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The legendary wrestler and one of the highest-paid and most recognizable actors of our time, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, is known even to those who haven’t seen any of his movies.
In this article, I would like to tell you about another side of Johnson – his entrepreneurship. The Rock has unexpectedly become a very successful investor and entrepreneur. After all, we are talking about money, so let’s count Johnson’s earnings.
Johnson’s Film Ventures
The main source of The Rock’s income is in movies, so it makes sense to analyze how he earns money specifically from films.
He generates a substantial income from his film work, as evidenced by his $25 million salary for his role in “San Andreas.”
In 2012, he became a co-founder of Seven Bucks Productions (SBP), a film production company that has been involved in the production and promotion of almost all films and TV shows featuring Johnson since 2017. And not only that: the company also participated in the creation of the first part of the comic book film “Shazam!”
Details about the terms of cooperation between SBP and major studios that produced these films are unknown. But active involvement in the production of a film means a percentage of its box office earnings. This is a common practice in Hollywood for big stars: they often receive not only a large fee but also a percentage of the box office earnings.
How much should SBP have received from its production activities?
We don’t have exact figures, but we can make an estimate. In the case of “Black Widow,” the lead actress received a percentage of 6.66% of the box office revenue. The films produced by SBP have grossed a total of $4.6 billion.
If SBP received 6.66% of the box office revenue for the films it has worked on since 2017, then its revenue for that time period should be around $306 million. However, it is likely that SBP’s share is even larger, since the company actively participates in the production of the films.
In 2019, the company had 15 employees. So, even taking into account all the salaries and benefits of regular employees, it is likely that Dwayne Johnson and his partners took a large portion of the company’s earnings.
Other Johnson Enterprises
Project Rock – sports clothing
This is a joint brand of sports clothing by The Rock and the Swedish company Under Armour, which specializes in this field. Project Rock was launched in 2018. The name, “Project Rock,” is a reference to the character The Rock played in wrestling matches.
The Project Rock description says that The Rock personally approves all the clothing that is released under this brand.
Teremana Tequila – a tequila brand
The Rock also invested in the Teremana brand of cheap tequila. The project was launched in 2020 and is very successful. In that year alone, they sold approximately 300,000 nine-liter sets, and by the end of 2022, the company sold about 900,000 of these sets.
The company is not public, but we still have some numbers at our disposal: Teremana director Richard Black said that the company sells tequila for about $350 million annually in the US alone.
We don’t know if the company is profitable. But The Rock could still sell Teremana. This is what George Clooney did with his tequila brand, Casamigos.
Clooney and his partners sold their brand for $1 billion: $700 million upfront and $300 million if the brand reached a certain sales threshold. Clooney’s share could have been around $233 million, but we don’t know exactly because the deal is private. It’s worth noting that at the time of its sale, Casamigos was selling about 120,000 nine-liter sets per year. So Teremana could be worth $2 billion or more.
ZOA energy drink
ZOA is an energy drink brand that has been in existence since 2021. Johnson is one of the investors, but the production and sale of the drink are handled by Molson Coors Beverage, a manufacturer of alcoholic and carbonated beverages.
We do not know the profitability of the enterprise, but it is known that ZOA sales amounted to $100 million in 2022.
Salt And Straw, an ice cream company
In 2019, Johnson purchased a stake in the American ice cream production company Salt And Straw. The size of the stake and its value are unknown. Since then, Johnson has been actively involved in promoting the company’s products.
XFL football league
XFL is a minor football league with 8 teams, and Johnson has been a co-investor since 2020. The company is not public, and we do not know the exact situation with its finances. But it is likely unprofitable: this year it became known that the league’s owners are looking for a new investor to whom they will give 45% of the company for $125 million.
Perhaps for Johnson, this is more of a dream project: in his youth, he was a football player himself.
Johnson’s media assets
Johnson has 369 million followers on Instagram, 17 million on Twitter, and 6.25 million on YouTube. This is a colossal media resource that allows Johnson to promote his projects and earn money on sponsored posts. According to third-party estimates, a single sponsored post on Johnson’s Instagram can cost $1.712 million.
