Would a fan takeover be realistic?

[CrankyCanary 32]

Bolstered by the idea of Luton and their success, could we become, and succeed as a fan owned entity. And would Delia allow the Fans to fully buy her out of her shares in the club?

[Google Bot 3,936]

She'd say she is a fan.. hehe 🙂

[nutty nigel 7,902]

We are a fan owned club. Wynnie has been going since the mid-fifties. Delia has been going since the late 60s. Michael Foulger is a lifelong fan.  And as far as I have ever been able to ascertain all the shareholders are fans too. Even down to me, Duncan and Jellytot.

Edited April 25, 2022 by nutty nigel

[Canario 268]

If each fan in the ground could put in 100k we'd just about be able to compete at the bottom of the PL. That's how ridiculous it's become. On the other hand, you can look at fans like Kaiserslautern who just pulled in 47800 fans for their derby in the third division. What do we want from the club ..... A globally recognized NFL style "brand", or a club owned by the fans, for the fans. It wouldn't bring us PL but we'd have one hell of a club

[GenerationA47 864]

Ok I am prepared to launch on onlyfans if that’s what it takes... If we all donate our profits we can do this. (Hope I have understood the brief because the promo is already everywhere)

[CrankyCanary 32]

1 hour ago, Canario said:

If each fan in the ground could put in 100k we'd just about be able to compete at the bottom of the PL. That's how ridiculous it's become. On the other hand, you can look at fans like Kaiserslautern who just pulled in 47800 fans for their derby in the third division. What do we want from the club ..... A globally recognized NFL style "brand", or a club owned by the fans, for the fans. It wouldn't bring us PL but we'd have one hell of a club

Green Bay Packers are fan owned and play in the NFL. It is just about possible even in the most corporate leagues in the world.

[CrankyCanary 32]

55 minutes ago, GenerationA47 said:

Ok I am prepared to launch on onlyfans if that’s what it takes... If we all donate our profits we can do this. (Hope I have understood the brief because the promo is already everywhere)

Next Belle Delphine here in the works folks.

[CrankyCanary 32]

1 hour ago, Canario said:

If each fan in the ground could put in 100k we'd just about be able to compete at the bottom of the PL. That's how ridiculous it's become. On the other hand, you can look at fans like Kaiserslautern who just pulled in 47800 fans for their derby in the third division. What do we want from the club ..... A globally recognized NFL style "brand", or a club owned by the fans, for the fans. It wouldn't bring us PL but we'd have one hell of a club

I do think it wouldn't take us to the premier league eventually. But it would definitely mean a shrewder business model than what we even have now. Moneyball on Steroids.

Edited April 25, 2022 by CrankyCanary

[CrankyCanary 32]

1 hour ago, Canario said:

If each fan in the ground could put in 100k we'd just about be able to compete at the bottom of the PL. That's how ridiculous it's become. On the other hand, you can look at fans like Kaiserslautern who just pulled in 47800 fans for their derby in the third division. What do we want from the club ..... A globally recognized NFL style "brand", or a club owned by the fans, for the fans. It wouldn't bring us PL but we'd have one hell of a club

From what I remember only Energy drink Leipzig and 1899 Hoffenheim aren't majoritively Fan owned in the Bundesliga at least. The only two in Bundesliga that aren't. 50+1 rule just in case you don't know it: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/50%2B1_rule

[JB 138]

If we all did a raunchy calendar to raise money?

[Yellow Shirt 17]

2 hours ago, CrankyCanary said:

Green Bay Packers are fan owned and play in the NFL. It is just about possible even in the most corporate leagues in the world.

No relegation in NFL

[littleyellowbirdie 3,141]

It'd be disastrous. Who could fans scapegoat when the team failed to deliver never-ending back to back wins on the pitch?

[CrankyCanary 32]

3 hours ago, Yellow Shirt said:

No relegation in NFL

And? Their one of the most successful teams, in the wealthiest sports league in the world. The city their from is about the same size as Colchester and smaller than Norwich. They would on paper have at least as much stacked against them than we do.

[Newtopia 573]

How would it work?  A big pile of cash sounds great but how many fans would really chip in, would it be every year, and how much each?  This would need to be converted into equity some how, so the club would need to buy something tangible, otherwise people are just giving the club the money.

