From shaking tins back in the 80s … this warms the cockles of my heart
Link
http://https://www.westernbulldogs.com.au/news/1035554
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From shaking tins back in the 80s … this warms the cockles of my heart
Link
http://https://www.westernbulldogs.com.au/news/1035554
Love this part
"Club’s eighth consecutive year of total profits, and its sixth consecutive year of total profits in excess of $1 million".
Go us!
I can still remember myself crying talking to my brother using a public phone when the news was announced that we were being taken over by Fitzroy so these reports are very sweet to me.
There's a lot to digest but I have a couple of comments:
1. The Whitten Oval project is stated to have $67m in total costs but we will "only" receive $37m from the state government and we are also up for $1.5m for the Skinner Reserve project. It also stated that we are committed to providing funding via our own fundraising initiatives. That's a lot of money to find and I'm wondering what rabbits we may have up our hats. I would not like our club to completely relinquish its strong liquid asset position which includes $18m of cash (which does not include state grant money for the redevelopment).
2. Our land at Footscray and land/building at Dromana are listed as worth over $16m but with recent huge increases in land values in Melbourne, the good news is that they probably have a much greater market value.
Great work by the members give yourselves a pat on the back.
Let's hope it's reinvested properly.
Incredible achievement when you think of the impact to the competition and the supporters
Club and members should be impressed by the result achieved.
In a year or two we can hopefully start reinvesting back into the footy department.
Great achievement by us all to get us into this position.
Go Dogs!
If anybody wants a reminder about how much we've turned things around then look at this. In 2005 we had negative $4.2m net assets with $5.6m in loans compared to positive $57m net assets today:
http://footyindustry.com/docs/Wester...l%20Report.pdf
I agree but I'd like to keep a fair bit.
I know we got $8m from the Federal Liberals back in 2004 but in more recent years they've provided or promised funding to most AFL clubs (Richmond, St Kilda, Adelaide, Port, Carlton, Brisbane, Hawthorn, Sydney, Gold Coast, West Coast, Freo etc) to the tune of up to $15m for their facilities.
Many NRL teams have also benefited. Despite out club being based in Labor heartland, with a federal election looming, I wonder if they or Labor (or both) might be the missing funder we're counting on.
I can remember thinking every morning when I woke up "I wonder if this will be the day that the club goes down the gurgler?" Especially in the economic rationalist days of Oakley/Nixon/Jackson/Scanlon when the commission had our existence squarely in the gun in order to prove an extremist economic theory.
Not just the commission, but the clubs that it represented indirectly/ directly. I'll never forget how much every club in the land (and their supporters, even those who barracked for Fitzroy) wanted us dead and I will have no sympathy for them ever when they themselves feel pain and find themselves on the brink.
History is filled with downtrodden people, entities, clubs or whatever forgiving and forgetting without any penance, sympathies or apologies offered, and it's bullshit. I won't forget, I won't have sympathy. We'll be strong, they've had their chance.