Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

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TVC15
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TVC15 » Mon Mar 04, 2019 12:10 pm

My plan would be fine - extra revenue from corporate facilities to cover depreciation of £1m to £1.5m a year which we could easily cover from parachute payments (for first few years) and extra corporate income. And we are then geared up for any promotion.

Most of the grounds in the championship are better than ours remember and they have not had the windfall and profit reserves we have. If we are going to make between £20m and £30m profit for 4 or 5 consecutive years as we may well do then that is a very healthy position which protects us and allows us to invest for many years.

I suspect I am talking about spending a lot less than Crosspool
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Vegas Claret » Mon Mar 04, 2019 3:51 pm

GodIsADeeJay81 wrote:Rovers had the cheapest season tickets in the PL for years and years.
They even arranged free buses I think for many fans further out.

They still failed to sell out every game.

The PL loses it's allure after a period of mid table dossing,or fighting relegation, it's a guarantee for the majority of clubs.
That's why it was simply bizarre to watch some on here having a gripe about the club being in the Europa league when it's pretty much the only thing that's been different for the club during it's time in the PL, apart from hitting those heights of 7th of course.

Cheap tickets would help for the short term, but it still doesn't ensure a full house and our tickets aren't overpriced really, plus the spread payments with the club is a brilliant option (apart from the direct debit date :roll: )
all fair points ! :)

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Goody1975 » Mon Mar 04, 2019 5:22 pm

Vegas Claret wrote:I'm not suggesting we do, I merely suggesting that better players would attract bigger crowds not new shiny seats
...and i've outlined above that we plan for ground redevelopment and only push ahead with it if we remain a Premier League club for the next few seasons. If we set aside a % of the profits we make each season we can surely tackle at least one of the older stands, this should be completely separate from any player purchases and wage budgets.

If we are budgeting wisely our club should be making a profit of a minimum of £20 million per year in the Premier League (except for exceptional circumstances), if we start getting close to break even we are a relegation away from being in serious ****.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Claret eze » Mon Mar 04, 2019 7:05 pm

.people talk like we haven't a pot to p**s in.we are not in the 4th division anymore grandad.
Nobody is asking to match man city or United but come on people,it's 3rd or 4th rate at best.its a global game now with global fans,and global money.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by CrosspoolClarets » Mon Mar 04, 2019 7:37 pm

TVC15 wrote:I suspect I am talking about spending a lot less than Crosspool
I wouldn’t hold a view as to the level of spending needed. I don’t possess the necessary information.

If I were doing it I would speak to all the stakeholders and experts, including the design and structural experts as well as the “chiefs” who would need to decide what they want. Only then can the finances be drawn up and prior to that even the “insiders” wouldn’t know factually what it would cost. I would hope that has already been done, but who knows?

I would expect a long term plan to have in it the plans to replace the cricket field as a minimum, but would also need long term ideas for the other stands in various circumstances so that the cricket field plans are a “fit” for the longer term (e.g. if we stayed up for another 10 years and decided to replace the whole lot in stages).

Realistically I would hope for a new CFS after buying the cricket pitch (whatever offer it takes) and some significant but not absurd changes to the main stands depending on the art of the possible. The latter would be beyond cosmetic but could range from moderate (e.g. more toilets, hot water and fast beer dispensers) to major improvements (probably costing a few million at the upper end, such as structural changes to make the upper concourses bigger).

But, back to the money, all in all I would be interested to see what £50m could buy, 50% cash and 50% borrowed and repayable over 4 years, secured on TV money. I’m not talking daft levels of spending. But to reiterate, we don’t know what things would cost without extensive dialogue so it’s only a guess just for the chat on here.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by CrosspoolClarets » Mon Mar 04, 2019 7:42 pm

Lancasterclaret wrote:Quick question, but with the variety of income that could come in due to relegation, how feasible is a long term plan that doesn't take into account we could get relegated in the first year of that 30 year plan?
The 30 year plan would have many trigger points built in (e.g. get relegated and don’t return we do “x”, whereas get relegated and bounce back we do “y”). I’d expect at least a dozen scenarios with a dozen income streams and thus a dozen expenditure models. Several dozen ideally - gives the accounting team something to do.

A bit like the Treasury’s Brexit plans we have discussed many times - the Treasury must have dozens of models, they just aren’t sharing them with us. Same for this.

The plan would be the same as they would have for player recruitment, just longer term as you must do with capital expenditure.

So yes, ambitious definitely, but safe too. Every financial plan is irresponsible if it doesn’t allow for contingencies.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TVC15 » Mon Mar 04, 2019 7:47 pm

CrosspoolClarets wrote:I wouldn’t hold a view as to the level of spending needed. I don’t possess the necessary information.

