Motherwell FC - A Thread For All Seasons

[Vietnam91]

1 minute ago, StAndrew7 said:

I want to greeny this, but also don't want to greeny it because of what you went through for that to happen...

Also, it's Ho Chi Minh City now, mate. Remember Erik's lads lost that one.

I'm well aware, Sai Gon is the traditional name and is beautiful and therefore I use it.

[capt_oats]

4 minutes ago, thisGRAEME said:

The Wrexham thing is based on winning, continuing to win, and continuing to progress. For this, as they acknowledge readily, they need "f**k off money", which Reynolds provides. They're also running at a massive annual loss to support this, with interest payments making their way to the owners on a monthly basis. 

Yes; they have been very successful, but they will (again, imo) reach a ceiling shortly where there next step requires a colossal leap. Where that leaves them "project" wise is anyone's guess. 

Related:

[Dosser1886]

Can we just thank EB for keeping the thread ticking over during the close season and ask him to to, politely, f**k off.

Beyond sick of this. If the vote goes south I'll be furious at the sheer stupidity of it all. And to use the Brexit analogy, again, we will be fucked. Those that vote for it deserve what they get. Unfortunately, like Brexit, the arseholes take us down with them.

[supermarv]

I think the majority will definitely be voting no to this investment. However my only issues is if this doesn’t go through are we just going to rely on what we’ve been doing so far hope to sell a player or 2 a season and keep the WS as a safety net. 
 

I hope not and as mentioned before EB isn’t like the Wrexham owners and multi multi millionaires who can just throw stupid money about and beat teams easily. Also even though he’s tried to low ball us he does have some good ideas of ways to generate more income for the club that could definitely be implemented or looked at. 

[Handsome_Devil]

1 minute ago, supermarv said:

However my only issues is if this doesn’t go through are we just going to rely on what we’ve been doing so far hope to sell a player or 2 a season and keep the WS as a safety net.

The Society has already said it will change the model and the club - under new daily leadership - will surely be looking to raise its game too. So there will be no status quo.

But for the record:, what we've been doing so far, has worked basically perfectly and that's despite McMahon and co in the boardroom being asleep at the wheel since Burrows decided to leave.

[capt_oats]

6 minutes ago, Handsome_Devil said:

The Society has already said it will change the model and the club - under new daily leadership - will surely be looking to raise its game too. So there will be no status quo.

But for the record:, what we've been doing so far, has worked basically perfectly and that's despite McMahon and co in the boardroom being asleep at the wheel since Burrows decided to leave.

Exactly this.

There's no reason why the good ideas in that plan (which are mostly already in the WS brief) can't be actioned without giving away half the club and there are plenty of people with actual real life experience (waves at @thisGRAEME) who are doing the work in pointing out why much of the plan is simply unrealistic and flawed.

Edited Friday at 10:22 by capt_oats

[Desp]

31 minutes ago, Vietnam91 said:

I was the focus of a whole nation of 90m people. I was the headline coverage for most TV and press stories for two months. Every night there was a five minute segment on their equivalent of the six o'clock news on my progress, showing my stats and x-rays (not ideal). The day I left and wheeled through the lobby it was six deep behind barricades and the same outside and onto the street outside the hospital ground. While I was transferred to the airport with 4 police outriders flanking my ambulance. I was met at Heathrow by the ambassador.

Aye awright Tom Hanks... 

[StAndrew7]

6 minutes ago, Handsome_Devil said:

The Society has already said it will change the model and the club - under new daily leadership - will surely be looking to raise its game too. So there will be no status quo.

But for the record:, what we've been doing so far, has worked basically perfectly and that's despite McMahon and co in the boardroom being asleep at the wheel since Burrows decided to leave.

Also, for the record, again and again and again:

"We are not desperate for money, we are financially stable," he said. "We have enough money to see us through this season, next and maybe a bit the next.

[Swello]

7 minutes ago, capt_oats said:

Related:

And this is partly where my scepticism comes from. I think English Football (including the Welsh add-on) is the very worst possible model for a modest fan owned club to aspire to - but some seem to think that is the way as we are so bombarded with it. The precarious nature of long standing, traditional clubs below the EPL level is scary and I would hate if we went in that direction, however modestly. 

Maybe the models we should be looking at for ideas and best practice are in other countries of less than 10m people where there are no billion dollar TV deals and A-list types wandering about the place.

[capt_oats]

5 minutes ago, Swello said:

And this is partly where my scepticism comes from. I think English Football (including the Welsh add-on) is the very worst possible model for a modest fan owned club to aspire to - but some seem to think that is the way as we are so bombarded with it. The precarious nature of long standing, traditional clubs below the EPL level is scary and I would hate if we went in that direction, however modestly. 

Maybe the models we should be looking at for ideas and best practice are in other countries of less than 10m people where there are no billion dollar TV deals and A-list types wandering about the place.

Aye.

We've got folk clutching their pearls because we posted a £1.6m loss after spending £1.2m on a new pitch but some are falling over themselves to chuck money at CRM and a fucking app.

[fatcalf]

1 hour ago, StAndrew7 said:

Just put this onto SO, so Ctrl C +  Ctrl V:

I have absolutely no wish to be part of the "I told you so" brigade in 2/4/6 years time, but if this goes through and the Club is left in a mess, who will be left to pick up the pieces?

The Society will more than likely implode (although fair play to @Ill Ray for saying they'd increase their contributions) and more or less cease to be the presence it is. The newly appointed Board will no doubt bend to Erik's will, reduce its loan as an equivalent investment when it can't meet its obligations (excellent work on that btw @David1979) and as a result the security of the stadium/land will go... then what?

