OLDCROMWELLIAN wrote:

tompkip wrote:Why the talk of investors,investors will expect a return on there investment,investing in Newport County will not return any investor a return on any money invested.
So what we are looking for is a sugar daddy in the likes of Les that’s not going to happen the only way forward is for as many people as possible to invest a small amount each month to support and sustain football in the city.
But what we should expect is that the board use that money responsibly and give quarterly updates on where the money is being used and some small inducements given to the people that are investing.
We the supporters are the only people that are going to sustain this club.as supporters we need to make that decision ASAP.

As things stand at present i agree the supporters are the only people who are going to sustain this club. But at what Level? Unless we are told that there are investors interesting in putting in £x amount of pounds for an x% of ownership any vote by trust members for a change of ownership will be meaningless. This of course will be even less likely given the uncertainty of tenency.

The discussion around tenancy drives everything else for me. If we're heading out the door, what are the fans going to be able to do to get us a new home in 4 years? Under those circumstances we would need to be approaching people who have the financial clout, ability and contacts to make something special happen.

rncfc wrote:Perhaps they were never interested. Perhaps they are interested but aren't prepared to invest without taking control. Perhaps they're no longer interested. Perhaps they never even existed.

Who knows and, frankly, who cares? We clearly need some help now, so the question as to what happened to people who might have been interested a few years ago is pretty irrelevant. We need to find people who are interested now (fans, businesses, a combination, whatever).

I am not adverse to business people being involved, far from it in fact. I would just like to know who and what they can bring to the table, as yet no one has talked specifics. Perhaps these businessmen realise that who ever takes over our club is going to inherit the same problems that the board are currently facing and in reality do not fancy it.

Successful Businessmen by definition are not stupid and I cannot think of one that would want to be financially liable for something they have no control over and also unlikely ever to see a return on his/their investment.

rncfc wrote:

OLDCROMWELLIAN wrote:

tompkip wrote:Why the talk of investors,investors will expect a return on there investment,investing in Newport County will not return any investor a return on any money invested.
So what we are looking for is a sugar daddy in the likes of Les that’s not going to happen the only way forward is for as many people as possible to invest a small amount each month to support and sustain football in the city.
But what we should expect is that the board use that money responsibly and give quarterly updates on where the money is being used and some small inducements given to the people that are investing.
We the supporters are the only people that are going to sustain this club.as supporters we need to make that decision ASAP.

As things stand at present i agree the supporters are the only people who are going to sustain this club. But at what Level? Unless we are told that there are investors interesting in putting in £x amount of pounds for an x% of ownership any vote by trust members for a change of ownership will be meaningless. This of course will be even less likely given the uncertainty of tenency.

The discussion around tenancy drives everything else for me. If we're heading out the door, what are the fans going to be able to do to get us a new home in 4 years? Under those circumstances we would need to be approaching people who have the financial clout, ability and contacts to make something special happen.

I would say Newport Council owe us a bit.

Unfortunately I could not attend the meeting last night as a bit poorly, but from what I can gather the biggest news is that the Trust are going to offer alternative levels of Trust Membership, depending on how much one pays a month.

For me, investors apart (and that's another story) this is the definite way forward -
It's madness that us Trust members (1400 odd) pay only £10 per year membership.
All well run Trust clubs utilise the Trust to bring in much more revenue.
The offer of starting with £5 onto £10 onto more per month from existing and hopefully new Trust members is very logical and achievable. There will be those of us who for whatever reason choose not to give, I'm not passing judgement on that.
But for me even if all 1400 of us went from giving the yearly tenner and gaining £14,000 to giving the minimum £60 per year we would see a jump to £84,000 (£70,00 more coming into the club), hopefully more if we all gave more, £10 per month is 33p a day etc.
This makes a genuine difference to a club like ours and for me is a great idea waiting to be done. So well done all.
I am not saying the trust board is perfect, I'm not saying we don't want investors, but for actions rather than debating this has to be done and I'll defo sign up for more input and hope more of us 'supporters' old and new do so too.
U.T.C

The NCFC Hippy wrote:Unfortunately I could not attend the meeting last night as a bit poorly, but from what I can gather the biggest news is that the Trust are going to offer alternative levels of Trust Membership, depending on how much one pays a month.

