Darlo Uncovered

Wrexham are top of the conference. They are run on a fan owned model. Before the season started the fans used a Go Fund Me page to boost their budget and it's clearly paying dividends...

An example of what can be achieved with this model... one I find encouraging personally...

I know they have an advantage in that they have a ground, but nevertheless, one in the bag for fan ownership, particularly if they can get promoted in a division full of financially bloated clubs like the Fyldes of this world.

UTD

SwansQuaker83 wrote:Wrexham are top of the conference. They are run on a fan owned model. Before the season started the fans used a Go Fund Me page to boost their budget and it's clearly paying dividends...

An example of what can be achieved with this model... one I find encouraging personally...

I know they have an advantage in that they have a ground, but nevertheless, one in the bag for fan ownership, particularly if they can get promoted in a division full of financially bloated clubs like the Fyldes of this world.

UTD

Grimsby did it a few years back when they signed Omar Bogle and achieved promotion from the Conference. They then sold Bogle for just over 1 million pounds in January.

The fan owned model can work at Conference National level if you get big enough crowds. Wimbledon were getting 4k ish and so are Wrexham.

I wonder if we will be continuing the boost the budget scheme in future seasons? I certainly don't miss my £2 a week out of my bank account. And I'd imagine fundraising such as that will be more popular if/when we ever reach a time when significant funds aren't needed for infrastructure.

Growing our crowds (and other revenue) is the most important challenge to crack if we ever want to compete at the next level. Fan owned and 1500 crowds is no good for National League level. Having a better ground situation would no doubt improve our chances, but it will take more than that.

Quakerz wrote:The fan owned model can work at Conference National level if you get big enough crowds. Wimbledon were getting 4k ish and so are Wrexham.

And we know there is potential for us to get crowds like that too. The catchment area is plenty big enough we just need to slowly get people back on board.

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We're still 24th best average attendance in non-league. Pretty impressive after all that's happened and a very poor run of results.

It's a bit of a chicken and egg scenario at the moment. Crowds won't grow that much playing the way we are at, at the level we are at, with the ground where it is at right now.

Even if we play well at this level, as shown last season, we have issues with larger crowds in the ground putting people off. If we spend too much on the ground and neglect the team, the performances will suffer.

It's just going to be a balancing act for a few years until BM is a good standard, with decent stands and facilities, covered with a decent view and atmosphere.... and then some tangible success on the field too. It's not easy, but that's the way it is. Others who have gone up this way, as noted above, have been getting average crowds over twice the size of our average.