Time for Norman Smurthwaite to put a genuine price tag on the club and go

[Family Stand Terrier]

No it would not, his biggest mistake would be to hang on and continue to cover the losses that have been incurred because of his management/owner decisions. Then at some point in the future when he runs out of money or decides that his £3.7 Million has now become something like £7M or £8M and that is too much he would have to go into administration. At that point new owners could pick up the club at a knock down price and Norman would be say £8M out of pocket. So selling now is quite a good idea even if it means walking away with £3.7M less in your pocket. Doing that now will end his losses, the longer he continues the longer he is putting his signature against a blank cheque.

 

Potential owners are not stupid, if they think we will go into admin they will sit tight and then pick up the pieces at a knock down price, the Chairman needs to convince them to buy now.

Exactly. Smurfs supporters themselves have said that if we give Smurf a few more seasons his gambles may pay off. That's Smurfs business plan, he's said as much. He hopes we sell a player, get into the playoffs or get a good cup draw. That's not a sensible plan that inspires confidence. Especially given his track record so far and where it's taken us financialy. It's not rocket science to see where we'll head if he doesn't write off the debt and carry on adding to it. I don't understand how people can be confident in his ability to turn things around.

 

Sent from my D6603 using the onevalefan mobile app

[Jacko51]

So how will it change with new owners?I know,a well run business owned by well meaning people who will **** off as soon as it goes **** up,because they won't be putting in unlimited funding.According to some people 3.7m is the least an owner should be putting in.Loans or whatever can be turned into equity if required.Whats the difference?We keep getting "Why don't we pay better wages?"We can only pay 60% of revenue.Do the maths Bert.

 

So if the wages we pay are 60% of revenue, what has the £3.7 million been spent on?

[Howjy04]

So if the wages we pay are 60% of revenue, what has the £3.7 million been spent on?

 

Running costs.Staff wages(other than players)VAT,employer NI,utility bills,refurbing the Valiant suite and Tommy's.Building costs ,floodlights.Medical insurance and costs.Players insurance,signing on fees,Car leasing.Catering costs.Boomer's outfit,pitch improvements,Away travel costs.

I'll let you know if I think of anything else.

[Ben]

Running costs.Staff wages(other than players)VAT,employer NI,utility bills,refurbing the Valiant suite and Tommy's.Building costs ,floodlights.Medical insurance and costs.Players insurance,signing on fees,Car leasing.Catering costs.Boomer's outfit,pitch improvements,Away travel costs.

I'll let you know if I think of anything else.

 

Smurf costume

[George]

Running costs.Staff wages(other than players)VAT,employer NI,utility bills,refurbing the Valiant suite and Tommy's.Building costs ,floodlights.Medical insurance and costs.Players insurance,signing on fees,Car leasing.Catering costs.Boomer's outfit,pitch improvements,Away travel costs.

I'll let you know if I think of anything else.

 

It certainly hasn't been spent stocking up the food kiosks.

[Tosh]

Running costs.Staff wages(other than players)VAT,employer NI,utility bills,refurbing the Valiant suite and Tommy's.Building costs ,floodlights.Medical insurance and costs.Players insurance,signing on fees,Car leasing.Catering costs.Boomer's outfit,pitch improvements,Away travel costs.

I'll let you know if I think of anything else.

 

New flag.

[Jacko51]

Running costs.Staff wages(other than players)VAT,employer NI,utility bills,refurbing the Valiant suite and Tommy's.Building costs ,floodlights.Medical insurance and costs.Players insurance,signing on fees,Car leasing.Catering costs.Boomer's outfit,pitch improvements,Away travel costs.

I'll let you know if I think of anything else.

 

So the remaining 40% after the 60% wages doesn't cover any of this? Bloomin' heck!

[Mattholl]

I have previously posted that the administrators were running the club at break even whilst at the same time we were heading for promotion. Since then our Chairman has spent almost £4Million to move us backwards. Firstly we need to reduce needless pointless expenditure on players to cover the total folly of decisions made and also the rest of the money wasted by many of the Chairman's poor decisions.

 

In terms of adding to resources, look at the model of AFC Wimbledon, who are run by volunteers, and run very well. To set up that infrastructure requires the goodwill of supporters towards the Chairman. Our current Chairman has lost that battle (rightly or wrongly) so a new owner would be more likely to develop a detailed volunteer infrastructure. However a good new regime could add significant resources at little cost with a realistic volunteer database. Even from my distance of 200 miles away I could add expertise and do some actual marketing work and would be happy to do so. There will be many others like me. I would not do it for our current Chairman because.....well we all know the reasons why.

