Fan ownership - a long-term solution

Quoted from ginnywings

Contentious first post. Good luck.  

Welcome BTW.

Quoted from Gtfc123

Think I might need it with my opinions lol

But thats what’s great about free speech

Quoted from Gtfc123

Dear me
Fan ownership would be the end of GTFC.
People bleat on about the Bennie loans etc but show me anybody who ever walked away without getting there money back !
We are not a big club and some fans need to remember that we have spent most of the last 50 years in the lower leagues of football yet they still think we should be up there with the bigger boys.
John Fenty (love him or hate him) ploughed money into this club to save it from collapse and that is why the club owes him money and why should he walk away with nothing ?
I wish we did have a sugar daddy that could plough millions into our great club without wanting anything back, but that’s just a pipe dream.
The club is not in a bad position but allow it to be taken over by people with no big business experience at your peril as it won’t be the conference we need to worry about heading for it will be winding up orders and the end of our small but great club.

Quoted from KingstonMariner

Mike Parker. Spent hundreds of thousands of pounds on shares, gave them away to the Trust because someone didn't keep their part of the bargain.

Quoted from ginnywings

At the end of the day, it all boils down to success on the pitch. If we were 10 points better off and in a play off position, we wouldn't be having this debate. So you have to ask if a fan run board is any more likely to pick the right manager than the current board, because that's the crux of it. JF is right in saying to an extent that PR is done on the pitch because if we are winning games, the focus is where it should be, on the team. If it all boils down to success on the pitch, why re we wasting our time on a second rate, 4th division outfit? Granted poor performances always bring the other gripes into stronger focus. But if those gripes weren't there, it'd make the periodic downturns in performance on the pitch more tolerable and folk would have more patience. Famine always makes revolution more likely but prosperity doesn't remove the basic demands.

I think the board know business and seem to me to be doing a decent job in that regard, although i'm sure some will disagree. The stumbling block is the playing side of the equation. Is there any more knowledge in that area among fans than there is currently in the board room? Then there are the other gripes about communication and PR. Fair enough, there are possibly people out there who could address these issues but that won't put the ball into the back of the net. I'd suggest that overall there are people with better skills out there among the fan base than those currently in the boardroom. Just removing the self-inflicted words of poor communication would save the club a packet in the long run. It'd do a huge amount to get more people supporting the club in practical way. A better explanation of the business case for the new ground for example would convince more people it was  worth getting behind. Transparency in the appointment of development partners (and of course selecting partners who look like they know what they're doing) would also help. A greater sense of ownership will give more people the incentive to help in all sorts of ways (not only financial). Of course it won't put the ball in the back of the net, but more support = more revenue = a better budget

In all the years i've supported Town, i have never really given much thought to what happens behind the scenes, but nowadays it's all anyone seems to talk about. From the outside looking in, the board looks a bit same-y and one dimensional to me. This is not a criticism as such, merely an observation and i also think that all the flak thrown their way has made them entrenched and an 'us and them' situation has arisen. The fans forum was a disaster because both sides went into it with a pugilistic attitude and both sides are now drawing a line in the sand it appears. To an extent I can understand them feeling there's been some unjustified criticism (and way back in the days of 'Keep the Mariners Afloat' campaign the response from the people of Grimsby was poor). But the board handled any questioning and criticism in a completely unnecessary aggressive way over years turning people against them. Even as far back as 2005 (before there was much criticism from the fans) JF had adopted a bunker mentality (witness the spat with RH and Ambulancegate).

So even if all the financial and operational hurdles could be overcome and the fans could take over the running of the club, are they any more likely to know what to do to bring success than the current set up? It would be a massively expensive and time consuming exercise to find out wouldn't it? I'm certain that if we somehow came up with a way of doing it and giving JF what he wants, he'd be off into the sunset in a flash. I don't think it is just about money either, because i don't think the board will relinquish power to just anybody who comes up with the necessary dosh. They would have to feel that the club was in safe hands also. I think only then would people get a grasp of how difficult it must be to run a loss making lower league football team. No one pretends it would be easy. If we want 'easy' we wouldn't follow GTFC. There could come a time when the club is available for peanuts. You yourself have said how it feels like the seasons leading up to the last relegation. I think now's the time to start preparing for that fateful day, especially if what you suggest below is rebuffed - I can't see JF agreeing to any meaningful power sharing unless he's had a Damascene conversion over Christmas.

The only way i can see fans changing things for the better is to grow the Trust somehow and get a bit more diversity into the club decision making process. Can the fans bring their wide ranging skills to the table and work alongside the current regime? Would the current regime be open to that? I'd be prepared to put some money into a pot as mentioned in the original post if it could help in some way.

Quoted from ginnywings

All very good points KM. I honestly don't know what the answer is and as someone who works with my hands, i know very little of how businesses operate. Don't even know if i could manage my own modest accounting- the other half does that for me. I have time, a modicum of enthusiasm and a bit of spare cash, but that's about it.

As you rightly pointed out, the Keep the Mariners Afloat campaign wasn't exactly a roaring success, but operation promotion was a different beast, so i'm not sure whether there is or isn't the appetite locally to raise big sums of cash on a regular basis. How losses would be covered would be my main worry.

I'm sorry, but i think it's a pipe dream without a benefactor.