TRS: The possible dream - fan ownership

[Frankie 8,562]

The only 'scheme' we have pretty much rallied together on was the RFFF. It would need similar figureheads to be involved (trust wise) for something like this to be achievable I think.

 

Walter being the example, he is a fan and has no connection to the club anymore. If he were to spear a movement of such i think it would gather a great deal of backing.

 

The 'bowling club cliques' we see today are embarrassing.

 

I think that's fair and there's no doubt the Assembly needs fully revamped into something credible for the fans it claims to represent to genuinely feel part of something worthwhile.

[compo 7,030]

To much guess work and if truth be told pie in the sky .

[aweebluesoandso 290]

The only 'scheme' we have pretty much rallied together on was the RFFF. It would need similar figureheads to be involved (trust wise) for something like this to be achievable I think.

 

Walter being the example, he is a fan and has no connection to the club anymore. If he were to spear a movement of such i think it would gather a great deal of backing.

 

The 'bowling club cliques' we see today are embarrassing.

 

I contributed to the RFFF but have been disappointed with the way the fund has been used or not been used to be more critical. To quote Winston Churchill about the effectiveness of General Lucas at the battle of Anzio ""I had hoped we were hurling a wildcat into the shore, but all we got was a stranded whale"

[calscot 0]

I like the quote.

[calscot 0]

I've always thought there could be something like the board could offer an annual share issue to the fans of say £50 each which gives a pro-rata share of the value of the club at the time (without artificially inflating it). If that had 40k take up that's £2m a year income for the club to spend. And giving say a £20m value now, in about ten years the fans could own half the club (even more if the club's worth doesn't increase as much as the cash injection). That's a bit simplistic but it gives the gist.

 

I think then there needs to be some sort of party system where you proxy your vote to one party from say three to five available whose policies you mostly agree with, and by being a member of that party you get to vote in the pressure group members and AGM representative, with the number of your votes proportional to your shares.

 

Ten years may sound like a long time but slow and easy beats standing still any day. A pound a week is also pretty affordable and your money doesn't exactly just disappear as the shares would be sellable and you have the voting rights as long as you own them. People could also club together.

 

The parties could start off with the likes of the RST, SOS and any forum that wanted to morph into that kind of entity, including Gersnet. They would each need a constitution that limited the maximum number of shares for one person (even as low as one per year of membership) and bar institutions to keep them democratic.

 

But there is nothing stopping us from doing this now by buying shares on AIM as the OP says. The only problem is you need the shares to be for sale and the more you buy the more the share price goes up which is a good or bad thing whichever way you look at it. If we could coordinate it in some way we could reduce the brokers fees to an acceptable level.

 

Ironically this is what the RST has been about but it's not something they have been able to really capture the imagination of the fans with. Due to the newco the gers-save scheme must also have burnt a few fingers.

 

Perhaps the way to use the infighting as a strength is for all the factions to get together and form a collective party system, that way they can all thrive in the same system with a common goal.

[DUDE 0]

Very interesting system calscot.

[aweebluesoandso 290]

I agree with Calscot, rather than throwing our money into an endless pit, the support should get something back for their investment? "More bang for our Buck" sort of thing. The support certainly deserve to get our foot in the door regarding our involvement or even part ownership, but whatever the scheme it will cost us.

[amms 0]

Interesting post Calscot.

 

Has thought ever been given to a 'Gersnet' collective clubbing together and buying shares? I appreciate it's a drop in the ocean but if it was a start who knows what might come of it.

[bossy 0]

There are a number of problems with getting to fan ownership or even serious fan participation.

 

First, guys like Dave King, Paul Murray or Walter Smith have a track record of antipathy to fan ownership. Even though they might mouth a few words or drop a few hints in order to get the supporter's associations onside, I see nothing concrete to suggest that their views have changed in any measurable way.

 

Second, the support as a whole has never shown any real appetite for fan ownership. Even in our darkest days they were more than happy to latch on to the latest white knight and certainly unwilling to get behind any supporter's organisation which was capable of delivering it.

 

Third, even the RST which is the most obvious supporter of fan ownership has shown remarkable timidity when it comes to actually advancing their agenda. There has been no sustained campaign around fan ownership and there has been a failure to leverage the influence of the supporter organisation's in the current stand-off in order to demand, for example, a supporter-director. Instead, they have been content with a couple of meetings and vague assurances of supporter representation. Like the support as a whole, the RST and other supporter organisations seem to prefer to hitch their wagons to the latest white knight than to strike out boldly on their own.

 

The best chance we have for fan ownership is if one of us won £100 million on the lottery, bought the club and then started giving his shares away.

[calscot 0]

I think part of the fan appetite part comes from the fact that it's usually a lot of money required eg £1000 at a time and the lack of an organised way of then having your voice really heard.

 

If Barcelona can charge £150 for a membership fee and have 170k subscribers then why can't we get 40k paying £50 for not just membership but a genuine share in the club that lasts a lifetime or can be sold on? It's hard to gauge an appetite for this when it's never really been offered.

 

I think the bigger obstacles are to have owners that buy into it and someone to organise the logistics to make it happen. I think RFFF and SOS have shown the support can be galvanised when someone actually takes the bull by the horns and organises it. The problem there is finding someone whom the fans can trust as a figurehead before they part with their money.

 

We needed someone like Kennedy to put up his money to buy Rangers in administration and then over say a five year period, making his money back while selling ownership on to the fans in a piecemeal fashion.