The concept of a fan owned club

[Inverurie Ram]

16 minutes ago, JoetheRam said:

Because power to the people. The whole point would be that every members voice matters the same.

Each person who invested should be given one vote. 

Maybe it's too socialist a model to ever work in England.

One vote, is one vote too many for me. I haven't got over my first and last attempt at starting a match day thread yet!

Played 1 Lost 1...............story of my life!

[Van der MoodHoover]

14 minutes ago, Tamworthram said:

Exactly. Everyone who invested not necessarily everyone that happens to be employed by the business.

You can make employees into investors by offering part of their pay in club shares (in return for less cash). 

[Tamworthram]

22 minutes ago, Van der MoodHoover said:

You can make employees into investors by offering part of their pay in club shares (in return for less cash). 

Yes I know but only if they choose to accept. In that scenario they would acquire voting rights as investors not employees.

[europia]

On 15/05/2021 at 12:38, Coconut said:

 

I would imagine it could only be successful if you start from pretty far down though, or with a blank slate financially.

 

Hasn't done Leicester City any harm.  Not very nice for the local businesses who were creditors and got screwed, or those who lost their jobs at the time. Having a clean slate made Leicester  an attractive proposition, and they ended up with relatively decent ownership. Not to mention a Premier League title  &  FA Cup in the trophy cabinet. 

[G STAR RAM]

On 15/05/2021 at 12:37, cannable said:

Our current wage bill is only £2,000,000 more than in Clough’s last full season as well. 

Where do you have this info from?

[Spanish]

14 hours ago, JoetheRam said:

Because power to the people. The whole point would be that every members voice matters the same.

Each person who invested should be given one vote. 

Maybe it's too socialist a model to ever work in England.

irrespective of the amount invested?

[Spanish]

11 hours ago, europia said:

Hasn't done Leicester City any harm.  Not very nice for the local businesses who were creditors and got screwed, or those who lost their jobs at the time. Having a clean slate made Leicester  an attractive proposition, and they ended up with relatively decent ownership. Not to mention a Premier League title  &  FA Cup in the trophy cabinet. 

but crucially without any sort of league punishment

[Tamworthram]

14 minutes ago, Spanish said:

but crucially without any sort of league punishment

Interestingly, if Leicester had received a 12 point deduction that year, they would still have comfortably made the play offs.  They were promoted with 92 points. Forest finished 6th with 74 points.

[JoetheRam]

1 hour ago, Spanish said:

irrespective of the amount invested?

Yes. All fan's voices equal.

Works for Bayern Munich - whether you're Franz Beckenbauer or Jens von Sauerkraut you get one vote.

[BaaLocks]

On 15/05/2021 at 10:18, MrPlinkett said:

Hopefully if we ever do become a fan owned group, that group of fans can find their way to agree on matters better than we do on this forum. ?

Exactly this. RamsTrust were long suggesting to move from a point of influence to eventual ownership (they might have moved from this now, but that was their desire back in the day and one of the key reasons I stopped being aligned to them). I don't think you can have it both ways - on one hand we deride Mel for running the club with his heart more than his head then we suggest that somehow we let the fans do it. I don't see how it could ever get to a place where it would be anything more than Championship Manager in real life and while I know it has been done elsewhere it just doesn't feel like a stable model for success for me.

[Spanish]

22 minutes ago, JoetheRam said:

Yes. All fan's voices equal.

Works for Bayern Munich - whether you're Franz Beckenbauer or Jens von Sauerkraut you get one vote.

I will invest £1 then

[Spanish]

1 hour ago, Tamworthram said:

Interestingly, if Leicester had received a 12 point deduction that year, they would still have comfortably made the play offs.  They were promoted with 92 points. Forest finished 6th with 74 points.

you know it isn't down to maths it is down to belief.  I believe that Wendy were far better than where they finished.  No 6 point penalty, I think they would have had a lot more points can't prove if of course

[Tamworthram]

1 hour ago, Spanish said:

you know it isn't down to maths it is down to belief.  I believe that Wendy were far better than where they finished.  No 6 point penalty, I think they would have had a lot more points can't prove if of course

I thought we were discussing the fact that Leicester hadn’t done too badly out of going into administration rather than the penalty Wednesday received? 

[Spanish]

3 minutes ago, Tamworthram said:

I thought we were discussing the fact that Leicester hadn’t done too badly out of going into administration rather than the penalty Wednesday received? 

no one can know how Fester would has reacted to starting the season 12 points down, it may have crushed them

[Tamworthram]

6 minutes ago, Spanish said:

no one can know how Fester would has reacted to starting the season 12 points down, it may have crushed them

Sorry, I get your point now. Leicester must have had a pretty decent team though to have amassed 92 points that season and, at the time of going into administration were 2nd in the league having won 8 and drawn 2 of their first 11 games. So, whilst a points deduction would have been a blow, it feels as if it wouldn’t have been enough to completely derail their season and see them drop to league 1. But, as you say, we’ll never know.

[cannable]

14 hours ago, G STAR RAM said:

Where do you have this info from?

