UFC president Dana White spoke with the media ahead of tonight’s UFC on ESPN 13, and discussed the challenges of holding events during the global pandemic.

The brand has never been bigger or stronger than it is right now, said White, as transcribed by Damon Martin for MMA Fighting. I mean if you look at the ratings and the amount of promotion. I don’t know if you guys felt it like we felt it, but you had to feel in your business. My personal social media was off the charts, the biggest numbers that I’ve ever pulled, ever. UFC’s social media numbers are off the charts. The traffic.

I told you guys the other day — the merchandise, we’ve already sold more merchandise this year than we did all of 2019. We already crushed that number from 2019. The list goes on and on.

Obviously, in a lot of ways this has affected our business. There’s no gate. That’s $110 million dollars – in that ball park – and some other things. But we’re still rolling.

You have to look at the value that’s being built in the brand. The amount of people that you’re probably converting to be fans that probably never watched before and the list goes on and on. We’re going to do a full analysis of the brand and what’s going on right now with the sport.

It’s impossible for it not to be good. It’s all a good thing. There’s more people that are aware of this sport than ever before, and not just in the United States, but globally.