Ring Of Honor Wrestling held a conference call earlier today to discuss the issues in regards to the ROH Border Wars iPPV, future business plans and more with Ring Of Honor’s Chief Operating Officer Joe Koff handling the call. Koff opened up the call by introducing himself and noted that he wanted to talk straight away about the ROH Border Wars iPPV noting that the company had the highest of highs and the lowest of lows and discussed the people attempting to sign in on Saturday night for the pay-per-view and how they had done testing in advance. Koff then stated that the issues were not related to streaming but instead to the website not being able to handle the amount of people attempting to sign in at the same time, putting a strain on their server and with that said, he was proud of their response team who put out word on Facebook to the customers about a refund being available. Koff noted that there’s no blame to be passed, the company should have anticipated the amount of sign-ins, should have been better prepared but weren’t and that there are people within the company looking into the issues, to which he deeply apologizes for. Koff was then asked to explain what the technical issue was, to which he reiterated that it was a server related issue.

Koff was then told by someone that it actually took the company 55 minutes to acknowledge the issues on Facebook, to which he responded was the case and was then asked whether the company are considering moving to a traditional PPV basis and said he doesn’t feel that ROH are at that point to make it a profitable venture and that they would like to build up to getting there. Koff then stated that he believes that the company are beating TNA Wrestling in the markets that Ring of Honor airs in and said that they are doing close to 2.0 in the ratings in not the most ideal timeslots and that in year two, Sinclair Broadcasting and Ring of Honor intend to increase their syndicated television. Koff was asked about the camera work on the television shows and said that ROH have to get the lighting right and then they can get into everything and noted that they might bring people in in the near future in that regard. Koff was then asked about how much ROH have invested to make enhancements to their production to which he responded that he would not respond to comments from the Facebook page of Gabe Sapolsky.

Koff noted that the company were close to if not over the 2,000 mark for pre-sales for the Border Wars event and said that it was down to the matches on the show, while it also may have been a case of the fans being pleased at the shows being moved to the company’s website. Koff was asked if the company can make more money by eliminating an internet pay-per-view provider and joked saying that they haven’t had a clean stream yet and noted that he likes to have control of things in-house and that they also have the potential to now run more shows than they have in the past and not have to work around a schedule that others would have to abide to and said that the company hopes to add more to their PPV schedule this year. In regards to a switch to High Definition, Koff said that it is at the top of their budgetary meeting list and it will happen in 2013, but HD may not be an option for all of their affiliates and brought up the option of putting the show on Netflix, without going into any more details. Koff then stated that he’s got a business lunch tomorrow that could potentially lead to an expansion of the Ring Of Honor syndicated shows and stressed that it was not something that was imminent.

Koff was then asked what changes he’d like to see ROH make in the second year under SBG to which he responded that the production needs to get to HD, the company needs to deliver on all promises, expand into new markets and grow in their current ones stating that some wrestlers are being recognized more in public these days than in the past. Koff was asked about running something similar to WCW’s Clash of the Champions and noted that the company would love to do that down the road, but issues will arise with potential affiliates, due to contractual issues. The question about the length of ROH PPV’s was then brought up with Koff saying that he rarely sees fans leave their events early and feels that 4 hours for an event is a perfect time to allow their wrestlers to showcase their talent and although some might say less is more, ROH’s performers shine at their highest level. Koff then concluded the call and thanked everyone for their questions.