Were The Beautiful People Actually TNA's Most Successful Stable Ever?
From The Asylum in Nashville, TN to the Impact Zone in Orlando, FL, and everywhere in between, TNA has seen many powerful and memorable stables enter its ring, both four and six-sided. The Main Event Mafia, Fortune, LAX, Aces & Eights, The Christian Coalition, Team Canada, World Elite, there is no shortage of groups that have wreaked their own brand of havoc on the TNA roster. However, when it comes to judging which of these stables had the most success over their tenure, it's hard to argue against that nod being given to The Beautiful People.
With the team of Velvet Sky and Angelina Love at the center of The Beautiful People, the group saw several members come and go in the time following its inception in 2008, with the ranks expanding at various points to include Madison Rayne, Lacey Von Erich, and even Billy Gunn! The concept of the group is fairly simple, a personification of the 'mean girl' culture that was all over pop culture in the 2000s, with The Beautiful People tending to pick fights with those they felt didn't meet their beauty standards. The group was fairly 'on-again, off-again', with the group breaking up only to reform later on several times. Despite that, The Beautiful People drafted an impressive resume for themselves by the time the stable ceased to operate in TNA, including various championships, acclaim, and a killer theme song.
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The Beautiful People Won Plenty Of Gold During Their Tenure
Looking at the raw stats alone, The Beautiful People certainly have a right to be called TNA's most successful faction by simply looking at all the championships the group collected over their run. In terms of singles competition, two members of The Beautiful People found particular success whilst part of the stable, implementing various classic heel tactics and using their numbers to their advantage. Angelina Love won the TNA Knockouts Championship on four separate occasions as a stable member. With a further two reigns in her own right away from the group, Love is one of the most successful women in TNA history, with The Beautiful People being a big part of her legacy. Madison Rayne also found singles success whilst under the banner of The Beautiful People, bringing a further two Knockouts Championships to the group, putting herself in the running as one of TNA's greatest-ever Knockouts.
More silverware was put into the trophy cabinet when The Beautiful People set their sights on the Knockouts Tag Team Championships. The team of Angelina Love and Velvet Sky reached the finals of the tournament to crown the inaugural champions but lost to the duo of Sarita and Taylor Wilde at No Surrender in 2009. The stable would eventually claim the titles in March 2010, with new recruit Lacey Von Erich capturing the gold with Velvet Sky. This reign even overlapped with Madison Rayne's time as Knockouts Champion, securing The Beautiful People as the absolute peak of TNA's women's division.
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The Beautiful People Were a Constant Presence on TNA Programming
The Knockouts Division has consistently been a gem in TNA and Impact Wrestling's lifespan, despite the various issues the promotion has had with management and decisions that have left the company far worse off than it had been. For some of the Knockouts' prime years in the sun, The Beautiful People were a constant fixture in the division. If the minutes were to be totaled, The Beautiful People would most definitely be one of, if not the, most broadcast stable in the history of TNA. They were perfect foils to any firey babyface making waves in the division, and when needed, their labels as TNA originals could always be used to set them up to be cheered whenever the situation called for.
It's not as if The Beautiful People were a constant presence out of coincidence either. The group was embroiled in major storylines that lasted weeks and months, taking place both on television and pay-per-view. The implosion of The Beautiful People dominated the Knockouts division as Rayne, Sky and Von Erich waged war against their former teammate Angelina Love in 2010, with the eventual split seeing Sky and Love breaking off as the original members. The Beautiful People were also at the heart of the storyline that brought the mysterious Winter to TNA, one of the more fantastical characters in TNA's history with her ability to literally cast spells and hypnotize people.
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The Beautiful People were a great utility group for the company, with their last hurrah for the company coming in the form of a reunion in 2015 to take on the new breed. The Dollhouse was another stable that had been running roughshod on the Knockouts Division, comprised of Marti Belle, Rebel, and Jade (AKA Mia Yim), and the perfect feud to pass the torch and give The Beautiful People one last showing in the promotion. Such is the success of The Beautiful People that even after the group ended in TNA, a spiritual successor continued their brand of 'mean girl' attitude with The Allure in Ring of Honor, with Velvet Sky and Angelina Love finding an ally in Mandy Leon.
With their time in the Knockouts division looked back on so fondly over the years, The Beautiful People have to be regarded as one of the key components of TNA's women's roster. Versatile at playing smaller roles to being able to seamlessly fit into the championship pictures, and possessing the longevity most stables can only dream of, The Beautiful People should certainly be recognized as one of wrestling's best stables.
