It should come as no surprise that the announcement of the putative new deal between Sevco and Sports Direct has been accepted at face value by the local media.
At the time of writing, I haven’t seen a corroborating response from Sports Direct.
Of course, we must take Mr David Cunningham King at his word.
Especially, given his excellent reputation for veracity in business matters.
However, forgive me if I have difficulty in believing that Mr Ashley was overcome with altruism apropos the retail deal with Sevco.
Of course, The People, with their lynch mob mentality like to think in the currency of aggression and fear.
For them the explanation is simple; Ashley capitulated to their champion in South Africa.
Apparently, the dignified world view of The People doesn’t allow for complexity or nuance.
For example, they clearly don’t understand what happens when a football club is liquidated.
In looking at this new arrangement rationally, the key question must be:
Cui bono?
Today we are being asked to believe that General Ashley simply walked away from a deal that guaranteed him millions in profits for the next seven years.
What did he get in return for this generosity?
Colour me cynical, but I prefer to know those devilishly fine details before making a judgment.
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Having now read the “breathless” stories carried by the DR online, a question comes to mind.
What exactly is this new deal?
Apparently, this development is “momentous”, it’s “the biggest single thing that has happened to the club since regime change”.
Is this the same Dave King who said that the retail income was not significant. Only around 5 or 6 Mil a year and that he could cover it?
I remember those old movie contracts where stars were to get a slice of the net profit. The only problem was it was the producers who decided what came off the gross so most of the actors got nothing. Hence the shift to a smaller percentage of the gross. Methinks the Ibrox crowd are in the hands of Sam Goldwyn.
The retail deal most likely has a lot of polish attached. Perhaps of more interest is that fact that loans have already been required despite this being the time of season ticket money gushing into the Ibrokes vaults. Are these loans to cover the costs of the transfers and those who have failed to find a new club or is the money so bad that even season tickets can’t cover the outgoings!
Ashley must be sick as a dog after being rolled-over by King. That’ll teach the billionaire not to mess with the criminal, cold shouldered business genius of Ibrox 😉
Theresa will be jetting King into Brussels any day now.
Dave King looked like a man that had just got one over on Mike Ashley.
Puma pressed him.
32red pressed him.
Ashley pressed him.
He surrendered.
The man that sold the jerseys right enough.
Should have enough in stock to sell 5 million worlwide.
It seems to me they’ve been landed with a bill of unsold stock, hence keeping the kit and they now approve the supporters to pay this bill by purchasing the jersey.
Am I right?
Daily Mail reporting Mike Ashley is selling his 8.92% stake in Sevco to a supporters group and an overseas investor. I have tried to include the link but it is not allowing me. Could selling up be related to the Takeover Panel pursuing DCK?
There are several points in this story;
It seems it is NOT a One Year Deal at all.
The Puma deal finishes then though. Could a SD company be the new manufacturer of the next shirt? This would allow Ashley to spare some more crumbs from his table while cleaning up the major profits.
As Phil has often commented on, Ashley was shrewd enough to have the clause where the club/company/ engine room subsidiary or whatever the feck they are this year has to buy back unsold stock. It looks like that stockpile is going to a lot of GulliBillies soon. At Full Price. Ashley is allowing King to con the Blue Sheep yet again. If this was a Nature programme King and the 3 Bears would be the dolphins rounding up the sardines and Ashley the big whale that comes in and.scoffs most of them.
Rangers fans celebrate Dave King’s victory over Mike Ashley and Sports Direct.
The headline today from The Daily Record after The Silly boys had claimed a 1-1 draw against TNS.
Why do they continue to believe Dave King and his doctor Jim Traynor the well known Airdrie fan.
It was not long ago that the same people were asking where is King?
Now, it appears the King is not dead, Long live the King.
Of course with all this good news the Ibrox Trophy will be overflowing come the season end.Oh dear
“The news of my death has been greatly exaggerated”….and I think this holds true, even amongst the hyperbole of SMSM…the nuts and bolts of this DEAL have yet to be revealed ..as ever SEVCO has the most shining of briliance forever eternal( COPYRIGHT : THE DEMOCRATIC PEOPLES REPUBLIC OF NORTH KOREA) and the greatest ever football club of ever….maybe we can forget about the armageddon of Scottish Club Football now.
Maybe there is a new one year deal because both Ashley and King know that Sevco will not last beyond that.
The people are rejoicing.
What is it they say…pride comes before a fall.
