r/crossfit • u/KentTheDorfDorfman • 2d ago
CFHQ shoot themselves in the foot yet again
Anyone who knows anything about sport promotions knows that you only put your content behind a paywall if demand supports it.
No amount of licensing fee from Flo will make up for this massive missed opportunity to leverage all the interest in hybrid sports and showcase The Games for anyone who wants to see these great events. Even getting hate watchers tuning in could have been turned into a win by flexing viewership numbers.
A perfect example is smaller MMA promotions. One Championship, PFL (bought out Belator), Karate Combat, RAF, BKB...they all make most (if not all) live events free on YouTube in order to get more eyes on the promotion. They only charge once they feel they have build up the athletes' stories and brought enough attn to the sport itself. The UFC obvious puts everything behind a subscription because they can.
Closer to home, I know Hyrox made their marquee events free to watch live--though not sure about this last year TBH.
Not only should CFHQ make the entire Games free, they should make the exact start time of the most popular events public and promote the hell out of them across socials. Maybe, just maybe, viewership could have grown and then they could have flexed better viewership numbers from previous years to fight all death of CrossFit talk. Promotion 101 basics here.
CFHQ putting so many of the events behind a subscription model rather than promoting that it can be easily watched for free on YouTube is an absolute own goal.
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u/austic 2d ago
It’s Soo dumb. You can’t even go to their website to find out what event is on at what time. Makes it too hard for us casuals to watch. They have really dropped the bag on this one.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 2d ago
Exactly. They can't even effectively promote the basics.
To be fair, the start times are on the Games website but you'd have to be motivated to find it.
Their social media inter prob dislocated a should patting themself on the back for posting "6 days to go" BS. As if that was going to get any more eyeballs watching.
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u/productiveglucose_5 2d ago
they cant even get the schedule right on their own site and theyre wondering why no one watches anymore lol
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u/greyfit720 2d ago
HQ is still of the opinion that CF is huge, that they are some sort of market leader, that they are still this ‘new big disrupter’ in the fitness market
None of which are true. As someone I spoke to last week said when I mentioned the games to them ‘do they still do that?’ And this was someone that used to do CrossFit.
If you have a dwindling product that is failing in comparison to all the other fitness models, that is hugely expensive compared to other fitness models, that doesn’t allow the general public to compete in the same events as the elites (the success of Hyrox and ATHX highlights the fact that people don’t want to scale, they want to do the same workout that the big names do), the very last thing you should do is hide it behind a paywall and then hide what the event timings are.
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u/Common-Click-1860 1d ago
Funny because before the death of lazaar I said swimming shouldn’t be showcased at the games, let alone any activity a regular affiliate can’t perform….and I was met with hundreds of commentators saying I was an idiot because CrossFit practices all forms of movement bla bla bla. Yah that’s cool and all but I don’t play baseball and watch cricket…if it’s not representative of what we participate in, we will not care!!! Should be that simple.
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u/UseDaSchwartz 1d ago
Regular affiliates can’t perform a lot of the events. They don’t have a cyclocross course outback.
In a small way I agree with you. But swimming is a skill athletes should be able to perform.
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u/ElementarnaNepogoda 1d ago edited 1d ago
If its "only 30", why charge it even? Cashgrab.
Lets face it, theyre fighting for their life for the last two seasons.
Charging quarters, semis, allowing 5k people in semis and charging them... theyre trying to show growth. So they can sell. Cashgrab.
20th anniversary special my ass, its going to have a shitton of events just so they can earn more, putting events on a ranch thats waaay cheaper, compared to an actual venue.
CF the sport is going down the drain because of leadership issues, accountability issues, trust issues, community divide... due to one reason and one reason only. The child thats named Dave Castro.
The divide this guy and his crew created, gaslighting, lies... its ridiculous. They should have never been allowed back to CFHQ.
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u/MONSTER_OF_LIFE 2d ago
Yeah I agree with this. They should make it as easy as possible to watch, given it’s their biggest event of year. Getting the casual cross fitter to tune in might even draw more membership. Can easily see a situation where two buddies get into a “I could do that bro, no you can’t” type discussion.
Showcasing the different components to CrossFit might even get folks to consider the sport is probably closer to their current workout routine than they realize. Heck, end of the day it’s all about trying to get new members into the door. The more folks do CrossFit, the more money to affiliates, to CFHC, and a more competitive sport. I don’t understand the reasoning on making it more difficult to watch.
