You are in:
Creating a community from scratch
myfootballclub.co.uk is a web site where people can sign up, register their interest, and pay the small sum of £35 for one year’s interest.What do they get for their money?
A share in a football club and a say in how it’s run. It’s an intriguing model, not least when you consider that, should the trust consider buying at, say,Conference level, that club will have around £1.5m a year guaranteed income outside of gate receipts, sponsorship and anything else, as well as an increased potential for merchandise and the like.
It could be a fairy tale story in the lower leagues… Will spoke to SGB - Sports and Outdoor about the project.
How did it all come about?
Basically, it came about after I had a number of ideas knocking around my head over many years of going to watch football. I thought it made more sense for thousands of people to own a football club and invest in that club rather than relying on one person to make the right decisions.
I also think football fans as a group are often proved right. Football fans spend a huge amount of time watching football and I do think they are pretty capable of making sound decisions. Over time, you’ll see at matches there are fans baying for a certain formation, and the manager might relent and play it and the fans are proved right. I’ve seen it happen time and again.
Two and a half years ago, the idea kind of crystallised, and the obvious way to do it seemed to be over the internet. That was then, and it’s taken a while to get to this point because I didn’t know how to go about it. I went out and spoke to three clubs and they loved the idea, and were very keen but were also slightly wary as it’s so revolutionary. It was a good experience to take advice from club owners and see what they thought.
Then I spoke to some venture capitalists who loved it but were not sure it would make them £100m or whatever they needed. It dawned on me that everyone thought it was such a good idea. So with my last throw of the dice I put the idea out there and floated it on the internet. It also turned out to be the right way to do it.
The phase one web site was launched in April, which was just to gather names and email addresses, and we got 53,000 in three months. In August,we started turning those pledges into money by emailing the 53,000.New people are joining all the time as well. Six clubs have already approached us,we’re looking at them and we’re also welcoming other clubs to come forward.
It’s just such a simple idea...
It is very simple, but scratch the surface and there are weighty terms and conditions.We have a trust, the myfootballclub Society Limited Trust, so everyone who joins becomes a member of that trust, which is registered with the FSA. It’s similar to other supporters’ trusts in that way, but we’re the first to do this via the internet.
It is a simple idea, but in order to do it you have to do it through a trust.We’ve taken top legal advice on this, and it’s the only way to go forward.
It’s also important to know that of the £35, £27.50 goes into the trust and £7.50 goes into the administration of the site and staffing etc.
It’s a five to ten year process, and we’re looking at it as a long-term project.We’ll get 50,000 paid-up members and take it from there.
Of course, clubs would find £1.5m a year concrete investment very attractive...
I think that’s why a lot of clubs have come forward. They can see that a club with 50,000 members could be picking up that money without all the extra stuff. It will have a huge impact on attendances, increase merchandise sales, increase sponsorship revenue.Not only will it bring a new revenue stream, it will boost existing ones. It will be a unique club in a unique position.
Also, this is money coming in, none of it is going out. The thing with the trust is the members are not allowed to have dividends or to sell their share.And to keep it, you have to pay your annual membership fee, so the money goes in and stays in.Usually, when there’s a club takeover it’s because they’re looking at what they can eventually take out of the club, and that’s not the way with this one.