If I were doing it I would speak to all the stakeholders and experts, including the design and structural experts as well as the “chiefs” who would need to decide what they want. Only then can the finances be drawn up and prior to that even the “insiders” wouldn’t know factually what it would cost. I would hope that has already been done, but who knows?

I would expect a long term plan to have in it the plans to replace the cricket field as a minimum, but would also need long term ideas for the other stands in various circumstances so that the cricket field plans are a “fit” for the longer term (e.g. if we stayed up for another 10 years and decided to replace the whole lot in stages).

Realistically I would hope for a new CFS after buying the cricket pitch (whatever offer it takes) and some significant but not absurd changes to the main stands depending on the art of the possible. The latter would be beyond cosmetic but could range from moderate (e.g. more toilets, hot water and fast beer dispensers) to major improvements (probably costing a few million at the upper end, such as structural changes to make the upper concourses bigger).

But, back to the money, all in all I would be interested to see what £50m could buy, 50% cash and 50% borrowed and repayable over 4 years, secured on TV money. I’m not talking daft levels of spending. But to reiterate, we don’t know what things would cost without extensive dialogue so it’s only a guess just for the chat on here.
As I said if I think you have bigger plans !
Personally I would not be interested in taking the club £25m into debt....or any debt actually.
At the end of the day you could put together forecasts and feasibility studies all you want but in my view relegation is pretty inevitable and going back up is far from inevitable.
That’s not me being negative or unambitious - it’s purely looking at the facts of the last 30 years of Premier league where all but 6 of the teams have been relegated at some point and many clubs far bigger than us failed to get up.
As I have previously said I don’t believe Burnley has the demographic / social population to make the kind of plans you are talking about viable.
A doubling of corporate hospitality / 10% increase in capacity possibly...and even that presents a big risk if we went down and stayed down as eventually our attendances and corporate would not be sustainable at the level they are today let alone increased capacity.

Any plan where we are spending the levels you are talking about is not viable IMHO.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by dsr » Mon Mar 04, 2019 11:35 pm

Mayne someone could do a poll on what people want from the matchday experience. I want to roll up sometime before 3 o'clock, watch the match, and leave at full time. For what I want, the Bob Lord Stand is perfect. What do other people want? How many people want a "matchday experience", and how many don't?

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Spijed » Tue Mar 05, 2019 9:51 am

dsr wrote:I want to roll up sometime before 3 o'clock, watch the match, and leave at full time.
That probably applies to the vast majority of supporters as well.

I'd certainly hate to hang around if we'd had a bad defeat.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TVC15 » Tue Mar 05, 2019 10:01 am

The home match day experience for most of us is about 2.5 hours between 2.30pm and 5pm in terms of being at the ground. If there were better and more facilities then many more people may arrive earlier instead of packing out the 110 club or other pubs.
Its also about improving the experience / facilities when you are there - however long that us.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by aggi » Tue Mar 05, 2019 10:23 am

Brighton is a good example recently of the kind of thing that could be achieved without a huge deal of cost. Decent range of beers, decent range of pies, including ones that actually had meat in them (I know the turf claims to have steak and kidney pies but I've never actually found one for sale), and other food, fast service, toilets and concourse that weren't rammed and plenty of screens so that you can watch the early/late kick off before/after the match (when the bar is still open).

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by aggi » Tue Mar 05, 2019 10:23 am

Spijed wrote:That probably applies to the vast majority of supporters as well.

I'd certainly hate to hang around if we'd had a bad defeat.
But I wouldn't mind hanging around if we'd had a good win (Spurs the other week for example).

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Barry_Chuckle » Tue Mar 05, 2019 10:34 am

dsr wrote:Mayne someone could do a poll on what people want from the matchday experience.
I want to turn up at the fanzone, have reasonably speedy service for a pint, and most importantly, enjoy the football being shown on the big screen along with being able to hear the commentary.
Instead, you struggle to hear commentary due to the gash music being played by 2BR.

The fanzone is for football fans, we are there to watch football, if I wanted to listen to music, I'd either wear earphones of go clubbing.

Sort it out Burnley or I'll take my pre match business elsewhere. :roll:

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Reecey1987 » Tue Mar 05, 2019 10:38 am

Barry_Chuckle wrote:I want to turn up at the fanzone, have reasonably speedy service for a pint, and most importantly, enjoy the football being shown on the big screen along with being able to hear the commentary.
Instead, you struggle to hear commentary due to the gash music being played by 2BR.

The fanzone is for football fans, we are there to watch football, if I wanted to listen to music, I'd either wear earphones of go clubbing.