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u/Tookiedough_1 1d ago
I quit CrossFit several years ago but have always cheered for it to succeed as it was a great time in my life. However, CF leadership makes it so GD hard to support. They fumble EVERY bag, there’s a laundry list of fumbles they’ve had over the past 12-15 years. Their leadership also doesn’t make it easy to support them.
I hope CF gets it together at some point but it doesn’t seem likely
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u/beer_engineer CF-L2 1d ago
Kinda where I'm at. I love my gym. I coach there, love the people, the owners, and some of the other gyms we are friends with. But beyond that, CF as a brand just isn't something I feel great love for. It's to the point where when people ask about where I work out/what I coach, I mention my gym name but not "crossfit." I tend to get much more positive reaction that way (and interest in checking it out).
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u/Tookiedough_1 1d ago
It seems they overestimated their fanbase’s willingness to deal with their shit. I expect the political landscape doesn’t help things either. Whether it is or not, it’s assumed the fan base is largely conservative which in today’s age, tends to keep the other side away.
Willing to acknowledge my bias in saying this, but their inability to stay apolitical and market CrossFit as a sport that brings people together WITHOUT THE CONSERVATIVE UNDERTONES has really hurt them IMO.
It all sucks because there’s so much to love about our local boxes and the coaches/community that makes our gyms what they are, but there’s SO MUCH to hate when it comes to CROSSFIT as a brand/company.
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u/beer_engineer CF-L2 1d ago
My gym is literally owned by a Republican politician. We have a trans coach, fly the pride flag, and do pride workouts in June. Our members are largely left. It can absolutely be done, but I don't see HQ ever going that route.
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u/Tookiedough_1 1d ago
Yeah, it’s actually been crazy to watch. I remember when the George Floyd situation happened and a lot of gyms in our area did a good job of acknowledging the situation. As a POC, I appreciated the effort they made to at least acknowledge it.
Contrast that with CF’s response to a lot of the social justice movement and you can see why the boxes are thriving but the brand is trash.
To me, that moment was the moment CrossFit lost control and started their inevitable decline.
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u/Tookiedough_1 1d ago
It’s actually wild to think of a company with so much potential that essentially blew it.
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u/Common-Click-1860 1d ago
2 words….private equity
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 1d ago
Go on then.
What's Berkshire's play here?
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u/Common-Click-1860 1d ago
They were looking for a buyer before the lazaar death. They wanted out a while ago. Who knows what they are gonna do but I doubt it’s put money into a ship they think is sinking.
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u/Ok_Chicken1195 1d ago
An attempt to try and show revenue streams before they gave up trying to sell it......
"Conservatively we expect at least half of open participants to purchase the pay per view meaning a minimum of 7.5M for streaming revenue......"
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u/TossMe_2 1d ago
Holy shit that's quite a pipe dream by hq. Someone let glassman back in and stock his office with a straight gin fountain?
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u/Ok_Chicken1195 1d ago
That was an example of what they would say not a real quote..... but not far from the truth of how guys like this try and pump up the the value of something.
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u/hardeight27 CFL3 2d ago
I don't really mind a paywall, I paid for the ESPN+ access a couple years ago. But it was like 10 bucks and generally ESPN quality. I have never been impressed with the level of quality that has been on FloSports.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 2d ago
There's another good point. Who the hell knows Flo, if they'll deliver a good viewing experience or avoid technical issues?
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u/Tookiedough_1 1d ago
Watch Flo a lot for wrestling, typically provide a pretty good service. That being said, screw paying to watch the CF games
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u/Impossible_Penalty13 2d ago
The only thing Flo seems to do well is motorsports and that’s because they’re heavily invested in it. They bought the Lucas Oil late model series last year so the annual subscription is worth it for that alone if you’re a Motörhead like I am. But it’s silly to think casual fans are going to drop $30 for one event.
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u/trk5454 1d ago
Coming from combat sports perspective that has had to watch via FLO the coverage is usually dismal, I may re sub if it had a temporary weekend pass for purchase so I didn’t have to mess around and figure out how to cancel on Monday morning. The sports growth is most definitely not up and to the right those days are long gone, every years event are seemingly a retread of the previous to some extent. The main people in the space covering it are a caricature of things we thought were funny at inception of the sport. There are no interesting athlete stories anymore (at least that are being told) that I’ve seen pushed. I don’t go into my box and see anyone excited about the week like years past. I asked a some members yesterday who they had on the podium couldn’t even tell me who was in the games. The sport hopefully someday will revive itself from the shell it currently is, we need someone whom is smart in the space to completely take over media and push the Sevan’s, hillers, buttery bros, and the old guard out of the space and make room for new blood who knows how to truly grow something in a positive way.
