How much more can the supporters take?

Rotork was £5k Rob.

Always scope for more HNWIs......the richest 1% are getting richer!

I know the community bid is the concept of one member one vote, but where is the incentive for someone to invest a large amount to get the same power as someone who has invested £250.

From the HNWIs point of view it can only realistically be a donation.

pete mac wrote:Rotork was £5k Rob.

Always scope for more HNWIs......the richest 1% are getting richer!

True.

To be fair Rotork are a world leader in their field - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rotork - and I stupidly turned down an electronic engineering apprenticeship with them in 1969.  

You need to change your tune to - regrets, I've had a few.....

He agreed to stand behind a banner? ah i take it all back then yuffie he he.

I was aware of that picture.

How many weeks into the fundraising bid did he agree to stand behind it?

Peteboa wrote:He agreed to stand behind a banner? ah i take it all back then yuffie he he.

I was aware of that picture.

How many weeks into the fundraising bid did he agree to stand behind it?

it was posted a bit tongue in cheek!

If the high worth individuals have declined at the "Bid" outset it does not offer much confidence in their coming to the party in the follow-up exercise. If they were either unconvinced or unwilling before I am not sure even the subsequent efforts of a fundraising "guru" would persuade them to change their minds.

Unfortunately it did seem that, back in the summer, some unofficial "bid" advocates were indicating that a successful outcome would result in a change to the management team. Whatever one's personal opinion of the management team they can hardly be blamed if they were not showing all out support for a project that could lead, possibly, to their own demise.

Diogenes wrote:If the high worth individuals have declined at the "Bid" outset it does not offer much confidence in their coming to the party in  the follow-up exercise.  If  they were either  unconvinced or unwilling before I am not sure even  the subsequent efforts of a fundraising "guru" would persuade them to change their minds.

There are a lot of experts coming out of the woodwork with 20:20 vision and ready to have a pop. If a professional fundraiser is willing to take on the task, I expect he has more of an informed opinion than the armchair critics otherwise he would be wasting his time. Why the snide "guru" comment as well?

Unfortunately it did seem that, back in the summer,  some    unofficial  "bid"  advocates  were indicating  that a successful outcome would result in a change to the management team.  Whatever one's personal opinion  of  the management team they can hardly be blamed if they were  not showing all out support  for a project  that could lead, possibly,  to their own demise.

Crap. Absolute bollocks. That has never been in the Bid proposals or any discussions that I was aware. Who are these unofficial "bid" advocates? It is remarkable that people who have put a lot of time, effort, energy and enthusiasm into the bid say a personal view and, suddenly, they are "leading lights of the bid" or "unofficial bid advocates.

I was in discussion with loads of people and the management issue was rarely mentioned because, like everyone else, we had and have no idea what the management situation is going to be by the time the community take over happens. The other thing is that the board that will run the club will be chosen by the community members and will run the management side so no-one in the Bid team can give any indication on what will happen with the management as they don't know who will be standing for and who will be voted onto the Board.

Personally, I have my ideas about what should happen with the management but that, like every other member of the Bid and, indeed, the supporters, is only my personal view.

I was going to leave this thread to rumble on as it appears to be people having a pop who shouldn't be given the oxygen of publicity but unsubstantiated rubbish based on rumour and innuendo irritates me and can't be allowed to go unchallenged.

It is interesting that posts that question aspects of the bid get called crap and bollocks and the poster risks being accused of making snide comments. Hopefully that isn't a sign of things to come if the bid is successful.

For what it's worth I can understand the 'guru' comment as a professional fundraiser makes me think of one step above the students who plague the centre of Bath with their rent a charity bibs on. Probably unfair I accept.

And going back to Archie, as he (allegedly) answers to the current board I can see that it is not unreasonable to avoid publicly backing an attempt to take over from them. Also it doesn't seem that unlikely that they would look to a completely fresh start managerial wise if they do take control.

Marc Monitor wrote:There are a lot of experts coming out of the woodwork with 20:20 vision and ready to have a pop.

Maybe these are the same experts the bid is continually stating will be available to help once it is successful...

yuffie wrote:It is interesting that posts that question aspects of the bid get called crap and bollocks and the poster risks being accused of making snide comments. Hopefully that isn't a sign of things to come if the bid is successful.

Come on Yuffie that's a bit unfair. Agree with your other points though - the management team have been open and helpful with the bid (letting us into the changing room to film the half-time talk for the Bid video, meeting with us, holding the banner for the Chron etc) - within the normal bounds of what can be expected given that they report to the current board (and more important that they have their hands full running a football team).

And Marc, regretfully I do believe that early on there may have been a bit of terrace chat along the lines of "back the bid and change the manager" - I think it was intended to be a bit tongue-in-cheek but obviously was "off-message" and not ideal.

As for the HNWI conversations - remember that these things are always a bit chicken and egg. Some supporters wait to see if there are big backers before committing, some big backers wait to see if there's any popular momentum before committing. When we first approached HNWIs we had a vision but no prospectus, no business plan, no £300K of pledges - let's just see what the professional fundraiser can do in the next month or two and then judge?

Marc

I would rather not see expressions like crap and absolute bollocks. People are entitiled to their opinions and this forum prides itself on not shouting people down. Generally Bath City fans have a bit more about them than that.

Lets keep it friendly shall we?

When I see people talking, well, the aforementioned and making snide remarks, Dave, I tend to call it as I see it but, apologies, I didn't realise that not using opprobrium and being friendly to each other were rules of the forum. It is certainly the first time I have seen it in a football forum but I will endeavour to keep to the rules in the future.

