NJPW News: New NJPW President Talks Future Of Company, Growth

As we previously noted, New Japan Pro Wrestling has hired Harold Meij as its new President (which you can find here), making him the first non-Japanese President in the company’s history. Meij recently was interviewed by Nikkei.com and spoke in-depth about taking the position, as well as the future and growth of the promotion. Below are some highlights, translated c/o @reasonjp on Twitter.

Why He Took The Position, Why He Sees Potential In NJPW
“The two big factors were whether I wanted to do it and whether there was potential there. The last 5…6 years, pro wrestling has really grown and lots of concepts are becoming reality. There’s a lot of possibility I think.

In Takara Tomy, we operated under three tentpoles; goods, brand awareness and accessibility. In terms of quality of the product, NJPW far exceeds the biggest wrestling company in the world, WWE. The moves, the drama, the talent, even how attractive the talent is. There’s a lot of strong points that appeal regardless of age, gender or other demographics. So the goods part is down. All we have to do to really take off is improve brand awareness and acessibility.”

His Goals For The Company In The Coming Years
“I want to get to 10 billion Yen in sales in three years, at least. The Sumo Association pulls in 12 billion in revenue and that’s just domestic so it would be a failure if we’re not at that level. Long term, I want us to trouble WWE. If you’ll just look at our product, you’ll see that’s not out of the question.

Japan represents 10% of global economy. Language, culture, business style are all big hurdles to growing that. The Japanese sense of duty doesn’t translate to a foreign contract driven culture. It hurts Japanese companies in acquisitions and negotiations. For me, I don’t have problems of culture or language. I can do business anywhere. And I can become the model of marketing sports content worldwide.”

EA’s Take: Dude is dropping bombs like he’s Rafi from The League and you have to love his enthusiasm if you’re a New Japan fan. Unless for some reason you’re against NJPW trying to grow and if that’s the case, you’re “S.O.L” as they say. I find this a bit ironic after I brought up how expanding to Japan could become a problem for WWE earlier in the day (you can find that here) and while I think Meij’s goals are pretty lofty given the timeframe he’s put on it, they’re not unattainable should they keep taking the steps that they already have been. I think some of his WWE comments are a little outlandish, but it gets people talking, that’s for sure. At the same time, he makes a lot of great, fact-driven points as well (such as the language and culture barriers preventing growth in the past) and also has a history of bringing success to other Japanese companies. Does he necessarily understand “the business”? Who’s to say, but he understands BUSINESS.

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