Dixie Carter Discusses Keeping Up with WWE, TNA Changing with the Times & More

- TNA President Dixie Carter recently spoke with Tennessean.com. Here are some highlights:

How has TNA changed with the times?

We’re not just a wrestling company anymore. We do our own booking. We do our own promotion and public relations. We’re a licensing company. We have toys, Halloween costumes, trading cards. We make our own music. All of those things are sold and promoted around the world. But we still do more than 500 hours of television a year.

How has TNA been able to keep up with WWE?

I don’t care who you are, competition makes you better. There’s a reason there’s a Lowe’s across the street from every Home Depot and a CVS across the street from every Walgreens. I think we’ve made WWE better, just as they’ve improved us.

How does TNA find its talent?

We have a program called Ohio Valley in the Kentucky-Ohio area where we send some of our talent for training and where people come from all over the world to train. It’s like a farm league. We have people work on a skill — and sometimes we’ll bring in one of our developing wrestlers from there into a storyline. We’ve found a couple of our big stars from there.

What’s one of TNA’s ongoing challenges?

When a company first starts out, you have to do whatever you can to get into the business. Then, once you’re established, you spend a lot of time getting out of all the bad contracts that got you into the business. Deals with companies, bad partnerships or licensing deals. We’re still working through some of those now that we’ve found our footing.