Off down the bookies to put £10 on them being pumped at the uefa cup in round 1
As far as I see it, Ashley is making money from the same replica kit, twice over. The deal was that sevco had to pay for any unsold kit, so if (at a conservative estimate) sevco were invoiced £1 million each season for unsold kit, SD pockets that money… KER CHING!! That kit simply gets stockpiled in the Shirebrook warehouse until an event such as this, then when King gives the gullibillies the go-ahead to start buying, that stockpiled kit hits the shops as RETRO KIT, and sold for pretty-much the full price of the current kit. So, in essence, a sevco shirt (if comparably priced to a Celtic shirt, at £50 a pop), actually costs £100, but subsidised by sevco fc to the tune of £50! And these idiot’s think they have “got one over” on Ashley! Shouldn’t the government be offering Individual Learning Accounts to these idiot’s, to help pay the cost of them learning basic arithmetic?!!
If Sevco did indeed pay for the unsold kit, then that kit has been bought by them and it belongs to them.
Sorry to rupture your story.
Ashley’s contracts were bombproof.
Ashley gives nothing away.
Ashley was about to win in court. King capitulated under board pressure and saved legal fees.
Ashley will get five one year contracts. Gullibillies will buy each year thinking it’s good business and Ashley is being squeezed each year (laugh). King will not disclose details like the pennies per shirt leak. Claiming confidentiality.
I presume Ashley got his £3m and loaned it back for a sales sanctioning nod to fans. Ashley and King both make. Ashley gets security of brands for loan period.
Ashley remains Club 8.9% owner.
Glib spins early entry to Europe which is rubbish as they spent two years in championship. Good old Motherwell. Glib states investors/3bears were asked to stump up. Which they did. More debt further breaking FFP rules to buy football success in SPFL and Europe.
The Rangers FC, Scotland’s most indebted club. Where’s their audited and certified accounts?
What now though as Ashley is giving up his shares ?
Only in sevcoland do you call a media conference to announce
The same sponsor, the same kit maker,the same retailer, oh and selling last year kit. Whatever happened to red bull are the new sponsors, nike and under armour are fighting to be the new kit maker. All we need now is ” the arabs are ready to invest millions timmy” to go with King the people outsell Man U in shirt sales.
Dear Phil,
The RRL deal with Sevco had a buy-back clause, thereby ensuring that Ashley was minted; uncondtionally. Yes?
Question arises, why the hell change such provision?
Please explain.
Ashley inserted the buy-back clause because he didn’t believe that Charles Green had the numbers correct.
Charlie thought that the new club could shift a huge amount of merchandise and Ashley was sceptical.
Why change?
Let’s start from the position that Ashley isn’t a charity and he held all of the cards.
Despite all the guesswork the devil is indeed in the detail.
I have in business been party to to a similar type of stock and buy deal that went to litigation.
I would hazzard a guess that this years unsold stock was subject to a directive or stock level agreement based on the previous years sales.
So despite sd retail being able to hammer the zombies the first year they should have ajusted the stock down for this year as its reasonable to expect less sales and if sd have just reordered the same amount they may infact have been stuck with that cost as they should have ordered or made less.
Thats my guess on it anyway
Makes sense. Contracts must be fair and reasonable to both parties. Buying excessive stock would not be reasonable.
How the” mighty” have fallen. Celebrating joyously, a perception that their club has signed a new improved retail deal, and the colour’s they are fine . If we, in the meantime, give this mob as much as a sniff of silverware in the next few years we can only have ourselves to blame. No letting up. Keep winning stay hungry, and let them celebrate, as much laughable triviality, as they can endure. We shall not be moved.
My dear friends in Celtic,
(1) Let them get on with it. They have been controlled by a conflicted felon!
(2) Be not afraid !!!
(3) We will do our talking on the park.
Hail Hail
Sean
does this mean that they are playing in last seasons strip as no new strip has been revealed?
Would explain one year deal to get old stock shifted and once again the gulibillies are lapping it up…. OH DEAR
So there’s around 40,00o strips sitting on shelves at £45 each and Rangers would owe sportsdirect from last season For unsold stock but now after today you can buy one at £25/£30 last years strips there’s no new ones and kings gets say £8-£10 per strip now but doesn’t owe sportsdirect any money now ….. King seriously knows how to play the peepul
The thing I find curious is…why would Ashley go for a new deal when King (and Sevco) is about to be cold-shouldered by the FSA? As has been written here and elsewhere, that would then mean “cold-shoulder-by-association” for any company doing business with Sevco, would it not?
I am going to take things on face value.
Mike Ashley makes his money on producing the kit and selling it to the retailer. He then gets more money from the retail operation.
He has now decided that he will agree a new deal on the retail part, Rangers will then get a bit more money. However as the level of sales are much higher Ashley makes much more from the original production and sale to the retailer.