For me, investors apart (and that's another story) this is the definite way forward -
It's madness that us Trust members (1400 odd) pay only £10 per year membership.
All well run Trust clubs utilise the Trust to bring in much more revenue.
The offer of starting with £5 onto £10 onto more per month from existing and hopefully new Trust members is very logical and achievable. There will be those of us who for whatever reason choose not to give, I'm not passing judgement on that.
But for me even if all 1400 of us went from giving the yearly tenner and gaining £14,000 to giving the minimum £60 per year we would see a jump to £84,000 (£70,00 more coming into the club), hopefully more if we all gave more, £10 per month is 33p a day etc.
This makes a genuine difference to a club like ours and for me is a great idea waiting to be done. So well done all.
I am not saying the trust board is perfect, I'm not saying we don't want investors, but for actions rather than debating this has to be done and I'll defo sign up for more input and hope more of us 'supporters' old and new do so too.
U.T.C

Whilst I don't take issue with your opinion I feel that it's all very well asking supporters to pay more, but unless you engage with those supporters they are simply not going to.

Edit.

Here's the thing. If everyone who attends our games brought a friend we'd double our gates. The argument is logical and flawless its only problem being it doesn't work in practice.

If everyone who is a member of our trust starts paying £60 as opposed to £10 a year we will make a lot more money. The argument is logical and flawless its only problem being.............

Alan G Bryant wrote:

rncfc wrote:Perhaps they were never interested. Perhaps they are interested but aren't prepared to invest without taking control. Perhaps they're no longer interested. Perhaps they never even existed.

Who knows and, frankly, who cares? We clearly need some help now, so the question as to what happened to people who might have been interested a few years ago is pretty irrelevant. We need to find people who are interested now (fans, businesses, a combination, whatever).

I am not adverse to business people being involved, far from it in fact. I would just like to know who and what they can bring to the table, as yet no one has talked specifics. Perhaps these businessmen realise that who ever takes over our club is going to inherit the same problems that the board are currently facing and in reality do not fancy it.

Successful Businessmen by definition are not stupid and I cannot think of one that would want to be financially liable for something they have no control over and also unlikely ever to see a return on his/their investment.

If a company needs funding, that is the responsibility of the board. Asking fans to provide specifics without any knowledge of what work has already been undertaken, who we may have already spoken to, etc, is braindead. It suggests to me that the board is more interested in deflecting any talk of relinquishing control than actually doing what's best for the club, seeing as you are quite clearly a messenger of theirs.

They're having a go at raising funds in a way that protects the interests of the trust first off, and then if/when that fails they're going to ask people whether we should try it another way. Is that acting in the clubs best interests? Well, we don't know at this stage, because we have no idea whether we are going to need to be finding £10m plus in the next few years to build a new stadium.

Hopefully there are some irons in the fire, and the first we hear about it won't be the news that we're out on our arses.

Of course the board is 'having a go' at raising funds for the trust at first. It's the only thing we got at the moment. We can't raise funds for something we don't have.

P.S. have now noticed that the various new trust monthly options now available to peruse on trust website under membership menu

rncfc wrote:

Alan G Bryant wrote:

rncfc wrote:Perhaps they were never interested. Perhaps they are interested but aren't prepared to invest without taking control. Perhaps they're no longer interested. Perhaps they never even existed.

Who knows and, frankly, who cares? We clearly need some help now, so the question as to what happened to people who might have been interested a few years ago is pretty irrelevant. We need to find people who are interested now (fans, businesses, a combination, whatever).

I am not adverse to business people being involved, far from it in fact. I would just like to know who and what they can bring to the table, as yet no one has talked specifics. Perhaps these businessmen realise that who ever takes over our club is going to inherit the same problems that the board are currently facing and in reality do not fancy it.

Successful Businessmen by definition are not stupid and I cannot think of one that would want to be financially liable for something they have no control over and also unlikely ever to see a return on his/their investment.

If a company needs funding, that is the responsibility of the board. Asking fans to provide specifics without any knowledge of what work has already been undertaken, who we may have already spoken to, etc, is braindead. It suggests to me that the board is more interested in deflecting any talk of relinquishing control than actually doing what's best for the club, seeing as you are quite clearly a messenger of theirs.

They're having a go at raising funds in a way that protects the interests of the trust first off, and then if/when that fails they're going to ask people whether we should try it another way. Is that acting in the clubs best interests? Well, we don't know at this stage, because we have no idea whether we are going to need to be finding £10m plus in the next few years to build a new stadium.

Hopefully there are some irons in the fire, and the first we hear about it won't be the news that we're out on our arses.

Thank you for unwittingly highlighting my point. You have berated the club for not having a plan and twice posted that they club should relinquish control, yet you do not say to whom(great plan btw). I would much prefer that the club concentrate on raising funds and separate income streams as opposed to relinquishing control to person/s unknown.

Alan, you're totally missing the point. What I'm saying is that I don't know if they should relinquish control.

In my opinion, IF there is an issue with the ground and the trust are unable to come up with a solution then they should set the wheels in motion to relinquish control.