Yuffie, I see your point about the 'chugger' image but it is a different thing. I am not sure that anyone wants that. Although I disagree with you on the Bid, yuffie, I have always seen your concerns as well-intentioned and sincere so I am disappointed that you have come out with the "Hopefully that isn't a sign of things to come if the bid is successful" propaganda. Just to make it clear now and in the future, I am not a member of the Bid team and haven't been for 4 months so don't speak for it (if I ever did). One of the reasons I came off it was because people were misrepresenting - sometimes wilfully - all of my personal opinions in my posts as official Bid statements as a stick to beat it with. As I have now put this very clear (and have many times before), anyone further using my personal opinions from now on in as criticisms of the Bid would be disingenuous and misleading.

As for my role, if the Bid is successful, I haven't even thought of having a role if the Bid is successful but the lovely thing about community ownership is that I or anyone that does want a role has to be democratically elected by the community owners so you would have an active say in what roles anyone - including I - would have. In the present situation, that wouldn't be the case as long if I had enough money to buy enough shares in the club.

You may very well think that "it doesn't seem that unlikely that they would look to a completely fresh start managerial wise if they do take control" but that is your speculation and nowhere in the Bid has there been discussion of it and it would be ridiculous to propose it as, again, we don't know what the situation would be and we don't know who would be running the club because they will have to be voted in democratically.

As it goes, whatever I think of their management presently, I, like Oliver, think that the management have been as supportive as they can be in the situation they have been in. I also have said before that the Board were very generous in letting Twerton Park be used for Bid activities as well.

Oliver, I am really disappointed to hear that someone has been saying "back the bid and change the manager" but I am sure it wasn't any of the Bid team and terrace banter does not equate to "some unofficial "bid" advocates were indicating that a successful outcome would result in a change to the management team." The 'unofficial' qualifier is doing a lot of weasel work in that quote as anyone could be seen as an 'unofficial "bid" advocate' if someone wants to push an agenda.

Strewth!

I thought it was just an innocent observation regarding the fundraising aspect. I used the term "guru" to highlight the fact that the bid team now had someone of status working on the fundraising exercise. Still maintain that if high worth individuals were not supportive at the outset then no amount of cajoling from a higher level individual is likely to persuade them otherwise. Fail to see how my posting translated into a snide comment.

I used the unofficial comment because the statement that a successful outcome would lead to a football management change was made by an individual wearing a "back the bid" T-shirt, whilst trying to persuade supporters to invest in the project.

As a matter of interest I have invested in the bid and have not discounted increasing my contribution level.

If I misread the intent of your post, I apologise. As far as your assertion regarding the high worth individuals, we can only wait and see and I am sure you will be happy to be proved wrong. I think that, as far as attracting corporate and grant money, I am much more hopeful than I was when we were talking about volunteers coldly phoning and approaching businesses.

As I said to Oliver, it is really disappointing to hear that an individual said that. I am sure it was off-the-cuff but it still annoys me. However, it was one statement by one individual and, if it were used to besmirch or misrepresent the whole Bid , t would be a great mistake for anyone that genuinely wants to see a bright future for the club.

Yes Diogenes is correct - while Bid volunteers were given an FAQ / key points text to make sure they could explain accurately how community ownership would work in practice, I understand that on a few instances people went 'off-script' and made it about the current management.

EDIT: The exact phrasing on the Q&A was:

Q. In community ownership, will the fans pick the manager and the team?

No – the members would elect the Board who would be responsible for those decisions.

I certainly heard bid volunteers suggest that a change of manager would be possible with a successful bid but there are 3 points.

They were volunteers and there was no strict party line given by bid organisers.

It was made against a backdrop of people saying they could not support the Bid while the present management were in place.

As Marc succinctly and briefly puts it - the community club would be run on democratic lines where any shareholder would have as much say as anyone else in who manages the team. So the volunteer was factually right.

Personally I think that since the heady days of the promotion season the management have managed to alienate an awful lot of club supporters. And the board have allowed that to happen because they have failed to communicate any sense of stewardship of that management.

Also I just want to add that while Yuffie's comment raised my eyebrow I wouldn't describe it as propaganda. I am personally very grateful to him for allowing the Bid free rein to use his photography for promotional purposes, and of course for pledging to buy shares.

I hate to try and take this thread back to its original theme, but there are some more pearls of wisdom from our esteemed leader in this week's Chronicle. (Again, apologies for not posting the link).

He likens Bath City to the Titanic: "Its like the Titanic, we've hit this iceberg, the hole is big and at the moment we're trying to repair it. Its just not being repaired very quickly". I don't recall anyone trying to repair the Titanic - I think it went down pretty quickly. On second thoughts, perhaps that is a good analogy!

He also says that he "...didn't get a microphone chucked in his face when we were ten minutes from Wembley. I didn't get a camera chucked in my face when we won the first six games". I don't recall that we were actually "ten minutes from Wembley" because I am sure North Ferriby equalised earlier than that in the second leg; I am sure I saw a photograph celebrating the manager of the month award for August which was a direct result of the great start we had.

With no game tomorrow we will be probably be denied any further gems until after the Ebbsfleet game.

I must admit - that Titanic quote is pretty special!

Howells out. He's a miserable person who doesnt care about us. we can do better. Let's not overcomplicate the issue


Post edited by moderator - please refer to Forum Rule 2

OliverH wrote:Also I just want to add that while Yuffie's comment raised my eyebrow I wouldn't describe it as propaganda. I am personally very grateful to him for allowing the Bid free rein to use his photography for promotional purposes, and of course for pledging to buy shares.

In retrospect, "propaganda" may not be the right word. Perhaps, "agenda"? Anyway, as I say, I respect yuffie's concerns for the most part ,even if I disagree with them. and am sure that we want the same result.

How is 'a r s e' a censored word? Haha. Strewth.