Dundalk's finances

**brianw82** · 21/08/2008, 9:02 PM

With all the doom and gloom about finances in the leauge as a whole, it's nice to read the occasional footnote that Dundalk are in their healthiest financial position ever.

So guys, can you enlighten us? What's your secret? Sensible planning? Money tree?

**Black and White** · 21/08/2008, 9:05 PM

Excellent board who aint taking the club for a ride...unlike the last shower of.......!!

**eamoss** · 22/08/2008, 9:57 AM

We could be in massive debt and we don't know it, the club feed us information and we take as the truth. Like I think Dundalk lost €75k last year and this year they hope to only lose €25k or even break even a lot better then a 3 years ago where we lost €250k and had to sell our training pitch (Which was bought by our now CEO and that is how he got involve).

Our CEO owns the club and doesn't have much interested in football so he is more concerned with the business sides of things.

Him and our now former commercial manager have brought in lots of sponsorship.

We now have a new chairman who is a bank manager so our finances SHOULD be looking good.

**higgins** · 22/08/2008, 10:03 AM

Originally Posted by eamoss

Him and our now former commercial manager have brought in lots of sponsorship.

Why former commercial manager if they were that good!

**gael353** · 22/08/2008, 10:06 AM

I think you have a good CEO so if he has no interest in football and has brought in sponsorship. Also to finish a year only losing under �100,000 is a good thing, as most if not all clubs will lose hefty amounts in the first and prem divisions. When we played ye recently the contrast between our team budgets couldnt have been bigger. I think there was a �7,000 differance that night yet still our club will lose upto 90,000 this year so your losses are actually good in a way. I think ye have a fine club as do we, but we only started being a propper club this year, so ye're a year ahead of us in the "propper" stakes.Prem licences to both of us me thinks

**eamoss** · 22/08/2008, 10:27 AM

Originally Posted by higgins

Why former commercial manager if they were that good!

I had too look up this thread, by the looks of it she wasn't doing her job and her and our CEO had a row and she left.

Originally Posted by gael353

I think you have a good CEO so if he has no interest in football and has brought in sponsorship. Also to finish a year only losing under €100,000 is a good thing, as most if not all clubs will lose hefty amounts in the first and prem divisions. When we played ye recently the contrast between our team budgets couldnt have been bigger. I think there was a €7,000 differance that night yet still our club will lose upto 90,000 this year so your losses are actually good in a way. I think ye have a fine club as do we, but we only started being a propper club this year, so ye're a year ahead of us in the "propper" stakes.Prem licences to both of us me thinks

Yeah I do think our wage bill is a lot higher then it should but like I said we don't know what is really going on behind them closed doors in Oriel. But from the sounds of things we are in a good position. Ever since our CEO came a lot of things have changed for the better.

**Conroy** · 22/08/2008, 10:57 AM

At a Trust meeting with CEO Gerry Matthews he said this year will be out first year breaking even.

As regards Playing Budget the main reason we have an increased budget this year is the fact of the Trust Patron Scheme which goes staright into the playing budget.

**jinxy lilywhite** · 22/08/2008, 1:53 PM

Originally Posted by brianw82

With all the doom and gloom about finances in the leauge as a whole, it's nice to read the occasional footnote that Dundalk are in their healthiest financial position ever.

So guys, can you enlighten us? What's your secret? Sensible planning? Money tree?

Its a number of factors. Maybe the best thing is that our CEO knows nothing about football but he likes to have the right people around him.

Gerry has the thing working like a business. If the first team need something it has to go by him first or whoever is in charge of purchasing. Proper cost control measures put in place too. He has given supporters a reality check in saying that he won't be pumping aimless money left right and centre and has promised that the club will never spend beyond its means again like we did in the 80's and 90's which is punished us in the early years of this decade.

I think sponsorship is a major factor. We use to go cap in hand to the same Dundalk business's and really they just got fed up of the whole thing. Under Gerry's stewardship we probably have never had as much sponsorship as we've had and it seems that everybody is confident and proud in our club and wants to get involved in the club in whatever way they can.

The Patron Scheme where supporters directly contribute funds to the players wages is highly successful and allows the board to directly tackle any o/s debt in the club has majorly helped the finances with near 400 subscribers. It might be more now

I think the way the board have managed our club is one step at a time and get the off the pitch problems dealt with while maintaining ambitions of supporters.

Anytime our CEO or the board talk they always say that they still need more help "we can't do it on our own" and ask people to try to attend games on a regular basis beacause they are the bread and butter of the club. Things like that tend to put a little spin on it and get a positive response