 

The Chairman may not want to walk away with a £2M loss but the alternative is that he continues the very high level of subsidy with little prospect of getting his money back and thereby increasing his losses. It is unsustainable to incur the losses he is doing with no end date. Sometimes in business you have to limit your losses to prevent catastrophe, our Chairman needs to assess the risks. He runs the risk of losing a lot more than £2M if he cannot turn the tide around and he can best come out of this with a loss of £2M and avoid a loss of a lot more. Every one of the Dragons in the den have lost money on some projects. Our Chairman seems to think he is such a super smart business man that he is exempt from that experience.

 

There is no sustainable goodwill towards him. No one wants a great Port Vale chairman more than me. However he has to be judged on the quality of his decisions and the strength of his communication. His track record in those areas is poor as Chairman. He has alienated the huge number of his core customers. If he was an executive he would have been sacked from any decent business a very long time ago for the reputational harm caused to his key customer base.

 

A business model needs to be produced that will demonstrate how the customer base will grow in the future. This means a determined attempt to capture youngsters and that can best be done by free tickets and other inducements to get them into the ground with their parents. An investment in that type of scheme rather than buying let another "Carlos kick a ball" (as described by Alan Sugar) would be a step in the right direction. More work needs to be done at generating off field income and that means building up strong relationships with local businesses. Our supporters work locally, some of them in influential jobs, would they recommend their employer engaged withe PV under the current regime? I would not that is for sure and I doubt others will do.

 

There is much that can be done. It may require a realistic assessment of us finding our true level. I would rather watch Port Vale in the national league than not watch them at all.

 

These are crucial times and we need someone with imagination, initiative, energy, passion to take the supporters along on the journey.

 

Ive also said that to say the club is able to be run at break even like during the administration is a complete sham. The PFA was paying the a massive part of the wages and staff were not being paid at all for long periods. All non essential debts and credit was also not paid during that time so we were paying caterers by the week etc..No owner can run the club with little to no wage cost, the staff working for free and the majority of the catering and shop based on week to week sales.

 

Judge the chairman however you like, he doesnt care and he owns the business. He can do with it as he wishes...a bit of bad feeling from supporters wont make him walk away from the club 2 million down. As for local fans in high places, everyone says they will work with PVFC but when it comes down to it they dont, we saw that under v2001. Business is business

[Mattholl]

Tim barber said nothing of the sort so stop twisting things to suit your own muddled agenda. Tim Barber said that he and the other people on the EMAIL GROUP got the info after the Sentinel was printed. Jean has confirmed that to be true, Tim Barber and the others on the email group can quite clearly prove that. Tim Barber and the email group weren't the only ones to receive the email. Norman said he had sent an email within the last 10 days and had not received replies, he had sent it 3 days before the Sentinel printed the story and 3 of the parties who were sent the info had contacted him straight away but he didn't reply to some parties. Just some of the facts that show Norman was being economical with the truth

 

I will post the screen shot of it Tim.

[Mattholl]

 

here you go Tim, according to you FACT is that the group got the email after the story was published. then further down you decide oh actually people did and start firing names about. However youve said originally they didnt , so you were lying and maybe so was the chairman. Who wins when you are both at it?

[Mattholl]

Let's all sit back and digest Malcolm's fine opening piece. The first thing I really struggle to understand is how, given the vast amount of information and actual dishonourable events and quotes made by the owner himself that there is a single, genuine Vale supporter who can still support this man.

 

These people slam the likes of Tim Barber, ST , Beza and myself to name a few who for some time now could sense the current episode starting to unravel before other 'non- political' fans. That is fair enough but when posters on here rubbish the likes of myself for our beliefs of course we are going to respond by trying to explain just why we are so disenchanted with Smurthwaite and so slowly this 'dirty linen' is put on such as OVF. Once again we still have a diminishing band of 'Smurfets' dissing our comments and so the accusations still continue to unfold. Can't these people see that they are actually fuelling the debate with their disrespectful opinions.

 

Believe me if I was to break personal trusts which I would never do, I could fetch out a lot more dirty washing. In fact I could bring a laundry basket full.

 

For the Club's owner to think that any potential buyer will pay for the many mistakes made by him. This quite frankly is simply astounding. I do wonder just what the asking price will be if he was to stay and drag us out of the football league £10 -£12 million. As I say it's ridiculous.

 

I do genuinely believe that if the owner has accrued as much as he and others would have us believe then surely he would have invested his money more sensibly instead of 'rooting around the scrappings' of the football pyramid.

