresh fighter wanting to make his debut, he fights another fighter making his debut. If a fighter had 5 fights in the cage, he should fight someone else with 5 fights and similar record and so on. You want to keep everything as even as possible as it keeps things fair and results in better fights. Visit www.fighteraccess.com for lots and lots of fighters, sponsors and the like.

You are best off selecting fighters from your hometown over an outside fighter. This will help increase ticket sales a bit with friends and family, and even enemies if the fighter has some, hoping to see their mortal nemesis get knocked out.

You want fighters with good personalities who are eager to please you and put on a good show. Most are.

Fighters who have any kind of pro record at all can not compete in an amateur event unless it is a pro am card registered by the state boxing commission at which point 5% of your ticket sales go to the commission and your referee, judges and officials all have to be commission approved. This does depend on state so you will need to check your states commission policies. You won’t worry about pro fight cards for a while. You will however have to send your amateur fight card to the commission prior to the fight night to ensure no body has a pro fight on their record, bannings, suspensions etc.

One thing you will want to avoid with a few exceptions is first time fighters. They are known for backing out at the last minute which causes you a great deal of frustration. Guys who have already been in the cage and come back for more are guys you want. It’s all more marketable to put guys on the card that have great records. Having two undefeated fighters going toe to toe is a huge deal and one worthy of main event promotional placement.

Things you will want to consider when drafting your bout contract are:

#1. Deposit: It helps to require a $100 deposit from a fighter which is refunded to him plus an extra $10 or something after his/her fight. This is to ensure they show up. Most wannabe fighters who show interest in fighting but are really just dreamers who never show will be weeded out this way.

#2. 25% pay penalty for showing up to weigh ins late. I’ve had shows where guys would show up at 2am the night of weigh ins wanting to weigh in. This blows your photo ops, causes chaos and only generates frustration. Include a late penalty and it will solve many problems.

#3. Fight waiver! Make sure you have every fighter sign a waiver so you don’t get sued if he doesn’t duck under a punch breaking his nose.