Sort it out Burnley or I'll take my pre match business elsewhere. :roll:
2br has been bought out by capital fm so you wont need to worry about that for much longer

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by CrosspoolClarets » Tue Mar 05, 2019 11:16 am

TVC15 wrote:As I said if I think you have bigger plans !
Personally I would not be interested in taking the club £25m into debt....or any debt actually.
At the end of the day you could put together forecasts and feasibility studies all you want but in my view relegation is pretty inevitable and going back up is far from inevitable.
That’s not me being negative or unambitious - it’s purely looking at the facts of the last 30 years of Premier league where all but 6 of the teams have been relegated at some point and many clubs far bigger than us failed to get up.
As I have previously said I don’t believe Burnley has the demographic / social population to make the kind of plans you are talking about viable.
A doubling of corporate hospitality / 10% increase in capacity possibly...and even that presents a big risk if we went down and stayed down as eventually our attendances and corporate would not be sustainable at the level they are today let alone increased capacity.

Any plan where we are spending the levels you are talking about is not viable IMHO.
Any capital expenditure of significance involves debt. Very, very few organisations would have the cash flow and debt can be low risk. I agree we aren't certain to bounce back.

I disagree with the viability though. We would be talking about <£10m per annum repayments for 6 years or <£15m for 4 years which is out of a £150m pot if we stay up and parachute payments of >£40m for 2 years if we go down, and a third year which is still in excess of this repayment value. We could of course spread it over a longer term but that adds to the risk that the club's income would dry up in that period. If we stay up, it is easily affordable. If we go down, a better quality stadium would be more likely to retain shareholder value rather than gambling on paying that money to players in wages and hoping they get us back up. I see it as a no brainer. There are reasons many other clubs are doing it, they are not just throwing money away.

Plenty of other clubs are combining housing schemes, hotels, conference facilities and other things with redevelopments too. London is different admittedly, but we should look at Brentford for ideas, Luton, Aberdeen (total cost £50m), Plymouth, and, in the rugby, Exeter Chiefs.

Not one of those places have income levels from Premier League football like we do. I simply don't accept that we can't do something that won't massively improve standards, create jobs, as well as safeguard the future of the club.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Lancasterclaret » Tue Mar 05, 2019 11:26 am

Plenty of other clubs are combining housing schemes, hotels, conference facilities and other things with redevelopments too. London is different admittedly, but we should look at Brentford for ideas, Luton, Aberdeen (total cost £50m), Plymouth, and, in the rugby, Exeter Chiefs.
First thing I'd say about all of them is that they are the big town in the area, which we are definitely not.

Much better transport networks etc

I fully agree that any expansion/development we do has to be focused on the needs of the town as well (I think the hub they advertise at half time is brilliant for example)

But does that involve a hotel? Something else like excellent business/conference facilities? Social housing?

Genuinely have little idea about this kind of thing to be honest so would love to hear more specifics about what people have in mind

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Claretforever » Tue Mar 05, 2019 11:59 am

Could we think a little differently with regards to the Cricket Club? Why do they need to relocate, and why should they? I mention this as people have put this forward in the recent past.

Okay, I’m not sure of the designs of course, but couldn’t we purchase the 10 metre wide strip of land behind the Cricket Field stand which the C.C. currently use for their bowling practice?

We could then create a larger stand, and partly attached to that we (together with the C.C. in some financial arrangements) rebuild their pavilion but making it much larger to incorporate our new fan zone at the back of it?

It could be separated to ensure segregation from away fans on match days, but allow extra revenue for the Cricket Club on non-football match days.

Sorry for the basic lines added, but it’s just to show the area I’m talking about.

Image

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TVC15 » Tue Mar 05, 2019 1:35 pm

CrosspoolClarets wrote:Any capital expenditure of significance involves debt. Very, very few organisations would have the cash flow and debt can be low risk. I agree we aren't certain to bounce back.

I disagree with the viability though. We would be talking about <£10m per annum repayments for 6 years or <£15m for 4 years which is out of a £150m pot if we stay up and parachute payments of >£40m for 2 years if we go down, and a third year which is still in excess of this repayment value. We could of course spread it over a longer term but that adds to the risk that the club's income would dry up in that period. If we stay up, it is easily affordable. If we go down, a better quality stadium would be more likely to retain shareholder value rather than gambling on paying that money to players in wages and hoping they get us back up. I see it as a no brainer. There are reasons many other clubs are doing it, they are not just throwing money away.

Plenty of other clubs are combining housing schemes, hotels, conference facilities and other things with redevelopments too. London is different admittedly, but we should look at Brentford for ideas, Luton, Aberdeen (total cost £50m), Plymouth, and, in the rugby, Exeter Chiefs.