How would people decide how to spend that money?

might be better if those fans just bought more merchandise, for highly inflated prices, and gave the self sustaining model a cash injection.

I bought shares when the club almost went bust, I would not invest if it is just to get in the premiership and then get in position where we needed to contribute every year just to stay there without any return.

[City 2nd 193]

2 hours ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

It'd be disastrous. Who could fans scapegoat when the team failed to deliver never-ending back to back wins on the pitch?

The manager and the DOF of course, just as they do now!

[littleyellowbirdie 3,141]

10 minutes ago, Newtopia said:

I bought shares when the club almost went bust, I would not invest if it is just to get in the premiership and then get in position where we needed to contribute every year just to stay there without any return.

And there's the rub: to meet the aspirations of the deluded minority you need someone to be willing to throw money at it with no expectation of a return, or even ever getting their money back. Hence why the sustainable model we have would be the best game in town if some people got a grip on their ridiculous expectations. 

Edited April 26, 2022 by littleyellowbirdie

[Big Vince 423]

7 hours ago, nutty nigel said:

We are a fan owned club. Wynnie has been going since the mid-fifties. Delia has been going since the late 60s. Michael Foulger is a lifelong fan.  And as far as I have ever been able to ascertain all the shareholders are fans too. Even down to me, Duncan and Jellytot.

Except when she supported Ipswich in 78. They're all frauds. Delia, Webber, the lot of them.

[Big Vince 423]

1 minute ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

And there's the rub: to meet the aspirations of the deluded minority you need someone to be willing to throw money at it with no expectation of a return, or even ever getting their money back. Hence why the sustainable model we have would be the best game in town if some people got a grip on their ridiculous expectations. 

Sustainable model will never work unless all the other clubs do likewise.

[littleyellowbirdie 3,141]

1 minute ago, Big Vince said:

Sustainable model will never work unless all the other clubs do likewise.

...or the bubble bursts and the unsustainable clubs go bust, which it will. 

[Big Vince 423]

1 minute ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

...or the bubble bursts and the unsustainable clubs go bust, which it will. 

Could be dead before it happens. How long have you got? Moreover, Rangers went bust but are now back to where they've historically always been.

[littleyellowbirdie 3,141]

1 minute ago, Big Vince said:

Could be dead before it happens. How long have you got? Moreover, Rangers went bust but are now back to where they've historically always been.

Possibly, but if I do see it happen in my lifetime then great, and if I die before it happens then I won't care anyway; seeing Norwich become yet another toy of an oligarch or a dubious Middle Eastern regime just doesn't really excite me. 

[Newtopia 573]

There have been plenty of examples of where clubs have messed up by over extending themselves, Portsmouth, Sunderland, Leeds, Derby, etc.  The FFP rules are simply not applied correctly, the way the money is distributed across the club is unfair, and the measure of who can own a club is risky.   I just wonder why, the premiership is a great product to watch, but who is it there for.  Only the top six club really have any chance of winning anything and everyone else is just existing.  If you are a young kid growing up in Norwich there is no chance of us competing at the very highest level.  Yet we do have the privilege of watching Pukki, Rashica, Buendia playing for our club.

[Big Vince 423]

2 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

Possibly, but if I do see it happen in my lifetime then great, and if I die before it happens then I won't care anyway; seeing Norwich become yet another toy of an oligarch or a dubious Middle Eastern regime just doesn't really excite me. 

I thought the ultimate goal of every fan was to see their club win major trophies domestically and internationally? So we don't want to be Leicester, whose owners also care about the fans and won the EPL and FA Cup? Are you saying Leicester fans right now should be going around hanging their heads in shame?

Do Norwich fans really have an ethical bias anyway? Instead of boycotting the game on Saturday due to Newcastle's connection with beheadings, torture and disappearances, the home areas were packed. To avoid the charge of hypocrisy, you need to have  proper resolve to stick to your principles.

Moreover, the UK government has been selling arms to Saudi for decades and nearly every other family in the North West is supported by employment income from BAe Systems. So there is much wider hypocrisy issue here. It is okay to bomb Yemeni families, as long as kids are fed back in the North West. Where is the moral in that? It is okay for the English to take dirty money when it suits their own pockets. And that's before we even start to talk about the massive trade with China!

