Post by CW .org .info .net on Mar 27, 2023 13:58:59 GMT -6
Co-owner JD Costello
It is with a great deal of pride and remorse that I must announce that NWA Charlotte will cease operations effective immediately.
The series of events over the past several days has forced us to make the hardest decision in our lives. As ironic as it may seem, our enormous success has caused us even greater obstacles that we cannot financially bare.
We have invested over $250,000 in our building. We never anticipated having the huge crowds that we have been honored with. As we have been made painfully aware by the CMFD, when you go over the 300 attendance mark, your building must have a fire alarm and sprinkler system. In addition, other requirements to rehab the building will run another $250,000 when all is said and done. In today’s poor economic environment, there is simply no where to turn for those funds.
We have looked at all possibilities, such as moving the shows to a school gym or rec center. From the onset, we vowed that NWA Charlotte would be significantly different from other wrestling shows. We would only have the best talent. We would produce the shows with studio quality sound and lights. The production of the show would be network quality, and the place of performance would be spectacular. Those remain our core values, and we decided long ago not to compromise our standards. It would be an insult to the wrestling profession and to our fans.
For the staff, thank you for the love and passion you have embraced us with. Thank you for the sweat of preping the coliseum each week and the countless hours of uncompromised dedication you have shown. You know who you are.
And to the wrestlers. Be proud that you were part of the most professional independent show to ever hit the country. I hope you will remember our little company with pride and respect. That is what I tried to show to you every show and my heart goes out to you for giving 110%. Keep moving forward and keep holding your head high.
Our fans...my oh my...what can we say. In our short live of NWA Charlotte, we have become so close with each and every one of you. Tears are running down my face as I type this now. I can’t help it, because we really enjoyed seeing your enthusiasm and passion as you entered the building each week, coming up to me and complimenting us and thanking us for bringing a quality wrestling product back to Charlotte. I can hear your cheers and boos right now and the excitement that you generated at each and every show. You will sorely be missed. I can’t explain how much I appreciate each and every one of you supporting NWA Charlotte. It has meant the world to me.
The honest truth is, we were not angered by the presence of the CMFD or the CMPD at our event. They are doing their job to insure the safety of the public. As we have been made aware of now, there were building rules and regs that were not to code, and we accept blame. It was not our intentions to disobey the fire codes, we simply thought we had done everything right. We are, however, angered by the way in which the CMFD and CMPD conducted themselves. They acted forceful, power hungry, and put forth an attitude of superiority with no regard for the feeling of others.
With the enormous success we produced comes the dark and ugly of the world of wrestling. There were a handful of NWA ill-wishers within the business who were cynical of us and wished openly of our failure. They are feeling good at the moment, but in reality, they failed. People such as Greg Price of NWA Legends Fanfest, Rikki Nelson of MidAtlantic Championship Wrestling, Viper of Hendersonville, Thomas Simpson from wherever and George South of Charlotte...all who were jealous of our success. They may boast about us being gone, but they cannot remove the fact of our unprescendented success, uncompromising standards, and the most loyal and supportive fans in the world. And in essence, they have performed a great injustice to the very industry that they claim to love.
Once wrestling is in your blood, it’s like a drug, you can’t live without it. NWA Charlotte was my dream, my baby, my passion, my reason for existence. The next weeks and months are going to be hard to come to terms with it being gone. I feel great lose, just as you, our fans do. I am a survivor and hopefully on the other side of this is more sunshine for all of us.
Until that time comes, we can look back on NWA Charlotte with great pride and dignity.
Thank you for everything. JD Costello
CO-OWNER JAY JOYCE
It is with a very sad heart and tears that we must make the announcement that we never prepared ourselves for: NWA Charlotte is closed.
As most of you know, this past Saturday night a fire inspector, along with other fire and police bullies, forcefully shut down the NWA Coliseum for as many “reasons” as they could think of, including lack of fire sprinkler and alarm systems, extension cord usage, lack of escape plan posting, doors not opening in the outward manner, and a couple of other miscellaneous reasons. Their actions were deliberate and as close to a realistic “witch hunt” as it could be.
The bottom line is that the improvements now required to convert the NWA Coliseum from “warehouse space” to “a place of assembly” will exceed $200,000. We have already put in excess of $250,000 into NWA Charlotte and NWA Coliseum with no hope of recouping any of those investments at this point.
