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Inside Golden Boy Promotions! PhilBoxing.com Wed, 11 Oct 2006 In a short span of less than five years, Golden Boy Promotions has gone from a startup company to one of the largest and most powerful promotional companies in boxing. Obviously having the sport's most marketable star in Oscar De La Hoya was a big plus, but other top boxers have had mixed results when trying to go the promotional route (Roy Jones Jr. comes to mind), so success was not a given. Some attribute the company's achievements simply to the golden touch of the Golden Boy and his relationship with HBO. The fact is, however, that the company started small (by Oscar's standards anyway) and took the time to learn the ropes. As a result of that solid foundation, over the last several years Oscar's golden touch and relationship with HBO have now kicked in to pay dividends. Fightnews.com recently visited Golden Boy Promotions headquarters in downtown Los Angeles, and spoke with Golden Boy CEO Richard Schaefer, the architect of the company's meteoric rise. Schaefer, came to boxing from an unlikely place. He left a top executive position with the Swiss financial management bank UBS to work with Oscar -- and not necessarily in a boxing capacity. "When I moved away from my banking career, I didn't really do it to join Oscar because of the boxing and to be associated with his last few fights," Schaefer told Fightnews. "It was really because I realized the Hispanic market here in the United States is sort of like a country within a country, an economy within an economy, and Oscar in many ways is the face of these Hispanics, of these Latinos. He's a success story, rags to riches and I think the kind of personality where people look up to him and admire him. He's become their hero." So when Schaefer got involved with Oscar, they put together a blueprint to see what kind of businesses and industries they wanted to be involved in. "We evaluated what kind of industries within the Hispanic market we want to be involved in. Obviously sports and entertainment was one of them, but there were others. There was the real estate business, there was the financial service business, food and beverage business, the media business, so we basically went very diligently about it, to implement opportunities in these various segments." Of course, boxing had to be an important part of the mix. "We started with boxing because we felt that boxing is a business which Oscar knows and the business knows him, so it's really like a win-win. We felt, as well, that I didn't really know boxing and Oscar had experience but he didn't really know the boxing business that well either. So our first thing was 'let's start a boxing management company.' So we started Golden Boy Management and we signed a fighter, Jose Navarro, to a management contract. Lou Dibella was the promoter. "Pretty soon, three, four, five months later, I realized, as Oscar and I got to know more about boxing and what was involved on the management side, we realized that the management side wasn't really the part of boxing we wanted to be involved in. We felt we would have more of an impact to help the sport of boxing by being a promoter. We felt that with Don King and Bob Arum being in their mid-seventies, that time in a way was on our side. We looked at who else was out there, and we really saw, 'hey, this is a business where the door is wide open.' If you look historically, boxing had its ups and downs and we felt the time was right to come in and do some new things and different things and get involved in the sport of boxing, so we formed Golden Boy Promotions. Then we asked ourselves 'Okay, what's the best way to go about it?' It was December 20, 2001 when the formation of Golden Boy Promotions was officially announced. And De La Hoya and Schaefer began learning the business end of promoting boxing events from one of the best in Roy Englebrecht, the successful club show promoter who later demonstrated his considerable promotional acumen by establishing Fight Promoter University. "In a way we sat in class, too," recalls Schaefer, who was a speaker at Englebrecht's FPU session in August. "The only difference was because of Oscar's deep pockets, instead of actually going down to Irvine and sitting in a classroom, we bought Roy's business. So Roy was, in a way, here teaching us for a couple of years. Then he decided that he wanted to go back down there [to Orange County], but we still work very closely together. Obviously he's a terrific guy, so we basically learned by doing a bunch of non-televised events." Schaefer also admits he learned from rival promoter Bob Arum, before Golden Boy and Top Rank had a falling out about three years ago. "I learned a lot from Bob and I think that Bob Arum is certainly one who is a master at what he does, and I think that what I learned from Bob, I'll never forget. I always have a very respectful relationship with him and he has always been and his wife has always been very nice to me and he really taught me a lot. In a way "I think as it relates to the matchmaking. Eric Gomez (Golden Boy matchmaker) was able to learn from the best with Don Chargin, and as to the promoting, I was