You're totally quoting me out of context and proving in my eyes that you're nothing more than a boardroom tool.

And if you read my posts I'm not berating the board. I explicitly say that the job they do is amazing given the resources and time they have. Unfortunately good intentions won't help us if we are up for eviction.

rncfc wrote:Alan, you're totally missing the point. What I'm saying is that I don't know if they should relinquish control.

In my opinion, IF there is an issue with the ground and the trust are unable to come up with a solution then they should set the wheels in motion to relinquish control.

You're totally quoting me out of context and proving in my eyes that you're nothing more than a boardroom tool.

And if you read my posts I'm not berating the board. I explicitly say that the job they do is amazing given the resources and time they have. Unfortunately good intentions won't help us if we are up for eviction.

We disagree on how our club should be run. However I could be persuaded I am wrong, I hope you could too.

Where we agree, and a point the Alan Bryant's of this world just don't get is it is impossible to make a considered decision if you are denied the factual basis to make that decision.

Stan A. Einstein wrote:

rncfc wrote:Alan, you're totally missing the point. What I'm saying is that I don't know if they should relinquish control.

In my opinion, IF there is an issue with the ground and the trust are unable to come up with a solution then they should set the wheels in motion to relinquish control.

You're totally quoting me out of context and proving in my eyes that you're nothing more than a boardroom tool.

And if you read my posts I'm not berating the board. I explicitly say that the job they do is amazing given the resources and time they have. Unfortunately good intentions won't help us if we are up for eviction.

We disagree on how our club should be run. However I could be persuaded I am wrong, I hope you could too.

Where we agree, and a point the Alan Bryant's of this world just don't get is it is impossible to make a considered decision if you are denied the factual basis to make that decision.

I could be persuaded I'm wrong yes. In fact, if I know the ground issue is sorted for another 10 years I'll definitely up my contributions to the trust. Because we will then have time to work with to find a more permanent solution. I'm just getting twitchy that having worked so hard to get to where we are that we are going to throw it away by naively crossing our fingers and hoping for the best.

Alan Bryant won't be able to convince me to not worry about that.

My take on the situation. As you probably know I’m an atheist and put no faith in saviours but the phrase “ the Lord helps those who helps themselves “ has never been more relevant than it is to our present situation. What I understand of our plight is this. I’ll enumerate so that if anyone wants to come back on a point it’s easier.
1) We need more money in ASAP given that if we continue our decent run or players go back to their parent clubs, Flynn can bring in players at Xmas to reinforce the squad for a push at the top. To further that end the contribution scheme will start in November but there’s nothing stopping us paying more now of course.
2) No decision will be made until the summer so as not to unsettle the playing squad and between now and then there will be many meetings including with other clubs trusts to share their experiences. We should have plenty of information by then to be able to come to a rational decision
3) in any case any decision we make may be irrelevant if investors are not queuing up to throw away their money , we have few assets and those are just our league status and a few players
4) we are only secure at RP as long as we are contributing and from a question I asked last night it seems we are negotiating a ceiling on our payments to the WRU. One thing to remember is that they are not awash with cash either and probably need us as much as we need them. If it’s possible to arrange a ground for less than we are paying now I’d be surprised but delighted of course but unless the lottery comes up......
5) we badly need an expert in revenue-raising at the club in order to progress so not having an active individual selling us locally/nationally is a disaster imho. We should appoint such an individual immediately imho
6) the new revenue streams of the Kingsway shop and BarAmber are laudable but shouldn’t prevent us trying to get a matchday shop and ticketing at RP. This is my private opinion but I just don’t understand why it’s apparently so difficult to negotiate a decent presence at the ground. After all, it should be pointed out that we are there far more often than the Dragons, they should want us there spending some money - which is something many of us won’t do while the present “ bad blood “ exists with our landlords.
7) once again last night we were promised better communication. It should be remembered that there are still tech dinosaurs out there and given that many supporters are as old as me ( though there are some younger duffers as well ) there should be a paper bulletin available for such fans perhaps as a handout at the match when important information needs to be relayed.
to sum up , what we need is a heavy dose ( possibly an overdose ) of realism.
Nobody is going to buy us a stadium
Nobody is going to turn us into a South Wales version of Man City
Sugar daddies get bored with their playthings and bugger off eventually
Charlatans are attracted to football clubs like flies to a manure heap
If local businessmen were still wanting to invest I think we’d have heard from them.
It’s down to US I’m afraid folks which may not be a bad thing in the long run. It’s us that have to step up but a concomitant requirement is that those in charge must also improve their performance exponentially too whether that’s by co-option or appointment of an enterprising money-making team or not, things can’t go on as they are for long.

rncfc wrote:Alan, you're totally missing the point. What I'm saying is that I don't know if they should relinquish control.