Not one of those places have income levels from Premier League football like we do. I simply don't accept that we can't do something that won't massively improve standards, create jobs, as well as safeguard the future of the club.
“If we go down more likely to retain shareholder value”

That does not make any sense to me at all.
If we go down - everything goes down...support, revenue, profit....and ultimately the value of the club. I do not know any examples in the unique world of football business where a club had been relegated and they have “retained shareholder value”....Bolton, Sunderland, Leeds, Ipswich, Norwich - the list is endless. Ask them how they are getting on with retaining shareholder value.

The kind of investment you are talking will never ever happen under the current board - and I think the vast majority of fans would be pleased with that fact.

Just as an aside - how do we repay £10m a year when the parachute payments have ended and we still have a wage bill of £25m and we are back to annual revenue numbers of £20m ?...these shareholders you refer to going to stump up to pay the debt ? We do not have a sugar daddy prepared to write it off and even those clubs that did like Bolton are not exactly in the best of financial health ! Remember Bolton had a hotel, a new ground, etc. They have now not got enough money to pay the cleaners.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by AndyClaret » Tue Mar 05, 2019 2:13 pm

I spend around £25 every home match in the 110 club on beer and food, the club could have this money if they provided similar facilities at a reasonable price.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by aggi » Tue Mar 05, 2019 3:00 pm

CrosspoolClarets wrote:Any capital expenditure of significance involves debt. Very, very few organisations would have the cash flow and debt can be low risk. I agree we aren't certain to bounce back.

I disagree with the viability though. We would be talking about <£10m per annum repayments for 6 years or <£15m for 4 years which is out of a £150m pot if we stay up and parachute payments of >£40m for 2 years if we go down, and a third year which is still in excess of this repayment value. We could of course spread it over a longer term but that adds to the risk that the club's income would dry up in that period. If we stay up, it is easily affordable. If we go down, a better quality stadium would be more likely to retain shareholder value rather than gambling on paying that money to players in wages and hoping they get us back up. I see it as a no brainer. There are reasons many other clubs are doing it, they are not just throwing money away.

Plenty of other clubs are combining housing schemes, hotels, conference facilities and other things with redevelopments too. London is different admittedly, but we should look at Brentford for ideas, Luton, Aberdeen (total cost £50m), Plymouth, and, in the rugby, Exeter Chiefs.

Not one of those places have income levels from Premier League football like we do. I simply don't accept that we can't do something that won't massively improve standards, create jobs, as well as safeguard the future of the club.
The issue there is that if we go down we're going to need those parachute payments to pay our wages and for working capital. Even if wages drop by 50% that will eat up pretty much all of the parachute payments.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Royboyclaret » Tue Mar 05, 2019 3:08 pm

aggi wrote:The issue there is that if we go down we're going to need those parachute payments to pay our wages and for working capital. Even if wages drop by 50% that will eat up pretty much all of the parachute payments.
And this supposed "£150m pot" is out of the question too.

We'd have to win the PL to reach that level. This current season, if we finish 17th, £130m is a realistic figure.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Murger » Tue Mar 05, 2019 3:56 pm

How much would it seriously cost to put a building up where the marquee is? Wouldn't be millions would it? Somewhere where people can actually use proper toilets and drink their beer without standing out in the rain.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by CrosspoolClarets » Tue Mar 05, 2019 5:03 pm

aggi wrote:The issue there is that if we go down we're going to need those parachute payments to pay our wages and for working capital. Even if wages drop by 50% that will eat up pretty much all of the parachute payments.
That should all be part of the long term financial plan. I agree it needs factoring in, my assertion is simply that there is a financial model possible that would include the investment I suggested whilst having a competitive squad and a solvent club. None of us can build that model without seeing all the details but my instinct is that it is do-able.

Regarding Royboy's comment I am quite comfortable with my £150m figure as an average turnover in (say) 2019/20 if we stay up (new TV deal kicks in, including bigger overseas deal, and not forgetting our other income streams). Lack year I would expect a £140m turnover (without checking, I know we got well over £120m from TV). It was only a guess though. I'm also quite comfortable with my assertion that building a better ground would retain more shareholder value than not doing so (in the context of us being in the same league position in both scenarios) - our crumbling infrastructure would mean any potential owner would have to factor a need for investment in facilities into the value of the business when bidding.

I agree with many of the above comments, such as "this board will never do it". Sadly though, if not then once the thrill of the Premier League wears off the board will have exceeded their usefulness to the fans who will gradually drift away.

Ultimately though it comes down to mindset. I have spent my long career advising fellow accountants to beware being the risk-averse person in the grey suit saying "no" all the time, instead say "yes, we can be ambitious, but we must be careful and I can help you do it in a balanced way". I very much hope that the financial strategist / advisers who are advising BFC are the latter type, not the former.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by CrosspoolClarets » Tue Mar 05, 2019 5:05 pm

p.s. see how few political threads there are on the front page when there is something interesting in football to discuss. Instead of people moaning about political threads, they should start an interesting football one ;)

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Royboyclaret » Tue Mar 05, 2019 5:14 pm

In agreement with your Turnover last year of £140m, Crosspool.

