Vice President of Retail Development, WWE

>> My name's Scott Flynn, and I'm currently a vice president of retail development for World Wrestling Entertainment, or the WWE. And my responsibility, I work in our Consumer Products Goods area, where we license the brand out to companies who, you know, create products and sell at retail. My job is to work with major retailers across the country, such as Walmart, Target. Toys-R-Us, Kmart and our license partners, companies like Mattel, 2K Interactive, Freeze Apparel, Gaiam Vivendi Home Entertainment, people like that, and bring parties together, to expand our presence at retail with the WWE brand of merchandise. Now, our consumer products business is about a billion-dollar business, globally. It touches -- we probably have a hundred licensees that we work with. You know, the major categories are toys, video games, DVD/home entertainment, apparel -- but apparel touches so many different areas. I mean, you have T-shirts. You have hats. You have socks. You have sweatshirts. You have swimwear and things like that. And then, you get down into, like, home -- bedding, room decor and things like that. You get into collectibles. You get in -- you know, like Fathead. And you know, photographs and we even sell cigarette lighters that are licensed WWE, so it's pretty broad. Most products that you see, if it makes sense, we would -- you know, makes sense for the brand, we would definitely partner with people like that. Well, meetings are a big part of what I do. And, you know, they're internal meetings. They're phone meetings. They're conference calls. That's a lot of what I do. Because the nature of my job now is I have to bring people together to make things happen at retail. And in order to do that, there's a lot of coordination that takes place which, you know -- and the key to coordination is communication. And so, that's -- I spend probably 60 percent of any day interacting with other people, you know, from the standpoint of communication and coordination. So, that's a big part of what I do. You know, and then, the other aspects of what I do is try to build programs or opportunities that I can pull licensees and retailers together in to create a stronger presence for products at retail, in conjunction with major events that our company does. I mean, if you follow WWE, we have pay-for-view events. One of them is WrestleMania, which is considered our Super Bowl. So, we work a year-plus in advance, with people to plan -- like a Walmart, for instance -- plan a program where we can put multiple licensees together in locations in the store to create just this strong brand statement, presence and, you know, sell product and generate revenue for everyone involved. And it's really funny, as you understand the business, because you have different demographics that you deal with. We have a kid who is a big part of -- who purchases our products. And they go for the good guys. Or the terminology in the business is "a face," which is short for "baby-face." The "faces" sell well with kids' products. And then, you have the bad guys, who we call "the heels," and the heels, they'll do well with the kids. Now, kids might purchase a heel product, like in a role-play situation, like with a Mattel action figure. But they'll have the good guy, too, so they can fight each other. But for shirts and clothing and things like that, a kid's not going to get caught dead in a heel. So, one of the challenges we have is that our storyline can change quickly. And your product development cycle cannot change that quickly. Like, for instance, it takes 14 to 16 months for Mattel to bring an action figure to market. Because you have to draw it, graph it, mold it, you know, build molds overseas and all that kind of stuff. So, if a guy takes off, trying to catch up to that, it's virtually impossible. With some other product lines, like apparel and things like that, you can catch up quicker because the lead times are shorter. But if a guy's a -- he's a good guy. And then, there's a decision made that he's going to change to a heel, that changes things overnight, if it's a big one. So, we just had a situation where one of our up-and-coming faces, a guy named Ryback, he went heel. So, now, we're waiting to see what happens with his products as it relates to kids. His action figure's just hitting the market. So, we don't know -- there's a good chance that it won't sell at the same level that we thought it would, like somebody like a John Cena, which, I'm sure, a lot of people have heard of. And, you know, he's a face. He's been a face since the beginning and, you know, and his merchandise sales are a reflection of that. But then, you find out that some of the heels, adults get into. You know, it's kind of the -- they love the bad guys. So, we have guys like CM Punk who, his apparel sales are, like, in the top two or three with adults. And so, there's that kind of dynamic, too, that different consumer groups resonate to different products. And so, that storyline and how it changes and, you know, a push on someone versus someone coming back, I mean, it has a dramatic impact on what happens with product. It sure does. And our storylines can change 10 minutes before you actually see it happen on TV. That's how volatile it is.