Issue 135
December 2015
UFC vp of international development, Joe Carr, says the Octagon’s global growth has only just begun
Joe Carr
UFC vp of international development
Until a few years ago, the UFC was largely seen as a North American promotion that occasionally took its events overseas. But now it’s expanded to cater to demand for fights across the globe. Part of the team behind that growth is vice president of international development, Joe Carr. Since joining the company in March 2012, he’s helped to take the Octagon to 17 countries, despite being a newcomer to the sports world.
“I actually worked in finance in private equity for a number of years before I joined the UFC,” explains the 31-year-old. “When I joined I was doing a lot of strategy work on bigger deals. Then that slowly evolved into a more international scope and now I’m overseeing our international development in our offices worldwide.”
The Harvard University graduate adds that he had to change his mentality to fit its business plans: “Joining the UFC was definitely a big change. Finance and private equity is very transactional and deal orientated. You close one transaction and move onto the next, but they’re not really related.
“Working for the UFC and working for a brand, so much of your decision has to have foresight because you’re looking five or 10 years down the line. You have to think about what it means for the brand and the business in the long term.
“You have to be a lot more forward-thinking and strategic, but everything has to come from a brand-first mentality. It’s not always just numbers on a page or profitability and finances. It’s a lot broader scope.”
Luckily for Carr, his job – in which he works closely with head of international development, Garry Cook – is made easier by the fact that UFC fans can be found across the world and he knows there’s demand for shows on all continents.
However, he admits it’s difficult to cater to a passionate fan base that’s spread out so far. He explains: “It is challenging. The company has been US-centric for so long because it obviously started as a US pay-per-view business, but we’ve dabbled internationally over the years. The last few years have been a much more concerted effort to grow internationally.
“The challenge for us is figuring out how to grow at a measured pace because you can’t be everything to everyone at the same time. There’s demand in Asia, there’s demand across Europe, there’s demand in Latin America and how do you satisfy all of that? That’s been our biggest challenge. We have to be able to say no sometimes.
“Europe has been a perfect example where we went from having one or two events here or there, to committing to five or six events a year going forward. Due to that, we’ve seen a lot more sustainability to the business and now more fighters are emerging.
“By July we’d already sold 50,000 tickets across Europe during our first five events and we still had Dublin to go to. It’s just been an amazing progression internationally, even over the last few years.”
Carr has been in on the ground floor as new territories like Scotland, Poland, Mexico, the United Arab Emirates, China, Singapore and South Korea have welcomed the world’s premier MMA promotion for the first time. But he isn’t about to sit and rest on his laurels.
After all, world domination waits for no one and Carr intends on achieving his goal of taking the UFC all around the world much sooner rather than later. “It’s been very tiring,” he laughs. “Our offices worldwide do an amazing job, especially the team in London. They’ve done an amazing job of acting independently and going out, being entrepreneurial and building the business.
“We still have a lot of work to do. We’ve been successful and it’s been great but moving forward, especially next year, our goal is always to break into new markets and deliver the fans the live event experience. It’s our best marketing tool, it’s our best fan-acquisition tool.
“There’s a number of markets in the EMEA region where we’re yet to go. Russia, France, the Netherlands etc. So that’s a pretty constant goal for the company, we want to grow and experience new markets. However, as much as we want to expand, we can’t forget our core fan bases, and we won’t.”
Thanks to the likes of Carr and the team around him, the UFC looks certain to continue its domination of the MMA world.
Nothing tops UFC Dublin 1
When you’ve seen as many events as Joe Carr has over the last few years, it would be understandable if he couldn’t pick out one that stood out as the most memorable. However, he says nothing has topped last year’s event in Dublin, Ireland.
“I’ve been fortunate enough to go to a number of events all over the world, whether it’s in Brazil, the US, Asia or Europe. On a personal level, my favorite was last year’s Dublin event with Conor McGregor.
“I’ve never heard a crowd that loud from start to finish. The way the arena was set up too, it was kind of like a concert venue so all the noise was coming from one direction and basically landing on the Octagon.
“The passion of the Irish fans, and having grown up in an Irish community in the US, it just felt very familiar to me.”
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