hadleighhammer wrote:
All this "someone will buy us and build us a fantastic new stadium" seems based on nothing more than wishful thinking rather than any specific rationale.
I don't think anyone genuinely thinks that new owners would build a new stadium. I threw that out earlier more tongue 'n' cheek. However I also think that should we get new owners, they would consider buying the stadium.
The potential income for the stadium is endless from our perspective. Will Olympics alone secure a multi million pound naming rights deal ? No. What about the advertising round the stadium ? Who would spend huge sums on advertising that isn't going to get maximum viewing eg Sky cameras ?
The TV deal plus sponsorship related to the stadium could be massive. If they wanted for example £300m, who is to say that we couldn't build an alternative stadium on the Olympic Park for about £100m more ? We could give the stadium back to the Govt - let them get on with it. Everyone seems to be hysterical about us getting "the deal of the century" so if it's that good, keep it. We can build a 60k stadium elsewhere on the park and ensure maximum naming rights etc for ourselves.
This current deal is huge for the Govt. It has saved them from huge embarrassment and huge costs long term. They're guaranteed £250m back from us in rent for the duration of our stay. Naming rights will apparently be mostly given to the Govt. Say they're getting £50m for 5 years - all of a sudden they've got £300m. If truth be told and they get more rent dependant on our success ? Potentially they could be looking at vast sums of money coming back from the white elephant.
I think it's clear that we have accepted a poor deal for West Ham United but the Daves were so keen to get in there they accepted regardless.
My guess is that we get....
100% ticket money
10% naming rights
60% trackside advertising
50% food and drink
100% club merchandise
100% shirt sponsorship
The main advantages are the increased ticket and corporate money. Our profile will grow in there so we should be able to attract better sponsorship deals for strips, training gear, training ground etc.
I have no doubt that anyone wishing to buy the club would study the deal with their legal team and find ways in which certain agreements can be altered. Maybe naming rights could be bought separately for PL matches so it'd be the "Westfield Stadium" or whatever for 340 days a year and the Govt get 90% of that however for the 25 days a year that we use it we could sell the naming rights ? Alternatively, the stands could have their own individual sponsorship deals - "The Betway Bobby Moore Stand" for example.
I don't know whether any of this is feasible or not as we haven't seen the agreement but fair to say that the Olympic Stadium in its location is an investment to potential buyers regardless. I'd imagine there's scope for the agreement to be amended as circumstances will change through time. There might eventually be a European League, we could go bust, any number of things could happen so there has to be some flexibility.