Dundee FC Community Consortium Announces Alternative Investment Opportunity!
Executive Summary
• £250k investment by first and foremost DFC supporters who love their and your club
• This would see club ownership broadened
• This would see club ownership kept local too.
• This would fuse pragmatism and business expertise together.
• This matches the FPS investment in the 1st team and Youth Development
• This allows Youth Development to remain local, using the DFC network to develop it.
• Also the Youth Development plan is ready to go based on DBBT’s 2011 initiative
• This investment become the springboard to buy back the Ground
• DFC is in a much better financial state now than it has been for perhaps a decade
• The formation of the SPFL will see DFC’s prize money rise significantly based on 4th upwards
• Does DFC want to be controlled by a London based and Texan base Directors?
• All profits will be re invested until the Ground is back in DFC ownership.
• FPS is looking for a return, which could see funds for players diverted to pay this
• FPS is looking for a return, which could see funds to purchase the ground diverted for this.
The proposal is outlined in more detail overleaf.
Dundee FC Community Consortium Announces Alternative Investment Opportunity!
The Dark Blues Business Trust (DBBT) is delighted to announce that it able to offer Dundee Football Club Ltd an alternative £250,000 investment proposal to assess in parallel with the option currently being considered from Football Partners Scotland (FPS). Since the investment proposal was launched by FPS the DBBT has taken significant and varied soundings from its members who all want as every DFC supporter wants:
• Increased investment in the club
• Pragmatic investment in the club
• A broader base of Community ownership.
During the past month DBBT has also been hugely impressed by DFCSS strategic intent to see its controlling shareholding scaled back, DBBT’s increased and a modernisation of the DFCSS and DBBT leading to the establishment of Dundee FC as a Community Interest Company (CIC). To achieve this, a collective community shareholding of at least 75% is needed and it is envisaged this can be achieved by the end of the coming season. DFCSS elections will be held shortly to completely revamp and reinvigorate their board of directors in line with their members’ wishes, and it is recognised that community ownership requires a broad base of experience including the local business community.
The DBBT investment would provide
• £150,000 towards First Team investment and additional youth coaches - IMMEDIATELY
• £100,000 towards Major Youth Infrastructure Development - for season 2014/15 (£50k to be paid in January 2014 and £50k in June 2014)
Crucial aspects to consider
1, Given the now increased financial rewards for the First Division will see the Champions earn over £300,000 and the team that finishes 4th earn over £200,000, allied to the £250K SPL parachute payment places Dundee FC in a far more comfortable financial situation than it has been these past 10 years, and also a much more comfortable situation than when FPS first proposed to inject additional funds in the club. John Brown has stated he is very happy with his budget and we all believe he has the players and will get the players that will return DFC to the SPL in one season.
Last season Partick Thistle received around £60k for winning the First Division. If DFC wins it this season the prize is around a quarter of a million pounds MORE, which makes the club sustainable both now, in the first division, and in the SPL - the numbers speak for themselves.
2, Further the Youth Development initiative would re-visit and update the previous DBBT proposal developed primarily by Steve Martin, which DBBT failed to win approval for early 2011. This crucially allows this key development to be localised, using local knowledge and experience, and to also tap into Dundee FC’s US-based coaching alumni e.g. Coerver Coaching (a global football coaching programme inspired by the teachings of Wiel Coerver and created in 1984 by Alfred Galustian and Dundee legend, Charlie Cooke).
3, If DFC Ltd becomes a CIC it then has the infrastructure to benefit from a raft of Government incentives (as recently as two weeks ago, members of parliament were quoted as supporting tax breaks for community owned clubs) and local grants, can begin to develop a scheme to return the Stadium to Community ownership, and then look to develop the South Enclosure into both a stand but also behind it an all sports community facility, which is achievable if all stakeholders are brought on board.
4, The FPS investment option indicates the potential for DFC Ltd to develop. However this option allows for the investors (as is their right) to profit substantially from this project. If successful, and DBBT believes they will be, then FPS can legally pay dividends and profits from Dundee FC to the owners as well as salaries to any executive directors. DBBT and DFCSS would instead use these “dividends and profits” to invest in a) the First Team 
Youth Development and c) CRUCIALLY assist the buy back of the stadium.
5, The evolution of Dundee FC, DFCSS and DBBT into a Community Interest Company (with all the protection that provides for clubs and their supporters) would also allow the hugely successful Dee Promotions a new marketing platform to build from. This could become a major contributor to the stadium buy back scheme.
6, The FPS option provides additional working capital, but has outlined no plans to spend this cash reserve, which would appeal to a subsequent investor and make the club more valuable to sell on for a profit. However, it is worth bearing in mind that league reconstruction has already made First Division football sustainable at break-even or better, and the entire sum proposed by FPS is less than a year’s prize money for finishing bottom of the SPL, and now little more than 2 years’ First Division prize money. If Dundee fans wanted to repurchase the club from FPS at any point in the future, they would likely have to raise £1-2 million pounds to do so, all of those funds going to FPS instead of into the club.
7, The proposed FPS structure for DFC is the antithesis of the eventual CIC model the DBBT would envisage DFC evolving into over an agreed period of time.
So, there are two options both provide significant investment, and both aim to provide similar levels of funding for the first team and youth development. One allows much broader but LOCAL control and accountability and a deliverable strategy which would see Dens Park back in Community ownership, while the other would see the club controlled from London and Texas with no plans to buy back the ground, and no guarantee of who the club would be sold to in the future.
For and on Behalf of the Dark Blues Business Trust
8th July 2013