That figure includes £119.4m TV Income based on our hefty merit payment for finishing 7th.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TVC15 » Tue Mar 05, 2019 5:18 pm

Tbh those very same consultants who are more “care-free” with other people’s money are the only people who are guaranteed to come out of any proposed venture a lot richer !!

Still do not see the commercial viability of the investment levels you are talking as I just do not see where the additional revenue needed to cover this would come from....and the downside risks of being relegated are far too great for a club of our ownership structure.
I do believe there is definitely room for some investment which would not put our future at risk and could have potential upside by delivering a better product for fans and corporate customers aswell as a modest increase in capacity of around 10% for fans and 50% to 100% for corporate.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Lancasterclaret » Tue Mar 05, 2019 5:19 pm

Crikey Crosspool, we would lose 90% of our income if we get relegated.

I'm not sure how you factor that in to a long term plan, even with financing.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Claret eze » Tue Mar 05, 2019 7:54 pm

Let's wait until we get relegated,this year,5 years ,10 years 20 years etc,then we don't come straight back up but 2 of the stands badly need replacing, so because money is tight again we build 2 really bad stands,not aligned with the pitch.but they are cheap and that's what we need with no money and start the cycle again.
Sounds like abit of a fairytale to me.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TsarBomba » Tue Mar 05, 2019 8:37 pm

Claret eze wrote:Let's wait until we get relegated,this year,5 years ,10 years 20 years etc,then we don't come straight back up but 2 of the stands badly need replacing, so because money is tight again we build 2 really bad stands,not aligned with the pitch.but they are cheap and that's what we need with no money and start the cycle again.
Sounds like abit of a fairytale to me.
Absolutely.

The ‘new’ stands are crap, and should serve as a warning.

Unfortunately, we don’t seem to have heeded that warning, and history is repeating itself with the disabled facilities.

The whole feel of the ground is ramshackled, bodged together, lick of paint here and there. ‘Improvements’ done on the cheap, and done only because we have to, and not because there is an appetite at boardroom level.

No one is advocating a fortune being spent, I’m certainly not, but jeez, let’s have a bit of pride FFS.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Claretforever » Tue Mar 05, 2019 9:17 pm

I totally agree, Tsar. Bob Lord, for his sins, wanted Burnley to look and feel part of the elite. Maybe he had ideas above our station, but he made Turf Moor into a ground to be a proud of for the time.

Our board these days appear to only do the mandatory upgrades and work, and care very little about the look of the ground or comfort of the fans.

Take the new corner stands. The plan is for cheap corrugated cladding, rather than the better looking cassette cladding. The main Entrance of the Bob Lord - Cheap columns with facia bricks, and a metal base. Penny pinching at every turn when we have plenty.

I’m a fan who was brought up on open air toilets on the Longside, but times move on, expectations change, and I want to be proud of our ground and facilities. No, I don’t expect to have the same facilities as Spurs, Arsenal or Man City, but having similar to Derby, Blackburn or Forest would be a good start,
Last edited by Claretforever on Tue Mar 05, 2019 9:20 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Bordeauxclaret » Tue Mar 05, 2019 9:20 pm

TsarBomba wrote:Absolutely.

The ‘new’ stands are crap, and should serve as a warning.

Unfortunately, we don’t seem to have heeded that warning, and history is repeating itself with the disabled facilities.

The whole feel of the ground is ramshackled, bodged together, lick of paint here and there. ‘Improvements’ done on the cheap, and done only because we have to, and not because there is an appetite at boardroom level.

No one is advocating a fortune being spent, I’m certainly not, but jeez, let’s have a bit of pride FFS.
Agree with a lot of this.
How many improvements have we made to the ground since the Jimmy Mac was built that we haven’t been forced into?

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Claretforever » Tue Mar 05, 2019 10:45 pm

It’s all been forced, INCLUDING the Jimmy Mac and Longside. We haven’t made any improvements to fan facilities through choice since Bonn Lord died. That’s almost 40 years ago!

We built the training ground because Dyche demanded it and we missed out on players and other managers because of the way it was.

We developed the club store for whose benefit? Bigger store and bigger offices and corporate for the club’s benefit and increasing staff.

In 1954 we put a large roof on the Longside for the fans, whilst also concreting the terrace, again for the fans.

In the late 60’s it was about the fans really, and Bob wanting to fit in with the big boys. A bit of vanity, but improved fan facilties.

