I heard yesterday on the radio that Portsmouth FC has been taken over by it's fans.

From what I heard on the radio:

It has raised £2m from the ownership with fans pledging £1000 each and I think businesses have bought shares too.

I was wondering what kind of model would and could work for us, surely the costs would be less, as the overheads of an RL club are different to a football team, but they have around 15000 fans to our 1500.

Another issue for us is the fans own the stadium at Fratton Park, too.

Does anyone think it's a viable option for us? I'm undecided.

It's not my idea, just thought it was something worth talking about on here.

I mean how much money would we all part with to ensure a bright future for the club?

Encorporating the TDC Direct Debit payment method, if someone said to us fans if you pay £60 PCM that pays £720 Per Annum into the club, and for this you get a ST included & a share in the club.

Sound fair?

Well if 500 of us paid that we have 360,000 Per annum.

Jonny, Maurice is the one you wanna bounce these ideas off, he has ideas on this subject almost every single season. My own thoughts are it would be a fantastic (lol) way to operate our club but i feel though at the outset we could maybe have enough people with money to get the thing started but i fear the apathy we seem to have around our club & team by the non hardcore would mean that continued support (in all areas) will be very difficult to maintain, not to mention the dummy spitting when individuals don't get their way or ideas used because its a democratic vote. I would be interested to know who would run the business side and how those people would be selected . Basically i don't know if we have enough support for the Fan ownership blueprint to work at the level lots of Leythers seem to demand.

Good points.

It would obviously have to have someone who can look at all the figures of revenue to see how many 'fan owners' it would take to start bringing in more revenue than we currently do.

Then maybe a pledge system could be done over say a month, if enough people pledge by giving their details the scheme is rolled out. If not, nowt happens.

Agree on LISA too mate.

Johnny is not another user name for me btw

How I see it

You open up the shares by capitalising debts to shares thus ensuring directors loans/PG's don't swallow up the cash generated. You create Millions of new shares, each would have no value as the club is worthless. Fans/business's can access these shares in say £100 lumps, eg get bought them instead of presents at Xmas etc, as fans buy them the existing shareholders see their shares diluted unless they also buy more. As I understand it if 300 fans bought £600 each then they would be majority shareholders and the club would have £180k to invest in taking the club forward. An AGM would be called on one vote per share to elect a board to run the club.
As fans have continual access to shares the cash would continue to roll in and the shareholder mix constantly moving.
If 1000 fans got bought £100 shares per annum instead of socks, undies and aftershave ( Tights, Knickers and perfume) that creates the cash needed to finance success instead of this constant no ambition penny pinching we have.
If you get 10 business's putting in £5k pa we then get a very healthy club.

The beauty about this is that you have no debt and no reliance on one man/woman, you have a real community club that the general public own - and can be marketed as such.

Arthur Thomas was the majority share holder was he not? It may not be appropriate due to the recent passing of Arthur but I thought the fans in mass numbers could possibly put forward buying the shares should the family consider this option.

Buying existing shares isn't an option, think about it and I am also sure the family of AT would give the shares away. The key is getting rid of the PG's/DL's to stop new cash meeting old debts. AT was a very honourable man, upon his business difficulties I understand he settled his PG on the overdraft in full which I believe was 60% of the total.

Our current problems are built around lack of cash, our structures are not attractive to investment and without cash increasing we will continue the circle of slow death

Oh and finally How do we get the ball rolling - we have the supporters group to build it around -LISA

So you suggest that LISA buys the shares as an independent entity and the members LISA contributions pay for shares?

I am saying we have a well established supporters group with 300+ members which would be a logical catalyst, are you saying LISA should buy shares with member contributions?

That's correct Mr C, but if the fans are tipping in £100k plus per annum the one man would be doing the same to maintain majority shareholding. 1) can you see that happening? 2) Would it be a bad thing?

The fans/LISA could make a donation to the Thomas family for the shares then we would be majority share holders & push to sell them to a wealthy benefactor possibly?

Great idea let the fans own the club have a clear out at the top form a new board a board than can set a budget that is realiistic by that I mean not one that thinks the crowds will increase rather than decrease and thats the only reason we as a club have money problems yet again spending more than we are earning if that means cutting players money along with the staff and coaches so be it but sooner have a club that is financially stable than one that every season has finance problems

and how do you cover outstanding PG's/Loans ? AT knew what he was doing, and that the shares had no value, I am also confident they would be given away now to the right person.

Realistic as in defeatist? ie less with subsequent income drops due to product on display.

We need to increase cash to provide a better product that generates more cash - we need the BoD to fund £100k pa min to kick start a transformation and the fans are the best way to find that cash