[Football] Wrexham Potential New Owners

[Palacefinder General]

I’m guessing the reason they haven’t gone for some amateur outfit in Portland, Maine or Warwick, Rhode Island is because striving for the MLS is less a commercial prospect than the EPL. Just seems completely random, North Wales.

 

[Braggfan]

Ordinarily, I'd agree with you. However, there is something slightly unique about this situation because of the parties involved. This is something I posted on another forum, but reading between the lines appears to be vaguely the plan. I think it's an interesting concept:

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I don't think there's a sinister motive behind this for a moment; neither Reynolds nor McElhenney have anything to gain by going in and 'asset stripping' Wrexham. As a business, they barely have any assets worth stripping anyway.

At the same time, I don't think this is about altruism either - if they wanted to be altruistic there are many worthier causes out there in the world (especially in these times) than Wrexham AFC. It's business, it's about money. So, how do you go about making money out of an unfashionable non-league football club from Wales?

The answer is, most people don't. But Ryan Reynolds and and Rob McElhenney aren't 'most people'; they're Hollywood movie stars. They have huge profiles globally.

And here's the key. All this comes at a time when the value of streamable TV content is rising exponentially, hence the recent explosion of football documentaries on the likes of Netflix and Amazon Prime. Such shows have been known to fetch upwards of £500k per episode. And what you've got here is a story not only incredibly intriguing to British football fans, but also to the massive potential audiences in the US and beyond who will be drawn to it for no other reason than who is involved. As a TV series, don't underestimate the massive, lucrative potential this story has.

In effect, what Reynolds and co. have done is taken the club off the hands of the supporter's trust for nothing, on the back of a pledge to invest £2m - money they will quickly earn back for the reasons above.

Managed correctly, I reckon this idea has the potential to easily self-fund Wrexham all the way to the Championship, where at the very least they have an asset worth significantly more than any net investment up to that point. At that point, I suspect they may seek further outside investment with a view to take Wrexham into the top flight, at which point the club is literally worth hundreds of millions. The story is complete, and they búgger off even wealthier than when they arrived having increased their own profile and had a few laughs along the way.

I personally think it's quite clever, and of course it only works because of the profile of the investors, but I think this actually amounts to a very low risk investment with incredibly high potential thanks to the unique parameters involved - fame, the current high value of streaming content, the cash cow that is the Premier League.

Whether this ultimately amounts to being a good thing for Wrexham fans in the long-term is debatable, because when you boil it all down this is not about 'them'. Like seemingly everything in football these days, it's about making money, creating personal wealth. No amount of Hollywood charisma can obscure that fact.

I agree I don’t think there’s a sinister motive and I hope it works out well, but what I was trying to say in my previous post is that it isn’t easy.

Also I don’t think this situation is unique. Having a business plan and lots of potential money to invest isn’t a new scenario. Granted a tv series that could pay for the investment is, but again that doesn’t guarantee success. Sunderland are much bigger than Wrexham, with better players and better infrastructure and their TV show didn’t catapult them back to the Championship.

I think to say ‘managing this correctly’ creates the potential to easily self-fund their way to the championship simplifies the whole process. The key is ‘managing correctly’. And there are plenty of examples of owners with savvy business plans and investments, who outline their dream and then fall short when it comes to implementing it.

I think its way too early to say their plan will make it easy for them to progress through the leagues. Although the tv aspect is a relatively new element, nothing they’ve said or the goals they’ve set are new, we have seen them all before. I hope it works for them, I genuinely do. My post is more a word of caution, it’s easy to write “it’s always sunny”, but history has shown it’s a lot harder to make it a reality.

 

[Rogero]

It does seem a strange choice of club .

 

[Bozza]

The takeover is complete.

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