WWE brand extension

The **brand extension** (also referred to as the **brand split**) is the separation of WWE's talent roster (and, at various times, creative staff) into distinct divisions, or "brands". The strict adherence to the on-screen integrity of the brand split has varied over time.

In March 2002, the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) began promoting its core business of professional wrestling through two distinct brands, named after their two major television shows *Raw* and *SmackDown!*. From 2006 to 2010, a third brand existed for their television show *ECW*. The first brand extension ended on August 29, 2011, after which the Raw and SmackDown brands were dissolved.

On May 25, 2016, WWE announced a relaunch of the brand extension, billed as the "New Era". The second brand extension went into effect on July 19, 2016, when *SmackDown* began broadcasting live on Tuesdays. In addition to Raw and SmackDown, during the second split WWE has operated two other brands: NXT (originally a developmental brand, now promoted as WWE's third global brand) and 205 Live, a cruiserweight-exclusive brand. Wrestlers are allocated to a brand via the annual draft, rebranded as the Superstar Shake-up from 2017–April 2019 with an untraditional drafting format. With SmackDown's move to FOX on Friday nights in October 2019, the draft returned to simply being called the draft and to a traditional format.

## History

### **2002 split**

*See also: 2002 WWF draft lottery*

With the acquisition of new talent, the WWF's already large roster was doubled in size. In order to allow equal opportunity to all roster members, the company endorsed a brand extension to have the WWF represented and promoted with two brands, Raw and SmackDown!, named after the promotion's two primary television programs, *Raw* and *SmackDown!*, respectively.

In early 2002, the idea was put in motion to separate the WWF's two shows into distinct brands while both being under the WWF banner. Previously, wrestlers appeared on both *Raw* and *SmackDown*, but with this extension, wrestlers would be exclusive to only one show. Only the Undisputed WWF Champion and the WWF Women's Champion were exempt and could appear on both shows. This would change as both championships were later assigned to a brand.

The extension started on March 25, 2002 with a draft on *Raw* and went into effect one week later on April 1. The following month, the WWF was renamed to WWE. On June 13, 2006 WWE announced an addition to its prime time programming with *ECW on Sci-Fi*. The new ECW served as a third brand. Both instances of the brand extensions required that representatives of each brand draft "superstars" (terminology used by the company to refer to its contracted personnel) onto each brand in a draft lottery.

### **2006 ECW introduction**

*Main article: ECW*

*See also: 2006 WWE brand extension draft*

On May 25, 2006, WWE announced a launch of a new brand, ECW, a revival of hardcore wrestling. The new brand debuted on Sci Fi Channel on June 13, 2006, with its final episode on February 16, 2010, on the rebranded Syfy. It was replaced the following week with *WWE NXT*.

### **2016 reintroduction**

*See also: 2016 WWE draft*

On May 25, 2016, it was announced that beginning July 19, *SmackDown* would broadcast live on Tuesday nights, as opposed to being taped on Tuesdays and airing on Thursdays as it was previously, receiving a unique roster and set of writers compared to *Raw*, thus restoring the brand extension. The draft took place on the live premiere episode of *SmackDown* to determine the rosters between both brands. On the July 11 episode of *Raw*, Vince McMahon named Shane McMahon the (on-screen) commissioner for SmackDown and Stephanie McMahon the commissioner for Raw; both chose a General Manager for their respective shows. On the July 18 episode of *Raw*, Stephanie McMahon chose Mick Foley as the Raw General Manager, and Shane McMahon chose Daniel Bryan as the SmackDown General Manager. Due to *Raw* being a three-hour show and *SmackDown* being a two-hour show, Raw received three picks each round and SmackDown received two. Six draft picks had to be made amongst the non-title holders from WWE's developmental brand NXT. Seth Rollins was picked first by Raw, with WWE Champion Dean Ambrose being SmackDown's first pick.

## WWE programming Effects

### **Interbrand competition**

Interbrand competition was initially kept to a minimum, with wrestlers from all brands competing together only at pay-per-view events. However, from 2003 to 2007, all pay-per-view events became brand exclusive, leaving the "big four" pay-per-views (WrestleMania, SummerSlam, Survivor Series, and Royal Rumble) as the only interbrand shows.

Starting in late 2006, in an attempt to add more star power to the shows, interbrand matches became more common. Most notably, MNM and The Hardys reformed, despite the fact that the teammates were on separate brands. Bobby Lashley was also notable for his interbrand action, as he was involved in a storyline with the WWE Chairman, Vince McMahon.

Interbrand competition returned with the reestablishment of the brand extension in 2016; the first interbrand match that occurred after the brand extension went into full effect was at SummerSlam on August 21, 2016 where Raw's Brock Lesnar defeated SmackDown's Randy Orton. The next large interbrand matches occurred at Survivor Series on November 20, 2016, featuring traditional Survivor Series elimination tag team matches between Raw and SmackDown, and beginning the following year, the event became about brand supremacy; in addition to the traditional Survivor Series matches, each champion of the Raw brand faces their counterpart of the SmackDown brand in non-title matches (e.g., the World Heavyweight Champion against the WWE Champion). Following the 2019 WWE Superstar Shake-up, a wild card rule was introduced. Interbrand competition became much more frequent, with interbrand matches occurring weekly on *Raw* and *SmackDown Live*, as well as at pay-per-views. With a second draft of 2019 occurring in October, the Wild Card Rule was abolished.

### **Pay-per-views**

The separation of the WWE roster between two brands also intended to split the pay-per-view offerings, which began with Bad Blood in June 2003. The original idea had the "major" pay-per-view events at the time (Royal Rumble, SummerSlam, Survivor Series, and WrestleMania) would contain the only instances where wrestlers from different brands would interact with each other, and even among the four shows only the Royal Rumble and WrestleMania would have wrestlers from different brands competing against each other. Wrestlers, as a result, appeared only in two-thirds of the shows in a given year, and thus appeared in fewer shows compared to before the brand extension. With single-brand PPVs in place, WWE was able to add more pay-per-view events to their offerings, such as Taboo Tuesday/Cyber Sunday, New Year's Revolution, December to Dismember, and The Great American Bash. Eventually, WWE abandoned the practice of single-brand pay-per-view events following WrestleMania VIII. December to Dismember and New Year's Revolution were cancelled following the announcement.

With the reintroduction of the brand extension in 2016, single-branded pay-per-view events returned, and seven more pay-per-view events were added in 2017 so that each brand could have their own pay-per-view each month, in addition to the four major pay-per-views, in which both brands were involved. The only exception to this were the two months leading up to WrestleMania X8 in order to build the feuds for that event, and the two months (including the month of WrestleMania) following WrestleMania to begin new feuds for each brand. For example, February 2017 only had a SmackDown pay-per-view while March only had one for Raw. WrestleMania X8 was on April 2 and Raw had its first post-WrestleMania pay-per-view on April 30, while only SmackDown had a pay-per-view in May. This also happened in 2018, however, for 2018, WWE announced that all pay-per-views following WrestleMania XIX would be dual-branded, abandoning the single-brand practice for a second time. The 2018 Elimination Chamber and Fastlane events were the last two brand-exclusive pay-per-views for Raw and SmackDown, respectively.