Everybody loses at this point. Charlotte loses the NWA, again. The fans lose the outlet for a connection to professional wrestling. The wrestlers lose their connection to jobs, exposure, career growth, and performance in front of their fans. The staff at NWA loses their jobs, their enjoyment of production, fans, and service. The city loses the licensing and tax money. The off-duty Charlotte police officers lose the ability to earn extra money for their families. The critics lose their enjoyment of watching a professional show and writing about the angles, performers, and flaws. The NWA loses a high-profile member, a large outlet for carrying the NWA banner forward, and a venue to stage a comeback. The NWA legends lose a place to “come home” and perform again in front of their endearing fans. The small, backyard wrestling shows and “people in the business” that love to make fun of NWA Charlotte lose an outlet to express their jealousy and ignorance. The vendors that we purchase all of our food and merchandise from lose a large customer. Duke Energy and Piedmont Natural Gas lose a large business customer. Time Warner Cable and WMYT-TV lose an advertiser. The building owner loses a tenant and income. The sponsors of NWA Charlotte lose a direct connection to their customers. Lowe’s and the Home Depot lose a business customer. We lose all of this and more.
NWA Charlotte was more than a business. It started out to be a business, but was quickly transformed into an “entity” that sheltered special people. There was a sense of kinship, friendship, devotion, empowerment, sharing, laughing, pride, crying, amazement, anticipation, wonderment, shock, disappointment, relief, anger, and any other emotion you can include.
To the fans, we say thank you so much for embracing us and supporting us. You are the primary reason that professional wrestling exists…it’s to entertain you with athletics, wonderful characters, and stories that you can believe in.
To the NWA Charlotte roster, we say thank you so much for even wanting to take a chance to be part of a start-up. Our paths will cross again. We can only pray and hope.
To Leigh Ann Albaugh, Fire Inspector, CFD Fire Prevention, and Calvin M. Wright, Senior Fire Inspector, Fire Marshal's Office, Charlotte Fire Department, we’re glad to know that you will continue to enforce the laws and provide this valuable service to our community in keeping us all safe. We’re sure there are other businesses with dreams and hopes out there that you can seek out and destroy in the names of safety and law.
However short and brief our run was, we proved that we can produce a professional wrestling show that hundreds of fans embraced and loved, and like-minded professional wrestling minds admired. Money comes and goes. People come and go. Walls come and go. Time comes and goes. But one thing will always remain: determination.
Thank you. Jay Joyce.
_________________
www.NWAcharlotte.com
It is with a great deal of pride and remorse that I must announce that NWA Charlotte will cease operations effective immediately.
The series of events over the past several days has forced us to make the hardest decision in our lives. As ironic as it may seem, our enormous success has caused us even greater obstacles that we cannot financially bare.
We have invested over $250,000 in our building. We never anticipated having the huge crowds that we have been honored with. As we have been made painfully aware by the CMFD, when you go over the 300 attendance mark, your building must have a fire alarm and sprinkler system. In addition, other requirements to rehab the building will run another $250,000 when all is said and done. In today’s poor economic environment, there is simply no where to turn for those funds.
We have looked at all possibilities, such as moving the shows to a school gym or rec center. From the onset, we vowed that NWA Charlotte would be significantly different from other wrestling shows. We would only have the best talent. We would produce the shows with studio quality sound and lights. The production of the show would be network quality, and the place of performance would be spectacular. Those remain our core values, and we decided long ago not to compromise our standards. It would be an insult to the wrestling profession and to our fans.
For the staff, thank you for the love and passion you have embraced us with. Thank you for the sweat of preping the coliseum each week and the countless hours of uncompromised dedication you have shown. You know who you are.
And to the wrestlers. Be proud that you were part of the most professional independent show to ever hit the country. I hope you will remember our little company with pride and respect. That is what I tried to show to you every show and my heart goes out to you for giving 110%. Keep moving forward and keep holding your head high.
Our fans...my oh my...what can we say. In our short live of NWA Charlotte, we have become so close with each and every one of you. Tears are running down my face as I type this now. I can’t help it, because we really enjoyed seeing your enthusiasm and passion as you entered the building each week, coming up to me and complimenting us and thanking us for bringing a quality wrestling product back to Charlotte. I can hear your cheers and boos right now and the excitement that you generated at each and every show. You will sorely be missed. I can’t explain how much I appreciate each and every one of you supporting NWA Charlotte. It has meant the world to me.
The honest truth is, we were not angered by the presence of the CMFD or the CMPD at our event. They are doing their job to insure the safety of the public. As we have been made aware of now, there were building rules and regs that were not to code, and we accept blame. It was not our intentions to disobey the fire codes, we simply thought we had done everything right. We are, however, angered by the way in which the CMFD and CMPD conducted themselves. They acted forceful, power hungry, and put forth an attitude of superiority with no regard for the feeling of others.