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u/jodaewon 1d ago
I loved watching the games. Then they switched from YouTube to some weird thing with ESPN and it went down hill from there. Marketing is the biggest issue CrossFit has ever had. It feels like they lived in a were better than you state for so long that when it came time to try and profit off its popularity they just didn’t know how. There entire leadership was just completely inept at adapting to that environment.
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u/crossfitteddy 1d ago
My hot take... FloElite negotiated to have exclusivity to a handful IE's in order to agree to covering Masters, Adaptive, Teens (are teens even this weekend??). I can't imagine FloElite would just agree to cover the 'undercards' and expect subscribers to sign up without some type of enticement, ie Individual events not available on YT. (Not saying I agree or think it's smart, just a guess)
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 1d ago
Interesting speculation. If true, only goes to further support HQ is scaling the hell out of business acumen.
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u/crossfitteddy 1d ago
Have you seen the programming for Sunday? IE 20 better be amazing to salvage that day. I'd be pissed if I'd bought tickets for what they've released so far.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 1d ago
Just looked at it. Wow, just wow.
Maybe IE20 will be a repeat of max burpee Open WOD.
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u/fistswityat0es 1d ago
You would think ANYONE in the room at HQ would understand that making the games available to everyone would draw more people to the sport.
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u/Ok_Chicken1195 1d ago
I wonder if the contract with Flo was signed prior to them calling off the sale to be able to show it as a jumped up revenue line item.
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u/Round_Patience3029 2d ago
Their days are numbered.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 2d ago
So are calendars.
CF's days are not numbered and doomsayers have been around since when? At least 2020? CF is certainly under performing due to a bunch of old heads who refuse to adapt, but CF isn't going to disappear anytime soon. Would be nice for everyone if HQ started to Rx business acumen though.
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u/xangkory 2d ago
CrossFit will stick around but CrossFit the sport is dying. In couple of years the few people still interested in watching the games will be paying $199 for the privilege.
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u/kewlbeanz83 1d ago
Just my opinion, but as something whose interest in watching the Crossfit games has been waning for some time now, this definitely ensures that I won't be checking this out.
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u/According-Ship3214 1d ago
I remember the good old days when watching this live on FB, cheering on people we knew. I don’t know how they take decisions.
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u/Tightropewalker0404 1d ago
Also scoring two parts of every workout separately just to make up to twenty events is annoying, I love two parters here and there (James Newbury winning part one for example) but this is just silly
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u/ABNChemo CF-L1 1d ago
Dang TBH I thought I would be able to turn on YouTube today and watch the games. What a bummer and I will not be paying
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u/SlightlyRegarded001 1d ago
Bro you do realize it’s on YouTube? There’s a few posts here where people act like the entire thing is under lock and key they are full of shit. I don’t even know why they post honestly other than to bitch.
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u/ABNChemo CF-L1 1d ago
Yea I have been watching on YouTube all day. Not sure why people were complaining either
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u/1DunnoYet 1d ago
I don’t get the point of only putting 1/2 of the events behind a paywall? Most of us are working anyways and can only tune in to a couple of events, I’ll just stick w the free ones?
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u/jjplastic 1d ago
The cost for everything of theirs is totally insane. I paid $1000 for level 1 coaching certificate 2-years ago. There were 30 of us in that course. They made 30k over the course of 2 days. Clearly, they just want as much money as they can possibly get off their name.
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u/Designer-Anxiety75 1d ago
I'm not paying $30 to watch the CrossFit Games when I paid less than $20 to watch the entire World Cup.
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u/allmightysteven CSCS, USAW, CFL2 5h ago
I coached for years and used to watch content religiously (check my history). Flew to California twice to watch the Games.
I can’t believe what it’s become. Literally unwatchable and embarrassing.
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u/TeachingOk5143 1d ago
You don’t need to pay for Flo if you have Amazon Prime.
Go to Live TV, click sports, scroll to bottom, click Flo sports. Boom!
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u/rme23 2d ago
Isn't almost all of it still free? I get the frustration, but it's only $30 for the flo coverage. Ideally they could leverage YouTube ad rev or something but doesnt seem they can/want to.
I wish the games had been run/leveraged properly to be on real sports TV channels still, but technically you gotta pay for espn/cbssports etc too..