able to learn from the best, as well, and that is Bob Arum." The Golden Boy Promotions braintrust wasn't merely trying to learn the business, however. They had bigger plans. "We basically applied these lessons and then we brought in our own ideas and our own thinking and we decided to really build a business which in a way that would reform the sport of boxing and we felt the time was right to empower the fighters. To shift some of the power away from the networks and the promoters, to the fighters. "One way we felt to go about it, was when I studied the entertainment industry and saw what they did with United Artists back in the 1920s with Mary Pickford, Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, where they basically broke away from the studio system and said 'You know what? enough is enough, we're going to stand up for ourselves and we're going to form our own company' and that became United Artists. In a way that was the time, that was the date in which the studio system in Hollywood broke, and it really empowered the entertainers. And we basically said, 'you know what, why don't we apply a similar model to boxing?' By making a selected group fighters shareholders of Golden Boy Promotions, we felt it was a way to form a business which would be different from any other business." The first partner brought in was Bernard Hopkins, which raised some eyebrows in the industry since "The Executioner" had a reputation for being such a renegade that he was almost unpromotable. However, almost two years later, Hopkins is still with Golden Boy and all signs indicate that the relationship is working out well for all concerned. "We knew that when Bernard signed with us a year ago or so he was already 40 years old, so we knew that we wouldn't promote Hopkins for the next ten years. We knew that Bernard Hopkins only has a handful of fights left. So a lot a people said 'why would you give a fighter at the tail end of his career a piece of your company?' "Well, I think that Bernard Hopkins has gained the respect of his fighters. Not only his peers, his age group but the kids, too. They look up to him because Bernard Hopkins has stood up to what is right and what is wrong, and in the process he has gained the respect of the fighters and he has gained the ear of the fighters. From all the people I know, he would be the best student of the sport. He has an eye for talent and he has credibility. Some people might say [in regard to] some of the things he's done, be careful and so on, but I guess for everybody, you live and learn. But I must say with Bernard it wasn't to be the promoter of his last few fights, it was really to have somebody there who could help us going forward, building young fighters and bringing young fighters to Golden Boy Promotions and be there when we promote boxing events, giving his abilities to the events and so on. "He's in a way has become an ambassador of the sport, just like Oscar. I mean, these guys are so different, and that is why we did it, because if they would be the same, we wouldn't need to do it. But they somehow respond to and attract a different group, a different segment. I don't mean necessarily by color, it really has to do with two guys who have become legends in the sport for different reasons. I think they compliment each other very nicely. To have them under the same umbrella I felt was going forward for the business for Golden Boy Promotions, very important." A few months later, Sugar Shane Mosley and Marco Antonio Barrera also signed on as equity partners. Regarding the addition of Mosley and Barrera, Schaefer states: "He is a fighter who can relate to young kids and tell them the great things he's done and the not so great things, and he has a certain amount of credibility there. Again he's a fighter with an amazing eye for talent. He can sit here and explain to me about this punch and that punch and moving this and moving that and here I am a banker, I mean what do I know? He could just talk for hours and hours about boxing. This guy has a love for the sport of boxing like I have never seen in somebody else. Again if you compare Oscar, Bernard and Shane, totally different personalities and yet each one is a legend and each one has achieved so much. To have Shane there as well, I felt was a good add on. Of course, Marco Antonio Barrera is recognized by many as one of the best, if not the best, fighter coming out of Mexico and he'll meet the Mexican market and the lower weight classes and so on, (it's good to) have him on our side." "It sort of like gives me the chills to see these four guys [De La Hoya, Hopkins, Mosley and Barrera], it's like one for all and all for one. If Oscar fights, we have these three guys welcoming Oscar into the ring when Shane fought you had Oscar and Bernard and Marco standing there, welcoming Shane to the ring when he fought Vargas. And you have them at ringside, yelling and screaming instructions to do this and do that, this in a way is really a good story. It's a kind of a story that fans like to see and if you go and see one of the Golden Boy fights you'll see these legends standing next to each other and empowering the fighter and the sport. I usually don't go into the ring before the