It was good presentation by Benny Gale and the other guys tonight, they seem to have a long term genuine plan to improve the club!
Benny had a saying which made a lot of sense " right here - right now" which suggested that the club is not looking back at our mistakes but putting energy into doing now so we are successful in the future.
Sure they would like donations from a range of sources / ideas but there was also a real belief that if we increase our membership and supporters in general we will improve our finances greatly.
The new facility is going to be fantastic - no other club has a better position than us, we can use / hire the ground / function rooms in the future for a huge amount of things.
I will leave it to some of the others to add but it was good to see that the club is actually talking to its members.
So "they seem to have a long term genuine plan". Pity the members expected to pay for it are not told what it is.
Not looking back at mistakes means we are likely to repeat them.
The idea of hiring out the ground and facilities was one of the reasons why we got the debt in the first place - oh right let's not look back at mistakes.
The crux of the push is to bring us up from being an average, honest toiler to a leader. Benny was big on stating that the Collingwood sets the bench mark for money invested into coaching, facilities, development etc and it is no coincidence that they have been there abouts for almost a decade now. It is on the back of this sustained success that their attendance figure have gradually grown dragging their membership, sponsorship, revenue etc along with it. We have not played in consecutive finals series since the 70s!!
This call to arms is about bringing us back up to a financial position where we can finally spend a comparitive amount as the more powerful financial clubs on the football department so we get the best out of our players. Benny also was very keen on the idea of having our own seconds team again using Collingwood as a model. Collingwood had over 7 Rookie players playing in their premiership side all of which they were able to put the game and development time into at their VFL side.
I'm not sure where you got the idea that it was the hiring or use of Punt Road that drove up our debt. This doesn't make sense to me. Have you got any evidence/articles on this? I thought allowing clubs such as Storm to use the venue for significant money would be a good thing as long as it doesn't impede on Richmond training/functions, isn't it? ???
I think it is a noble cause and while the idea of forking over additional funds after already buying memberships, joing coterie groups etc seems a little too much, I can see the purpose and see the motivation. I'll be donating (not anything crazy mind you) because I want to see my club at the top of the ladder and top of the balcony holding the cup aloft. I don't wat us to be another Western Bulldogs or Saints who were lamost there but just didn't have it.
I don't want Collingwood to be the benchmark, I want us to be...
Stripes