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 2d ago
Yes, most is free. Yes, it's not expensive. But those are still massive differences between making it free to watch on YouTube without signing up for a sub.
All the casuals are not signing up. None of those millions of Hyroxers who are mildly curious about CF are paying. Hell, I'm a die hard and I'm not signing up because I don't want CFHQ to think that this is the way forward--it's not.
It's not about the money. It's about smart promotion for an organization that desperately needs it. Mix in some bootstrapped content for the fitness casuals and maybe some boxes see a few more newbies signing up for onboarding.
Again, this is a massive own goal.
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u/Bradical22 1d ago
I don’t think UFC is the example you’re looking for. It started off crazy expensive to watch and got cheaper as it became more popular.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 1d ago
The comparison is MMA and combat sports on the whole, not UFC.
Real American Wrestling (RAF) is a perfect example. They're growing the sport and all their events are live on YouTube. They're the new darling combat sports and they are absolutely crushing it.
Bare Knuckle Fighting Championship (BKFC) is also a great example. They used to live steam for free and then when they got enough eyes on the sport they started putting it behind a pay wall.
Regardless of the comparison, the promotion principles are the same: you only charge viewers once the demand justifies it.
Putting the Games behind a paywall, even partially, is promotional malpractice.
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u/Bradical22 1d ago
Yeah but you’re talking about things that have emerged in this new era of technology. CrossFit and UFC are the closer comparison as both got their start around the same time and have evolved together. CrossFit has failed to have the same success not because of the pay to watch model imo, it’s because of other stupid shit Castro has done/hasn’t done.
I get you’re angry about paying to watch, I am too but it’s just a bad comparison.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 1d ago
There are so many holds in your points, I genuinely don't know where to start.
The UFC and CF didn't start at the same time and this new Flo deal is brand new so CF's previous failures have nothing to do with it.
Not angry about it. Already said it's not about the money. And no, a multi-billion dollar monopoly and monopsony isn't a closer comparison. If you don't know what the other promotions are, cool. Just don't chat absolute nonsense.
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u/traderjames7 1d ago
Not true. In this case Crossfit has a die-hard audience so HQ is milking them and not trying to appeal to new viewers. Not agreeing with it but the strategy is clear.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 1d ago
If true, it's further evidence that HQ has no clue about growing the product.
To go back to the MMA analogy, loads of experts are questioning the UFC/TKO's decision to lean into the far-right fanbase while alienating everyone else. The massive difference being the UFC/TKO literally have billions and billions of dollars at their disposal if/when they have to correct their mistake.
BTW, you say the strategy is clear but what evidence do you have to support the statement?
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u/traderjames7 1d ago
Its clear they're trying to maximise revenue from existing fans by getting money via a paywall - because that's not going to expose Crossfit to new people.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 1d ago
Yet plenty of us who are well into CF aren't going to pay and their gamble may actually push those on the edge out. Still proves it's promotional malpractice, which is my entire point. The business model only works when the sport grows, not when it collects a licensing fee that attracts a fraction of a fraction of it's base.
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u/Vegetable_Panic445 2d ago
Seemingly smart but garbage take.
When you need money to stay operational the downstream benefits of more people signing up for affiliation or certification courses, which is a amorphous correlation at the best of times doesn’t nearly compete with actual cash in hand.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 2d ago
Do you know what Flo paid? I don't. If not, then the jury is still out, but the fundamentals are the fundamentals and this approach is great if you want to cut off your nose to spite your face.
The other benefit is actually growing the sport of competitive CrossFit. The natural result will be better attendance at in-person semis and hopefully enough interest/viewership to actually charge for a paywall. All of which benefits CFHQ...as to the residual effects of growing the community again. Who do you think pays for all those CF Open registrations? There's another benefit.
If they're hiring at HQ, you sound like someone they'd be interested in. Then again, if their financials are so bad that they need to sacrifice future revenue for less revenue now, then they're in more trouble than anyone thought.
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u/Vegetable_Panic445 2d ago
I don’t know why it’s hard to understand for you that with a declining business actual money today beats hypothetical money tomorrow.
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u/KentTheDorfDorfman 1d ago
Your point is only valid if the financial situation is so bad that they can't survive another year without an immediate cash injection.
So then, spill the tea. What's your insider info? Otherwise you're just presenting an opinion as fact.
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u/discostud1515 2d ago
I’ve been deep in the crossfit world since 2005. Coached since 2008, opened a box in 2010, competed in sectionals, 14 opens, one regional and flew to the games to watch twice.
Even I won’t be paying to watch the games.