Since then we’ve had nothing.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Spijed » Tue Mar 05, 2019 10:53 pm

Claretforever wrote:We developed the club store for whose benefit? Bigger store and bigger offices and corporate for the club’s benefit and increasing staff.
What a daft thing to say, considering EVERY club in the league, especially those in the Prem build bigger and better club stores for one thing and one thing alone - Profit!

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Claretforever » Tue Mar 05, 2019 10:59 pm

Spijed wrote:What a daft thing to say, considering EVERY club in the league, especially those in the Prem build bigger and better club stores for one thing and one thing alone - Profit!
I was merely covering that off in case anybody brought recent developments up. I’m sure you knew that though.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Royboyclaret » Tue Mar 05, 2019 11:30 pm

Claretforever wrote:It’s all been forced, INCLUDING the Jimmy Mac and Longside. We haven’t made any improvements to fan facilities through choice since Bonn Lord died. That’s almost 40 years ago!

We built the training ground because Dyche demanded it and we missed out on players and other managers because of the way it was.

We developed the club store for whose benefit? Bigger store and bigger offices and corporate for the club’s benefit and increasing staff.

In 1954 we put a large roof on the Longside for the fans, whilst also concreting the terrace, again for the fans.

In the late 60’s it was about the fans really, and Bob wanting to fit in with the big boys. A bit of vanity, but improved fan facilties.

Since then we’ve had nothing.
Top post........When you tell it like that Claretforever I doubt very many, if any, will argue.

For all his faults, we owe a massive debt of gratitude to Bob Lord. He was the real visionary that made all these improvements to Turf Moor with the Burnley supporters first and foremost in mind. Makes me realise he is exactly the type that this Boardroom needs right now, someone to galvanise the secret seven into action at a time when the finance is readily available. Someone who is proactive rather than reactive and, just as important, someone who also sees communication with the fans as essential via face to face meetings at the Club, rather than a five minute interview on the Club website twice a year.

No wonder at his funeral, Bob Lord was described as one of Burnley's great men and compared to other giants of the industrial North, men such as Arkwright, Hargreaves and Shuttleworth. If only Bob was available for the Chairmanship right now, we'd be witnessing actions as well as words.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Turfytop » Tue Mar 05, 2019 11:50 pm

TsarBomba wrote:Absolutely.

The ‘new’ stands are crap, and should serve as a warning.

Unfortunately, we don’t seem to have heeded that warning, and history is repeating itself with the disabled facilities.

The whole feel of the ground is ramshackled, bodged together, lick of paint here and there. ‘Improvements’ done on the cheap, and done only because we have to, and not because there is an appetite at boardroom level.

No one is advocating a fortune being spent, I’m certainly not, but jeez, let’s have a bit of pride FFS.
Spot on

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by CrosspoolClarets » Wed Mar 06, 2019 12:01 am

Royboyclaret wrote:No wonder at his funeral, Bob Lord was described as one of Burnley's great men and compared to other giants of the industrial North, men such as Arkwright, Hargreaves and Shuttleworth. If only Bob was available for the Chairmanship right now, we'd be witnessing actions as well as words.
“Great” is a word bandied around too often.

Not in Bob’s case (he used to live yards away from me, many years ago).

I’d hazard a guess he would have agreed with the thrust of what I have been rattling on about in this thread. You can’t be risk averse when you are from Burnley. Life is too darn short and we are starting from too far behind. Dare to dream.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by bfcwest » Wed Mar 06, 2019 8:38 am

The other sad element to our penny pinching when it comes to Turf Moor and how the fans are treated on Match Day is that in the long run it costs us more. If the board thought a bit bigger and invested a bit more, then we would get things sorted for the long run, rather than having to "buy cheap, buy twice" all the time.

The new corner stands seem like an example of this. Couldn't we have invested more into the one between the Longside and the Jimmy Mac, made it much bigger so that it could have served more purpose, with bigger capacity, and maybe done away with the need for the one on the other side that is still going up? If it had been deeper and taller then they could have created a big bar / 'food court' area on the same level as the upper tier concourses that could have been accessed from the Longside or the Jimmy Mac Uppers. (It would have needed a wall down the middle obviously to prevent fans going from one stand to the other, although this isn't an issue in other grounds where you can sometimes walk all the way round).

This would have gone along way to solving the overcrowding and queues that happen in the upper tier concourses. It could have had windows overlooking the fan zone and would have been a great place for a drink and a bite to eat before the game. All this could have generated extra revenue, improved the fans experience, and also meant we didn't need to build the other corner, which I think is only going to get in the way when we come to re-build the Bob Lord (it maybe the ready made excuse for why they don't re-build it!).