fight, and I'm sitting there ringside and I see these guys and I'm proud that we have come so far in such an amazing short period of time." Will there be any more stars becoming partners in the company? Probably not any time soon stated Schaefer. "I think the equity is probably going to be a difficult thing whether we want to give up more equity." But that doesn't mean the company will quit pursuing the sport's top talent. Golden Boy recently established an alliance with Winky Wright, who had started his own promotional company and Golden Boy Promotions will be involved in Winky's December 2 fight against Kassim Ouma on HBO. In addition, last month Golden Boy inked 130lb pound superstar Manny Pacquiao to a seven fight promotional pact, which would kick in after his November 18 rubber match with Erik Morales. "I was just telling my staff the other day, we've sort of reached a harbor now and now we are refueling and we're going to set sail again and we're not half way. I have other plans and other ideas to really build this business, Golden Boy Promotions, as the predominant boxing business in the world with diversified revenue streams, really make it a sports business we can all be proud of. Frankly where the participants in the sport, the writers, the networks, the fighters, where anybody can be proud of the sport of boxing again. It doesn't have to be in the shadow of other sports. Boxing has such a huge global reach, it has such a rich history that we just need to be there and be proud and we don't need people saying bad things about boxing and negative this and negative that and this was a bad decision and that was bad and immediately they think about they must have been paid off or things like that. "With Bob Arum, as much as I learned from him and as much great things he's done, there were some things which are not so good and obviously the same is true with Don King, so in a way they were the face of boxing for the last 40 years and as I have said, they have done some good things as well as not so good things too. I think they should be held accountable to the fact that boxing is today where it is. "I don't mean that we are saints, but I think we want to really try to make it a business and really run it as a business. In the process, hopefully we'll attract corporate sponsors again and bring some of these great brands back to the sport of boxing (and also bring in) new ones and hopefully as a result, maybe one day, bring boxing back to network television. "I look at the kind of sponsors for example involved in this fight on September 16th, Barrera vs Juarez. We have Southwest Airlines; that is a premium brand when it comes to sports sponsorships, they are involved with us. Bacardi; big conglomerate. They are involved again based on the great experience they had with the De La Hoya fight and this time they are using another one of their brands which is Tequila Cazadores, great brand. Rockstar energy drink is again involved. Sony, that is as blue chip as you get. Sony, involved in boxing. Pretty good. To get a multiple of four blue chip sponsors like that, I'm proud and it's a step in the right direction." What is the secret to Golden Boy's success? Schaefer has a simple philosophy: "We under-promise and over-deliver." "When we sit down with the fighter, it's always that. But you know what? In boxing we're the only ones who do that. Because if you put in a contract "minimum purse," I guarantee you for 99.9% of the fighters, the minimum purse is what they get. When [other promoters] sign you, they say 'Well, this is just the minimum.' They'll never see a penny more. I can give you examples of Golden Boy fighters who have made more than the minimum. As I said, when we sign a fighter, I always tell them, 'most promoters they're going to promise you the world, and as you'll see, they're not going to be able to deliver. I'm going to under-promise and over-deliver. And if you don't believe me. Call the toughest out there, Bernard Hopkins. Ask him. Ask Shane, Marco, Oscar. Ask anyone. Coming from the banking to boxing, for Schaefer it has been a wild and exciting ride. "From analyzing the business, learning the business the first year, retaining Roy and doing the non-televised shows for the real hands-on experience, to then doing "Boxing De Oro" on HBO Latino and learning it from there. Now we're talking about televised shows establishing the credibility that we are actually able to execute on televised boxing events where you are to be live at a certain time and everything has to click. "Then obviously doing the Telefutura shows because now we have credibility that we could do actually live events, learning with our first pay-per-view on our own which was "Fiesta De La Hoya" [November 22, 2003], then to see the whole pay-per-view business leading up to the bigger pay-per-view events and now being, and I don't mean it in a bragging way, the largest and most successful boxing promoter in the world.....all in five years. "And you know what? We're barely starting." Click here for a complete listing of columns by this author. Click here for a complete listing of this author's articles from different news sources. |
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