In my opinion, IF there is an issue with the ground and the trust are unable to come up with a solution then they should set the wheels in motion to relinquish control.

You're totally quoting me out of context and proving in my eyes that you're nothing more than a boardroom tool.

And if you read my posts I'm not berating the board. I explicitly say that the job they do is amazing given the resources and time they have. Unfortunately good intentions won't help us if we are up for eviction.

I am not a tool, this is your post, apologies if I you think I have quoted you out of context, but I do not think I have.

' If we're at risk of being thrown out of RP over the next few years, then the trust should be relinquishing complete control - and NOW, not at the end of the season. They don't have the financial resource or know-how to get us into a new ground but there may well be others out there who can. Relegation for us would be a disaster, but having no ground would be even worse - therefore, it's worth gambling on new owners if they can make inroads here.'

You clearly state that they should relinquish control , accentuated in capitals, but do not say to whom.

Anyway , My personal view is that if the supporters up their donations enabling Flynn to strengthen in January and subsequently gain promotion, it gives us a stronger hand at the negotiating table with increased crowds and support from the council. I would certainly rather gamble on this than gamble on new owners that may or may not be able to make inroads and would ultimately face the same problems with the WRU that the club are. Relegation indeed would be a disaster, but it's more likely to happen the longer supporters pay their £10 and expect the world.

History shows there is not the financial clout in Newport for investors to step in and develop a ground, if there was, we would already be in it!

lowandhard wrote:My take on the situation. As you probably know I’m an atheist and put no faith in saviours but the phrase “ the Lord helps those who helps themselves “ has never been more relevant than it is to our present situation. What I understand of our plight is this. I’ll enumerate so that if anyone wants to come back on a point it’s easier.
1) We need more money in ASAP given that if we continue our decent run or players go back to their parent clubs, Flynn can bring in players at Xmas to reinforce the squad for a push at the top. To further that end the contribution scheme will start in November but there’s nothing stopping us paying more now of course.
2) No decision will be made until the summer so as not to unsettle the playing squad and between now and then there will be many meetings including with other clubs trusts to share their experiences. We should have plenty of information by then to be able to come to a rational decision
3) in any case any decision we make may be irrelevant if investors are not queuing up to throw away their money , we have few assets and those are just our league status and a few players
4) we are only secure at RP as long as we are contributing and from a question I asked last night it seems we are negotiating a ceiling on our payments to the WRU. One thing to remember is that they are not awash with cash either and probably need us as much as we need them. If it’s possible to arrange a ground for less than we are paying now I’d be surprised but delighted of course but unless the lottery comes up......
5) we badly need an expert in revenue-raising at the club in order to progress so not having an active individual selling us locally/nationally is a disaster imho. We should appoint such an individual immediately imho
6) the new revenue streams of the Kingsway shop and BarAmber are laudable but shouldn’t prevent us trying to get a matchday shop and ticketing at RP. This is my private opinion but I just don’t understand why it’s apparently so difficult to negotiate a decent presence at the ground. After all, it should be pointed out that we are there far more often than the Dragons, they should want us there spending some money - which is something many of us won’t do while the present “ bad blood “ exists with our landlords.
7) once again last night we were promised better communication. It should be remembered that there are still tech dinosaurs out there and given that many supporters are as old as me ( though there are some younger duffers as well ) there should be a paper bulletin available for such fans perhaps as a handout at the match when important information needs to be relayed.
to sum up , what we need is a heavy dose ( possibly an overdose ) of realism.
Nobody is going to buy us a stadium
Nobody is going to turn us into a South Wales version of Man City
Sugar daddies get bored with their playthings and bugger off eventually
Charlatans are attracted to football clubs like flies to a manure heap
If local businessmen were still wanting to invest I think we’d have heard from them.
It’s down to US I’m afraid folks which may not be a bad thing in the long run. It’s us that have to step up but a concomitant requirement is that those in charge must also improve their performance exponentially too whether that’s by co-option or appointment of an enterprising money-making team.

Excellent summation. I agree it's down to us to increase our contributions. The amount of contributions will of course eventually dictate at which level we compete. Yes, the tenancy issue is an extra concern, but thinking an investor(s) is waiting in the wings to fund an alternative is totally unrealistic. I'll write to santa to ask him for a brand new stadium in the city centre. Probably have a much chance. Low and hard, if you ever think of standing for the board, you'll have my vote.

There are only two choices.

Work with Dragons and Newport City Council to share Rodney Parade as a shared Newport facility. Or return to Spytty and Conference South.