UTC
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by randomclaret2 » Wed Mar 06, 2019 10:37 am

I made an observation about the age of our directors on another thread a while back and was quickly shot down I seem to recall. It just seems unlikely that the club will be forward looking, dynamic and modern when aside from MG and JB I would imagine all our other Board members are over 70. I stand to be corrected and am not trying to knock the board for the sake of it but there must surely be a connection of some sort.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TVC15 » Wed Mar 06, 2019 10:59 am

randomclaret2 wrote:I made an observation about the age of our directors on another thread a while back and was quickly shot down I seem to recall. It just seems unlikely that the club will be forward looking, dynamic and modern when aside from MG and JB I would imagine all our other Board members are over 70. I stand to be corrected and am not trying to knock the board for the sake of it but there must surely be a connection of some sort.
I know what you mean but isn’t Flood still on the board ?
He’s in his 50s...I wouldn’t trust him with a single cent of the clubs money.

I do agree that the board is crying out for an injection of new blood though. Whilst I will always be grateful for the fact they chose Dyche and he brought us this completely unexpected period of success I think the current board do not have the experience and expertise to deal with the billion pound business that is the Premier League.

Whilst I have personally said many times that all the history of the Premier League points to relegation st some point I don’t expect our current board to continuously act in such a way that they also think it’s inevitable. I’m all for having a contingency plan and mitigating risk actions like players contracts having relegation clauses but as a board they have taken their frugal approach way way too far....and it will impact on our future.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Guich » Wed Mar 06, 2019 11:15 am

TVC15 wrote:I know what you mean but isn’t Flood still on the board ?
He’s in his 50s...I wouldn’t trust him with a single cent of the clubs money.

I do agree that the board is crying out for an injection of new blood though.
Had Flood not grabbed the club by the scruff of its neck and rolled the dice back in 2007/8 we'd now be in League 1 or 2.

Yes, he took risks; but that's often what distinguished football owners on either side of the Pennines back then. While the North West had 8 Premier League clubs in 2010, Yorkshire's finest was Doncaster Rovers.

He wasn't simply a reckless fan as his detractors may have you believe, he introduced a carefully structured and calculated buying and selling policy.

Barry and Brendon worked pretty well together, Garlick was an outsider and took his chance when it came - global debt crisis and health issues. But he doesn't have vision or ambition.

I'd be very happy to see Barry and Brendon work with the money we have now.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TVC15 » Wed Mar 06, 2019 12:36 pm

That’s one way of looking at it I suppose.
I’ve got a bit more of a detailed knowledge as to how his companies operate and another way of looking at it was that he put into the club money that his company only had on paper - the commercial property market crashed and he took back the money he had lent to the club and then some. Fortunately for us we had been promoted as he would have had to take this money back regardless of our promotion....and Burnley FC would have gone into administration. There is no way on earth Flood would have chosen his own company going into administration and personal bankruptcy before the club.

In my book that is not a carefully structured strategy - given our financial future pretty much hung on a toss of a coin 90 minutes versus Sheff Utd.

Of course I am happy the way it turned out but if I was to weigh up the downside of not winning that game and going into administration with losses which would have been around £10m to £15m then I don’t think that I and many other fans would have taken that gamble.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Rileybobs » Wed Mar 06, 2019 1:31 pm

Claretforever wrote:Our board these days appear to only do the mandatory upgrades and work, and care very little about the look of the ground or comfort of the fans.

Take the new corner stands. The plan is for cheap corrugated cladding, rather than the better looking cassette cladding.
Where do you get this from? The plan is for concrete cladding.
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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Guich » Wed Mar 06, 2019 2:48 pm

TVC15 wrote:That’s one way of looking at it I suppose.
I’ve got a bit more of a detailed knowledge as to how his companies operate and another way of looking at it was that he put into the club money that his company only had on paper - the commercial property market crashed and he took back the money he had lent to the club and then some. Fortunately for us we had been promoted as he would have had to take this money back regardless of our promotion....and Burnley FC would have gone into administration. There is no way on earth Flood would have chosen his own company going into administration and personal bankruptcy before the club.

In my book that is not a carefully structured strategy - given our financial future pretty much hung on a toss of a coin 90 minutes versus Sheff Utd.

Of course I am happy the way it turned out but if I was to weigh up the downside of not winning that game and going into administration with losses which would have been around £10m to £15m then I don’t think that I and many other fans would have taken that gamble.
Fair enough TV.

Modus' business affairs were in the public domain, but without knowing how BF's personal finances were structured it's impossible to say what he would have done if we hadn't beaten Sheff United.

My understanding was that some other directors were keen to discuss repayments of their own £500k investments pretty soon after the final whistle. I very much doubt we would have gone into administration. Could be wrong though...