I will go with that until a reliable source (like Phil) tells me otherwise.
Mr king obviously knew he was losing the court case so ate humble pie.
It’s just an advertising coup.
And as usual the peepul will believe
Mike – “tell the idiots to buy from us and I’ll give you 240,00 pounds”
Glib – “aye aw right”
That just about covers it.
The moonbeams continue to glow over the dull ones.
Lets not forget, that previously unsold stock was the financial responsibility of the club to make good…so encouraging the fans to buy the stock helps avoid or reduce any future shortfall the club might face…makes sense…pass the shortfall bullet back to the fans….but dress it up as business success.
Meanwhile…the club still get to share the net profit of the square root of very little….every little helps…those additional player salaries won’t pay for themselves…
Lmfho selling at £20 today but Ipox store closed will be £40+ tomorrow and apparently running bus trips to the Ipox store tomorrow to get the new top that’s been stored in a cardboard box for last few years not that they will notice the smell …by the time MA gets his lawyers onto this they have sold 50,000 tops via a DHSS or Provident cheque …Dodgy Dave strikes again ????????
How could Ashley make millions in profit over the next 7 years if little or no strips are getting sold? Surely this deal will make him more money, short term without seeming to capitulate??
You haven’t been paying attention.
The RRL contract with Sports Direct had a buy back clause.
Ashley couldn’t lose.
I have reported on this several times.
So Sevco have paid him upfront?
The buy back clause, could you explain it again Phil mate?
I REALLY have lost the story here…
Cheers…keep up the great work!
The real problem here comes down to the 5+ year old one that haunts `Scottish football…
This club simply shouldn’t even exist.. never mind be allowed to call itself ‘Rainjurzz’ and operate out of iBrokes Park. Add to that their chairman being a convicted fraudster and that they are allowed to compete in Europe, despite failing financial criteria, is the pinnacle of the ‘wrap sheet’ being ignored by our own supposed football authorities.
Whatever the truth or true detail of the new merchandise deal – the ‘Peepul’ will pawn their kids xbox and blow the giro on new kit for Big Billy and Wee Billy in those very upper end sizes popular down Edmiston drive. It will bring in funds and I certainly can’t help feeling that a ‘percentage’ of their spending spree can be put down to that deal being renegotiated.
It won’t be as much as they seem to think. 5 years will have much depleted their supposed ‘world status’ while the rest of Europe and the football world has evolved, culturally as well as in footballing terms.
I doubt knowing the way that Ashley and Sevco both operate that anybody will ever know the full truth behind it. The Lyin’ King will certainly use it to his advantage .
As for being able to renegotiate a better deal in a years time.. just like with the 32Red deal, a toxic brand with a toxic leadership will not exactly hold much in negotiating chips.
To be honest, I find their whole existence and continued discussion very depressing and a shameful indicator of just about everything that is wrong with our game.
As Ive seen here and elsewhere before…
Scottish football doesn’t need ANY Rangers…
It needs a Strong (and honest) SFA.
Totally agree. Where are they getting the money from?
I see a lot of currants on Twitter saying that they’ve now got it sorted regarding the hunstore and merchandise. I wonder who negotiated this? The capitalist extraordinaire has just waived millions of pounds, highly unlikely.
You and me both , the key phrase in the announcement is “net” profit , I wonder how much net profit you make on selling a jersey ? 15% ? On a 50-50 basis 7.5 p in the pound ? Sounds familiar ……..
Until I can verify details on this new deal then I think that the triumphalism is premature.
Then again, they cheered Mr Whyte down Edmiston Drive in May 2011…
Ach, sure, Phil, the ‘triumphalism’ is endless with this mob, it’s all they know and can make sense of, it’s even the key line in their key song.
In fact, it’s so ingrained into their thick skulled collective psyche that they don’t understand its opposite at all, not even when presented with the clear evidence that their oldco club asphyxiated on its own hubristic gluttony.
So it’s either ‘Triumphalism’ or ‘Death’ for them, and, as their ongoing blatant stupidity proves, they don’t even understand the reality of the ‘Death’ bit.
Pretty much exactly what I was going to write. 50% of a squirrel or 7% of a unicorn? Which is better?
I want the unicorn!
Billy can have the squirrel!
And a further couple of thoughts. A slice of the gross is far less risky and less able to be manipulated than a proportion of the net (a number I would imagine Big Mike could – and probably will – apply some very reasonable but onerous logic in arriving at).
Also – 5 years to one year? Hmm.
Only rationale would be that he’s fed up tormenting the mouse and would rather start shifting some goods. My cat gets that way sometimes. Brings a mouse in, has an episode of tom and jerry but realised it’s not hungry and wanders off.