Tony Khan Didn't Consider AEW An Essential Business, Doesn't Think Now Is The Right Time To Let Anybody Go

At the beginning of April, All Elite Wrestling taped four weeks worth of programming at QT Marshall's gym in Norcross, Georgia. Tony Schiavone asked AEW President Tony Khan about the tapings during the most recent episode of the AEW Unrestricted podcast. 

Khan explained that the tapings were difficult as they ultimately had to film one month's worth of TV in two days before Georgia went into lockdown and they only had 23 wrestlers available. The AEW president also stated that he never considered the company as an essential business, which meant they had to hurry to tape as much content as possible before the lockdown began.

Khan said: "I first had an inkling that things were going to be shut down going into the third show (April 1), which is when we taped all these shows. We kinda going in, I had a feeling that you know, you saw states that were starting to shut down and I never considered us or tried to force us to be like an essential business. I never tried to stay open against restrictions. And so, when we heard Florida and Georgia were going to shut down we were shutting down too and we needed to tape as much content as we could before that shutdown."

Later in the podcast, Khan explained AEW had lost millions in live gates because of cancelled shows, but he put an emphasis on not releasing anybody from the company.

He added: "Something I've really put an emphasis on over the shutdown is we haven't let anybody go and tried to take care of everybody through this. I think it's not the right time for reorganising or restructuring or any of that kind of stuff for us, and really I just want to care of everybody and make sure everybody's comfortable."