This might seem petty, but the people who vote this through will flip like a coin and look to those who opposed all this for the solutions when it goes tits up... If I'm wrong in all of this, I will absolutely hold up my hands and admit that I was. Will those that voted for it, if/when this all goes wrong?

So we start again, and save the Club, again. We'll become the next Clyde/Airdrie/whatever and that'll be that.

All because someone stood up and said "NETFLIX! DOCUMENTARY! SNAPCHAT!"

This brings me back to one my earliest arguments. If I'm wrong about this, our club will just continue on our merry way doing what we do but still have a team to support. If the others are wrong....??????

[Handsome_Devil]

6 minutes ago, Swello said:

Maybe the models we should be looking at for ideas and best practice are in other countries of less than 10m people where there are no billion dollar TV deals and A-list types wandering about the place.

Definitely.

A ridiculous thought but I'd be very curious to see how often the sole investor proves a medium to long-term success for a club compared to failing, against it being broadly owned. I suspect the ratio will not make great reading and if you further sub-divide to remove the Haywards, Walkers, Halls, McGregors etc who act(ed) as benefactors not investors, you wouldn't even contemplate it.

There's a reason there's the long-standing gag about how you make a small fortune from football...

We're not desperate for money, even the outgoing chairman confirms that, but even if we were there are god knows how many safer ways we could raise it than this.

[supermarv]

19 minutes ago, Handsome_Devil said:

The Society has already said it will change the model and the club - under new daily leadership - will surely be looking to raise its game too. So there will be no status quo.

But for the record:, what we've been doing so far, has worked basically perfectly and that's despite McMahon and co in the boardroom being asleep at the wheel since Burrows decided to leave.

That’s a fair point and glad the WS will be more involved in the daily running of the club. 
 

Also it may well be running well but I’ve got to disagree, yes we have been in the SPFL for nearly 40 years. However any time we finish in a 3rd or European spot the next season or 2/3 are a struggle. We want to be a successful club and try push for Europe every season if we do that then you can start thinkinb it breaking the top 2 (unrealistic but it’s not impossible). Maybe with the new daily involvement with the WS it will see improved investment regarding sponsors which was in the their plan and hopefully other ideas. 

[capt_oats]

Can I just say that the level of incredulity of some of the responses to Barmack's proposal from people working in the creative industry (mostly in @thisGRAEME's mentions) is fair warming my soul.

[Swello]

2 minutes ago, supermarv said:

However any time we finish in a 3rd or European spot the next season or 2/3 are a struggle

When we are good, we sell/lose the players that made us good - and we actively do this as it's part of the deal we make with players who join ("we do well, you do well out of it"). We've practically never started the subsequent season with the bulk of a successful squad still in place - and 300k/year can't change that. I think this is baked in but I'll take it as long as the "bad" season isn't a relegation one as was nearly the case when we went straight from 2nd to 11th a few years back.

The demands of early season European stuff have also affected every club that's done it to some extent, even Hearts and Aberdeen who have way more ability than us to run a stable squad.

[Handsome_Devil]

1 minute ago, supermarv said:

 However any time we finish in a 3rd or European spot the next season or 2/3 are a struggle. We want to be a successful club and try push for Europe every season if we do that then you can start thinkinb it breaking the top 2 (unrealistic but it’s not impossible). Maybe with the new daily involvement with the WS it will see improved investment regarding sponsors which was in the their plan and hopefully other ideas. 

With the best will in the world, that level of consistency is impossible. It's a sport, no one wins all the time and for us to challenge every season it would mean not only out performing the city clubs who spend a wad more but effectively winning a league of our peers every season and nobody does that.

For perspective, in the modern era we've finished in the top three more than Hibs and I struggle to remember another non-city club doing it much more than once. Killie - certainly our level and probably a fraction bigger - have done it once in decades, St Mirren just lost their shit (rightly) for finishing fifth etc.

Taking on any investment in a bid to move up is an absolute fool's game because the risk-reward ratio is stacked against us to a comical degree.

We'll be successful by being stable, sustainable, surviving in the league and with a solid base to take advantage of the chances when they do come. Which is exactly what we've done (in the league at least, and I don't believe we actually enter any other competitions).

[superwellfan]

One of the most striking things about the Barmack proposal is the 13,000 former season ticket holders. 

Dunno over how many years that data is gathered, and some are obviously likely dead, but that's a lot of folk. 

Massive.

[fat_tony]

2 hours ago, thisGRAEME said:

Could someone explain to me why 50k people would download a Motherwell FC app? For a club with around 5k season ticket holders in good or bad, that's... Ambitious.

The amount of marketing budget that would require would be astronomical. If it's £100k for app development, you're looking at, what, 3 or 4 times that to even get close to that number? You'd have to reach, with some cigarette packet maths, 200k odd, already vaguely engaged people? Are there 200k vaguely engaged Motherwell fans, in a best case scenario?

Not to mention the bit everyone always forgets with software development. It's not a one-and-done thing. There's ongoing hosting, support and maintenance costs, plus development of new features over time etc. 

Same goes for implementing a CRM system. It means nothing if you don't put a solid data foundation in place and continue to support it.

 

Edited to add: There is some budget allocated for ongoing maintenance for both the app and CRM system that I missed on first read through. I think these are massively undervalued though.

Edited Friday at 11:23 by fat_tony

[Swello]

14 minutes ago, fatcalf said:

This brings me back to one my earliest arguments. If I'm wrong about this, our club will just continue on our merry way doing what we do but still have a team to support. If the others are wrong....??????

Right with you on this. Again - there is a false sense of urgency being injected here. When we have the vote and if we collectively decide not to proceed with this external investment - the club is *absolutely fine* (and we've got the bonus of an energised WS with a forward plan, which wasn't the case previously). This is not do or die.

[RandomGuy.]

Scab