Johnson’s enormous media presence makes him an attractive partner for promoting even the largest brands, including Ford, Apple, NASCAR, and others.
Johnson’s investments
Johnson has also invested in various companies and startups. Here are some of them.
- Acorns, a fintech startup that allows users to manage their personal finances and build up a safety cushion.
- Voss Water, a Norwegian producer of bottled water.
The size and value of Johnson’s stakes in these companies are unknown.
Ex-wife as a business partner
In almost all of his ventures, including the film company SBP, Johnson’s ex-wife Dany Garcia is a business partner, investor, co-founder, or co-owner. Garcia is an entrepreneur and bodybuilder.
Details are unknown, but I think Garcia plays the same role in Johnson’s life as Johnson’s character Spencer Strasmore in the TV show “Ballers”: she looks for projects for him to invest in and protects his interests.
I think Garcia and other partners are of critical importance to Johnson’s businesses; otherwise, he simply wouldn’t be able to keep up with everything.
Johnsons’s profile in the Wall Street Journal for December 2019 gives the following description of Johnson’s daily schedule:
05:00 – wake up and spend 1-2 hours responding to emails and working with paperwork, then breakfast with family.
08:30 – Johnson arrives at his personal gym, Iron Paradise, located right in his house, where he trains until 10:00, after which he goes to work – for filming, business meetings, and so on.
As The Rock himself told journalists, organizing everything during filming is very difficult. For example, he can schedule a call for 10:57 in the morning – not 10:50 and not 11:00: every minute is so important. He can meet with accountants and marketers from his companies on the film set during breaks between takes.
This is beyond human capability to juggle such a large number of businesses and an acting career. And this only reinforces my belief that Garcia and other partners of The Rock play a key role in the day-to-day operational management of the companies.
Strictly speaking, this follows from the corporate structure of these enterprises: Johnson is not the only investor in any of them. He only manages his assets in social media alone.
How rich is Dwayne Johnson?
The Rock does not disclose his finances to the public.
According to Celebrity Net Worth, Johnson’s fortune was estimated at $800 million in 2022, but only on the basis of several assumptions: that his tequila brand Teremana is worth $2 billion and that he owns 30-40% of it.
It is clear that Johnson is wealthy, but the exact size of his wealth cannot be determined: the sizes of his stakes in the listed companies are unknown to us and, worse still, the valuation of these companies is not only made by compilers of the rich list in different categories based on estimates, but also does not reflect the constantly changing circumstances.
In 2023, the economic situation in the world has significantly worsened, and the same Teremana may now be worth not $2 billion, but $500 million. And if it is unprofitable, then even worse: it may well go bankrupt. If Johnson’s other investments are unprofitable, then his fortune could shrink by a factor of 10 or more.
For example, Johnson bought a mansion in Georgia for $9.5 million in October 2019 and sold it for $7.5 million 14 months later. The actual loss was even greater, since he had to spend money on utilities, maintenance, and property taxes during ownership. So, his $800 million fortune today could turn into a smaller amount tomorrow.
As for cash flow, everything is very good: in 2022, according to Forbes estimates, Johnson earned $270 million from all his investments, contributions, assets, and of course, acting work. The amount is taken from the ceiling, as the publication does not provide details, but we have no better data.
Instead of a conclusion
In the past, even children from royal families were taught various crafts in case they didn’t ascend to the throne or find a position at court, and had to earn a living.
The Rock is a smart and forward-thinking person. In 1996, after his football career ended abruptly – his contract simply wasn’t renewed – he became a wrestler.
But the lifespan of a professional athlete is short: even a strong and healthy person starts to experience ailments after 30, so The Rock wisely transitioned into movies before he turned 30, capitalizing on his fame in the world of wrestling.
And in the last 6 years, he has been increasingly diversifying into the world of business and media. This is already a huge achievement, that The Rock was able to simply preserve all his earnings.
Johnny Depp lost all 650 million dollars he earned during his acting career, among other things due to the dishonesty of his financial advisors, to whom he entrusted all his affairs.
So, despite all the gaps in our knowledge about The Rock’s wealth, we can draw a lesson from his story that it’s necessary to diversify our investments.
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