 

A word of advice to the owner would be to watch an episode or two of 'Homes Under The Hammer' where he will learn that to make a profit that you must buy a house in a poor state and improve it. Unfortunately owner seems to think that it works the other way around! Utterly amazing.

 

To prevent more money being invested by the 'Bank of Smurthwaite' I suggest that he cuts his loses and sells the Club for the best offer which I suggest is around the figure that he acquired it for himself. Hand on heart can he sensibly claim to have improved Port Vale during his tenure?

 

My issue is not that I support the chairman,its I don't support the way some fans are dealing with NS. Is NS lying?, maybe so? doesn't it matter in the current situation he owns the club and until that changes hes here and making decisions. This isnt a union workers strike, slagging off the bosses and whipping up 15 people into a frenzy about lies and proof from your small contingent of followers isnt going to make a difference. Smurf isnt going to bend to the pressure of 15-20 vocal people. Tim is on this very thread talking about NS lying and how important it is. Lets say we prove everything NS has been telling us is all lies and the club is 50m pounds in the red, you have his bank statement and hes borrowed all his money from the bank, the bottom line is that doesnt change the status here and now, its still NS who owns the club. Change can happen when both sides work together for the want of the same outcome, not when both sides spend all their time saying the other is lying and slagging each other off. Thats my issue these fans bouncing about like the sound of their own voice and getting one over on NS more than they want to see Vale do well. If they really wanted the club to do well they would engage with the chairman, take what hes said and nod (even if they think its BS) because some engagement is better than no engagement and develop the relationship so that long term they may well be involved in the process of talking to a new suitor and focus on moving PVFC forward. The issue is some are focused on winning the argument not winning for PVFC and with that I dont support them.

[Family Stand Terrier]

To me Matt, that looks as though you're failing to understand what you're being told, rather than Tim lying.

[cheshirevaliant]

Running costs.Staff wages(other than players)VAT,employer NI,utility bills,refurbing the Valiant suite and Tommy's.Building costs ,floodlights.Medical insurance and costs.Players insurance,signing on fees,Car leasing.Catering costs.Boomer's outfit,pitch improvements,Away travel costs.

I'll let you know if I think of anything else.

 

Surely we declare our revenue net of VAT?

[Mattholl]

To me Matt, that looks as though you're failing to understand what you're being told, rather than Tim lying.

 

behave! hes said that its a FACT they didnt get it till after it was printed. Which he either didnt explain it or he realised that it wasnt fact

[Family Stand Terrier]

My issue is not that I support the chairman,its I don't support the way some fans are dealing with NS. Is NS lying?, maybe so? doesn't it matter in the current situation he owns the club and until that changes hes here and making decisions. This isnt a union workers strike, slagging off the bosses and whipping up 15 people into a frenzy about lies and proof from your small contingent of followers isnt going to make a difference. Smurf isnt going to bend to the pressure of 15-20 vocal people. Tim is on this very thread talking about NS lying and how important it is. Lets say we prove everything NS has been telling us is all lies and the club is 50m pounds in the red, you have his bank statement and hes borrowed all his money from the bank, the bottom line is that doesnt change the status here and now, its still NS who owns the club. Change can happen when both sides work together for the want of the same outcome, not when both sides spend all their time saying the other is lying and slagging each other off. Thats my issue these fans bouncing about like the sound of their own voice and getting one over on NS more than they want to see Vale do well. If they really wanted the club to do well they would engage with the chairman, take what hes said and nod (even if they think its BS) because some engagement is better than no engagement and develop the relationship so that long term they may well be involved in the process of talking to a new suitor and focus on moving PVFC forward. The issue is some are focused on winning the argument not winning for PVFC and with that I dont support them.

 

At the beginning of last week Norman came on OVF and started to engage with fans. Sensible questions were asked, and Smurf replied to quite a few. In the main, his replies were horrendous. To the question of marketing a bycars ticket initiative, he couldn't understand the futility of advertising such a scheme through 100 flyers in the stadium. He received no abuse at all throughout that time, he just didn't like the fact that people weren't kissing his arse all the time, such as they he likes to be treated. That's the ego we're dealing with.

 

What I don't understand though Matt, given your assertion that "Smurf isn't going to bend to the pressure of 15-20 vocal people", why are you getting so worked up about such a "small contingent" (we both know that's not true by the way). The truth is, Smurf does care, his poll last week proves that, he's considering selling to hedge funds because apparently, he's tired of the criticism. He's sought fans opinions over the last 2 weeks, but when those opinions don't involve constant praise, he stamps his feet and promises never to post on here or twitter ever again.