With the enormous success we produced comes the dark and ugly of the world of wrestling. There were a handful of NWA ill-wishers within the business who were cynical of us and wished openly of our failure. They are feeling good at the moment, but in reality, they failed. People such as Greg Price of NWA Legends Fanfest, Rikki Nelson of MidAtlantic Championship Wrestling, Viper of Hendersonville, Thomas Simpson from wherever and George South of Charlotte...all who were jealous of our success. They may boast about us being gone, but they cannot remove the fact of our unprescendented success, uncompromising standards, and the most loyal and supportive fans in the world. And in essence, they have performed a great injustice to the very industry that they claim to love.
Once wrestling is in your blood, it’s like a drug, you can’t live without it. NWA Charlotte was my dream, my baby, my passion, my reason for existence. The next weeks and months are going to be hard to come to terms with it being gone. I feel great lose, just as you, our fans do. I am a survivor and hopefully on the other side of this is more sunshine for all of us.
Until that time comes, we can look back on NWA Charlotte with great pride and dignity.
Thank you for everything. JD Costello
CO-OWNER JAY JOYCE
It is with a very sad heart and tears that we must make the announcement that we never prepared ourselves for: NWA Charlotte is closed.
As most of you know, this past Saturday night a fire inspector, along with other fire and police bullies, forcefully shut down the NWA Coliseum for as many “reasons” as they could think of, including lack of fire sprinkler and alarm systems, extension cord usage, lack of escape plan posting, doors not opening in the outward manner, and a couple of other miscellaneous reasons. Their actions were deliberate and as close to a realistic “witch hunt” as it could be.
The bottom line is that the improvements now required to convert the NWA Coliseum from “warehouse space” to “a place of assembly” will exceed $200,000. We have already put in excess of $250,000 into NWA Charlotte and NWA Coliseum with no hope of recouping any of those investments at this point.
Everybody loses at this point. Charlotte loses the NWA, again. The fans lose the outlet for a connection to professional wrestling. The wrestlers lose their connection to jobs, exposure, career growth, and performance in front of their fans. The staff at NWA loses their jobs, their enjoyment of production, fans, and service. The city loses the licensing and tax money. The off-duty Charlotte police officers lose the ability to earn extra money for their families. The critics lose their enjoyment of watching a professional show and writing about the angles, performers, and flaws. The NWA loses a high-profile member, a large outlet for carrying the NWA banner forward, and a venue to stage a comeback. The NWA legends lose a place to “come home” and perform again in front of their endearing fans. The small, backyard wrestling shows and “people in the business” that love to make fun of NWA Charlotte lose an outlet to express their jealousy and ignorance. The vendors that we purchase all of our food and merchandise from lose a large customer. Duke Energy and Piedmont Natural Gas lose a large business customer. Time Warner Cable and WMYT-TV lose an advertiser. The building owner loses a tenant and income. The sponsors of NWA Charlotte lose a direct connection to their customers. Lowe’s and the Home Depot lose a business customer. We lose all of this and more.
NWA Charlotte was more than a business. It started out to be a business, but was quickly transformed into an “entity” that sheltered special people. There was a sense of kinship, friendship, devotion, empowerment, sharing, laughing, pride, crying, amazement, anticipation, wonderment, shock, disappointment, relief, anger, and any other emotion you can include.
To the fans, we say thank you so much for embracing us and supporting us. You are the primary reason that professional wrestling exists…it’s to entertain you with athletics, wonderful characters, and stories that you can believe in.
To the NWA Charlotte roster, we say thank you so much for even wanting to take a chance to be part of a start-up. Our paths will cross again. We can only pray and hope.
To Leigh Ann Albaugh, Fire Inspector, CFD Fire Prevention, and Calvin M. Wright, Senior Fire Inspector, Fire Marshal's Office, Charlotte Fire Department, we’re glad to know that you will continue to enforce the laws and provide this valuable service to our community in keeping us all safe. We’re sure there are other businesses with dreams and hopes out there that you can seek out and destroy in the names of safety and law.
However short and brief our run was, we proved that we can produce a professional wrestling show that hundreds of fans embraced and loved, and like-minded professional wrestling minds admired. Money comes and goes. People come and go. Walls come and go. Time comes and goes. But one thing will always remain: determination.
Thank you. Jay Joyce.
_________________
www.NWAcharlotte.com