Podcasting paid off for Colt Cabana.
Before everyone in the world had a wrestling podcast, Colt Cabana was a pioneer with The Art of Wrestling, which began in 2010. Cabana would tell road stories and welcome guests from the world of wrestling to share their stories.
The podcast started just over a year after Cabana was released by WWE and he was looking to branch out.
"Our industry, it's all downhill," Cabana told Chris Jericho on Talk Is Jericho. "I did the shows with King Kong Bundy and Brutus Breefcake on the way down, those were the shows I did on the way up. It's not like they were going to hire me back, I was on my way down. The first thing I did was put my resume on Monster, I have a college degree and I was like, 'I'll try to take bookings but eventually, I guess I'll have to do a real life.' As everything started building and as I started really taking so much from comedy, I started doing a YouTube show where I took a basic idea YouTube show and I made the documentary, which was based off Comedians of Comedy, my YouTube show was based off a thing called Puddin' by Eddie Pepitone, he was doing these short videos so me and Marty DeRosa would film ten things in two hours and make one minute videos and they'd come out every week. The podcast, a lot of it was inspired by comedy, and as it started building, I realized that I don't want anyone to fire me anymore, I want to be the only person that can fire myself and I want to have so many different boxes, because I put all my eggs into the WWE basket and I just wanted all different boxes so if one box goes away, I have six more. That was my mentality to try and survive. As it started getting really good, I knew...I was fired at 29, at 31, I realized 'I'm doing good, there is longevity in this.'"
Cabana continued by saying, "I knew I didn't have to take a job at Monster and I knew I could do the Indies. I was making pretty crazy money...at the height of my podcast, I know I was making more than mid-carders in WWE, which I know is wild for people to hear, but also, I think I was wrestling more. I was on the road about 200 days a year. I would take everything and do everything and I would have this mentality of because of the popularity of the podcast and being on the interview and all this stuff, merchandise moved and people wanted to come and have an experience. I didn't really need to get paid the most per show, I just needed to get to the merch table. I loved the wrestling and I thrived in professional wrestling and I think I have a weird and different style and if it doesn't fit some places, I know I enjoy doing it and it makes me happy and I know there is a pocket of people that it does make happy. The art of it I love, but also, to make a living, if I can get to a show, get to a table, meet the fans who want to meet me. How I look at it is the promoter pays me for the job, but the fan pays for the ticket and they get that money and I get the money at the meet and greet."
Giving an example of how he was able to boost his profile and sales, Cabana said, "I won't necessarily draw at an arena, but I'm going to draw in front a thousand people or whatever it might be and I can bring 100, 200 people or whatever. Andy Quinlan in England and RevPro, I probably went to England every other month for three years. He was like, 'Why would I not book you? The podcast...they are coming over.' I boosted his business a little bit because no one was bringing me overseas and we kind of figured it out and it became a model. The brother thing is, I knew him for so long that I would work cheap for him, but I would make so much money because the UK fans liked me and enjoyed me, but I lived in Chicago."
Cabana started a new podcasting venture this year entitled Wrestling Anonymous where he curates anonymous voicemails from wrestling fans all over the world.
Cabana is also signed to AEW and part of the Dark Order.
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