[dylanisabaddog 6,149]

9 hours ago, CrankyCanary said:

Bolstered by the idea of Luton and their success, could we become, and succeed as a fan owned entity. And would Delia allow the Fans to fully buy her out of her shares in the club?

In order to buy the shares, build an extension to the City Stand and buy a team of players capable of surviving in the Premier League you would need 25,000 people to put in £18,000 each. 

And I think we all know what will happen if Luton achieve promotion. 

[littleyellowbirdie 3,141]

28 minutes ago, Big Vince said:

I thought the ultimate goal of every fan was to see their club win major trophies domestically and internationally? So we don't want to be Leicester, whose owners also care about the fans and won the EPL and FA Cup? Are you saying Leicester fans right now should be going around hanging their heads in shame?

Do Norwich fans really have an ethical bias anyway? Instead of boycotting the game on Saturday due to Newcastle's connection with beheadings, torture and disappearances, the home areas were packed. To avoid the charge of hypocrisy, you need to have  proper resolve to stick to your principles.

Moreover, the UK government has been selling arms to Saudi for decades and nearly every other family in the North West is supported by employment income from BAe Systems. So there is much wider hypocrisy issue here. It is okay to bomb Yemeni families, as long as kids are fed back in the North West. Where is the moral in that? It is okay for the English to take dirty money when it suits their own pockets. And that's before we even start to talk about the massive trade with China!

The ultimate goal for me is to see the club do the best it can with what it has available to it.

For most of us we don't choose our country. You might have an opinion on who the UK allows UK arms manufacturers to sell to and you might push that opinion through the democratic process and you're a British citizen at the end of the day, regardless. On the other hand, you choose to support a football club and if you don't care about the ethics of that merely for the sake of winning games of football then there's no good reason to care about the ethics of your government either when they allow exports that provide jobs that feed families in the UK. 

Edited April 26, 2022 by littleyellowbirdie

[canarydan23 4,762]

1 hour ago, CrankyCanary said:

And? Their one of the most successful teams, in the wealthiest sports league in the world. The city their from is about the same size as Colchester and smaller than Norwich. They would on paper have at least as much stacked against them than we do.

Hogwash.

There is a salary cap in the NFL, which alters absolutely everything. Their only challenge is to make enough from TV revenue, attendance and merch to reach that salary cap. And there are just 32 NFL franchises, it doesn't matter if the city is smaller than Norwich, you need to travel 300km to reach the closest competitor. Their target audience is gargantuan compared to Norwich.

No chance a fan-owned club could compete in the EPL in the corrupt and broken industry that is football in England.

[Badger 2,745]

31 minutes ago, dylanisabaddog said:

In order to buy the shares, build an extension to the City Stand and buy a team of players capable of surviving in the Premier League you would need 25,000 people to put in £18,000 each. 

And I think we all know what will happen if Luton achieve promotion. 

Are you sure that this would do it? It hasn't worked for Fulham and Everton have spent more.

If it works, I think we should commit to putting a few thousand each in every 2 or 3 years to keep us there.

[Unhinged Canary 375]

5 hours ago, JB said:

If we all did a raunchy calendar to raise money?

Frolic! FROLIC!

[king canary 8,758]

In a serious answer to the question, a fan takeover would likely only be possible if the current owners were open to taking less money for their shares than they would otherwise get.

People who know more about this stuff than me reckon it would cost about £100m to buy the majority shareholding (correct me if I'm wrong). There is no way a fan group is raising that kind of capital. So you either need a rich individual to buy them out or you need them to take less money for their shares in order to facilitate a takeover by ordinary fans.

[littleyellowbirdie 3,141]

I have a brilliant, sustainable way of getting the money to eventually become a regular fixture in the Premier League without risking bankruptcy? 

-Build a strong academy to provide a stream of players that can be developed for first team use and/or be sold at profit to interested clubs
-Instead of overspending for a slim chance of survival in the Premier league, spend more meagrely in a way that might hopefully bring survival, thus ensuring the club is in a strong position to be quickly promoted again if it doesn't work; if the season does result in survival, then start spending to properly establish in the Premier League the following season. 

What do you think? Has anyone suggested this to the board? I think this could also work with a fan stakeholder model of some form. 

Edited April 26, 2022 by littleyellowbirdie