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by aggi » Wed Mar 06, 2019 3:05 pm

Guich wrote:Fair enough TV.

Modus' business affairs were in the public domain, but without knowing how BF's personal finances were structured it's impossible to say what he would have done if we hadn't beaten Sheff United.

My understanding was that some other directors were keen to discuss repayments of their own £500k investments pretty soon after the final whistle. I very much doubt we would have gone into administration. Could be wrong though...
From what I remember it wasn't up to BF whether the loans were called in. Modus (I think, it may have been another of his companies) went into administration and it was the administrators who called in the loan (and that would have happened regardless of the play-off result).

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Chester Perry » Wed Mar 06, 2019 3:25 pm

Guich wrote: My understanding was that some other directors were keen to discuss repayments of their own £500k investments pretty soon after the final whistle. I very much doubt we would have gone into administration. Could be wrong though...
The terms of those loans were that they were to be repaid should we ever get into the premier league - there was never the expectation that they would be repaid anytime soon.

What I like most about our club and the boards activities is that that it is built on sustainable business practices. Would I have gone about the £20m+ spend on Turf Moor in the Premier League years - absolutely, the design in all instances is truly woeful, but that could be said about almost anything in Burnley in the last 70 years.

I would be pleasantly surprised if the Cricketfield stand could be replaced for less than £30m with anything better than the Linpave sheds

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TVC15 » Wed Mar 06, 2019 4:25 pm

Guich wrote:Fair enough TV.

Modus' business affairs were in the public domain, but without knowing how BF's personal finances were structured it's impossible to say what he would have done if we hadn't beaten Sheff United.

My understanding was that some other directors were keen to discuss repayments of their own £500k investments pretty soon after the final whistle. I very much doubt we would have gone into administration. Could be wrong though...
Why do you not think we would have not gone into administration ?
You can look at the accounts for that year and see the loss we made - from memory it was £9m. Add on Modus calling in the debt and you are up to around £13m.
Bearing in mind we did not own Turf Moor or Gawthorpe at this point I don’t see we would have had much alternative.
It’s been well reported since that we would have been in massive trouble if we would not have gone up.

Personally i’d say what Flood persuaded the rest of the board to do was wreckless. How much due diligence do you think the board did on Modus ? At the very same time we were borrowing money from Modus all the major banks had stopped lending in that very same sector they operated in.
Why do we think that Barry Kilby took the main assets of the club out of the clubs name and into subsidiaries owned by him and others ?

That whole period is looked upon by many fans as a golden period purely because of what happened on the pitch - which I agree was brilliant. But what was happening in the board room was very “strange” - i’m trying to be diplomatic using that term because if this had happened at any other club we’d all be using different words !!

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Guich » Wed Mar 06, 2019 4:57 pm

There are two sides to this TVC15, and it appears we have some insight from either side.

Flood was the catalyst to our success and I agree there was risk involved. The timing made the risk much higher, as no-one quite foresaw the financial tsunami quickly enough. Had Flood's involvement been five years earlier the risk would have been much smaller.

You're right, he had bigger problems to handle with his core business than with the football club.

But no-one can deny his passion for the club nor his ability to bring contacts and money in, John B for instance. That's why I believe we would have muddled through.

I acknowledge we need a balance of risk and caution. I just think we can afford to be a little more ambitious/speculative now and Garlick is not the man for the job in my opinion.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by TVC15 » Wed Mar 06, 2019 5:13 pm

Not disagreeing about the current situation / board and we should be investing more and there is a lot of room for improvement in the way we operate. I agree that Garlick is not the man - I don’t think there is anyone on the current board with that expertise.

We’ll have to agree to disagree on what Flood did. As I said I know what what happening to the sector at this time - yes the crash was a lot worse and more devastating than expected but in terms of the commercial property sector the decline and risk was already there. I was working in the corporate finance sector and the way that many companies like Modus grew and valued their companies was not too different to the dot com boom in the late 1990s....it was crazy and very clearly not sustainable. It defied any financial logic and I am 100% sure our board did not know what we were getting ourselves into but i’m equally convinced Flood did. I have met quite a few directors of commercial property companies and they all knew that it would end at some point but they could make a sh-it load of money for a short while.

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Re: Mike Garlick says we have £24m in bank

Post by Guich » Wed Mar 06, 2019 5:39 pm

Well we agree on that then. Good.

I did a fair amount of commercial property lending too, and the speed of growth is often linked to the gearing. You're right about the escalating risk, but I guess the question is as much about our beloved club and the man himself.

Looking at the old canons of lending - Character, Capability and Capital - if you believe the fist 'C' to be questionable then we may well have entered administration. I'm trying not to sound too naïve and thankfully it's hypothetical now.

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