Accounts for 12/13 and I believe The Athletic stated the current wage bill recently 

[LeedsCityRam]

On 16/05/2021 at 12:10, LeedsCityRam said:

I've emailed the guy at the FSF who advises fan groups on how to get these off the ground. Our situation going to be very different from all of the other clubs under fan ownership as a) we would be looking to buy a large, existing club & b) any purchase would need to clear some of the debt off (assuming could come to some arrangement with Mel)

https://thefsa.org.uk/our-work/supporter-ownership/

Just an update on this; the FSF Network Manager for Community owned clubs has offered to call me over the next few days to talk through various scenarios around community/fan ownership. I've made some points in the email below but is there anything else people would like answers to? Am happy to raise in the call & report back on here. If so, either reply to this or DM me ?

My email to FSF btw;

Hi Andy,

Saw your contact details on the FSF site & wondered if you could provide some advice

I'm a Derby fan & as you're probably aware, the club is in a difficult financial position currently with the incumbent owner looking to sell asap. Unfortunately this seems to have attracted a number of chancers & charlatans with 2 potential takeovers falling through already due to prospective buyers being unable to provide proof of funds by way of actual bank transfer.

As few of us on the main forum have been discussing the prospect of a fan owned club or at least a club majority owned by the fans & whilst doing some reading on the AFC Wimbledon model, the DonsTrust gave a lot of credit to Supporters Direct for advice given back in 2002 that enabled them to start from scratch & employ the successful model that has brought them back into the League.

I was therefore interested to learn what the framework of a viable fan led buyout could be, particularly given the size of Derby. Unlike AFC Wimbledon, we'd be looking to take on a existing large club with pre-Covid annual turnover expectations of circa £30m & unknown debts although rumoured to be around the £60m mark. I suspect any condition of sale would be paying off a proportion of those debts so the first challenge would be raising the cash from supporters to do this (possibly in the form of a bond rather than seeking external lending)

Any advice you could give would be really appreciated. I'm guessing you may have fielded a few of these from larger clubs from time to time - it'd be nice to actually land one & prove fan ownership can work at the top end of the pyramid!

[JoetheRam]

10 minutes ago, LeedsCityRam said:

Just an update on this; the FSF Network Manager for Community owned clubs has offered to call me over the next few days to talk through various scenarios around community/fan ownership. I've made some points in the email below but is there anything else people would like answers to? Am happy to raise in the call & report back on here. If so, either reply to this or DM me ?

My email to FSF btw;

Hi Andy,

Saw your contact details on the FSF site & wondered if you could provide some advice

I'm a Derby fan & as you're probably aware, the club is in a difficult financial position currently with the incumbent owner looking to sell asap. Unfortunately this seems to have attracted a number of chancers & charlatans with 2 potential takeovers falling through already due to prospective buyers being unable to provide proof of funds by way of actual bank transfer.

As few of us on the main forum have been discussing the prospect of a fan owned club or at least a club majority owned by the fans & whilst doing some reading on the AFC Wimbledon model, the DonsTrust gave a lot of credit to Supporters Direct for advice given back in 2002 that enabled them to start from scratch & employ the successful model that has brought them back into the League.

I was therefore interested to learn what the framework of a viable fan led buyout could be, particularly given the size of Derby. Unlike AFC Wimbledon, we'd be looking to take on a existing large club with pre-Covid annual turnover expectations of circa £30m & unknown debts although rumoured to be around the £60m mark. I suspect any condition of sale would be paying off a proportion of those debts so the first challenge would be raising the cash from supporters to do this (possibly in the form of a bond rather than seeking external lending)

Any advice you could give would be really appreciated. I'm guessing you may have fielded a few of these from larger clubs from time to time - it'd be nice to actually land one & prove fan ownership can work at the top end of the pyramid!

Hats off for pursuing this.

I'd like a bit more info on what being a member of a part fan owned club involves, what's it actually like? What do you get to do that you can't do at non-fan owned clubs - what benefits can it bring to members. I (think I) know some but given we're going to need lots of members for a club our size some are going to question what does my £x a year buy me and why should I pay it? Essentially, how can we sell the idea to those on the fence/against it to grow support for the idea?

[bimmerman]

1 hour ago, JoetheRam said:

Hats off for pursuing this.

I'd like a bit more info on what being a member of a part fan owned club involves, what's it actually like? What do you get to do that you can't do at non-fan owned clubs - what benefits can it bring to members. I (think I) know some but given we're going to need lots of members for a club our size some are going to question what does my £x a year buy me and why should I pay it? Essentially, how can we sell the idea to those on the fence/against it to grow support for the idea?

I am part of Exeter city trust which part owns Exeter. Think it's about 30 quid a year now I pay,get subsidised tickets and priority tickets for big games on a tier system based on what you put into the club. Get voting rights on some things as well,but still have a board in place that gets voted on now and again. Not same scale but still a decent experience if I'm honest

[Anag Ram]

1 minute ago, bimmerman said:

I am part of Exeter city trust which part owns Exeter. Think it's about 30 quid a year now I pay,get subsidised tickets and priority tickets for big games on a tier system based on what you put into the club. Get voting rights on some things as well,but still have a board in place that gets voted on now and again. Not same scale but still a decent experience if I'm honest

On that basis 20,000 rams fans paying £100 a year would net £2 million and provide an excellent forum for club developments (and a marketing database!) 

We could pay off any future captain who gets injured when Peaced.