speedy19902006 52 Posted September 20, 2021 (edited) Thought I'd chip in my thoughts on this one. I follow the forum but never really post anything. Firstly I am Speedway through and through, come from a family with a long connection to speedway I have family members that have helped build tracks, been mechanics and sponsors (team and rider). I have travelled all over the country for speedway and have spent quite a bit of time in Vastervik Sweden following Speedway, I mention these things as I would consider myself an avid hardcore supporter of not just Newcastle but the sport in its entirerity. I was brought up on Berwick speedway but naturally gravitated to Newcastle as I got older and they are my local club. For myself I hold the belief that if Newcastle can survive at all it has to move away from Brough Park at some point. This is a view I have held for years and spoken to friends on the terraces about. I go to Newcastle to support my local club, but the product on offer is not up there with the likes of Berwick, Glasgow etc. Anytime I have brought friends to Newcastle Speedway to introduce them I feel I have found myself making excuses before they get there about it not being the best racing etc. I want to make it clear that I don't put this down to the riders, the club or anything like that. For me I find that at Brough Park there is an element of detachment from the racing. You are so far away from the track its hard to FEEL speedway. When you go to Berwick, Glasgow, Armadale, Redcar etc you are so close to the action it is simply breathe taking. You get a feel of the speed, the thump and tire squeal of the bikes roaring past you. You can physically see the skill of the rider shifting weight on the bike, doing different things to overtake etc etc. Unfortunately at Brough because of the sheer geography and set up of the stadium this makes these things that make speedway very hard to appreciate. Its only people that understand speedway can see and appreciate these things from afar. New goers or people trying it out for the first time simply will not see what its all about. However put the same people literally next to the track and I feel the story would be very different. I have had some amazing nights at Brough Park and some memories that I will never forgot and have seen some amazing racing there but its not consistent enough to pull new people into the sport. I honestly hold the belief that Speedway in its purest from is the best sport in the world and the product can sell its self - however it needs the right environment and ingredients to let it thrive and unfortunately for me Brough Park does not offer that up close, get hit with shale, roar of the bikes flying past you experience... Add to that the rent and overheads of running meetings and all the connecting issues with Brough Park, I do not think its holds the answer long term. Not an easy task to find a new venue or field in order to relocate but I'd rather be in a farmers field right up close to the action (with less overheads) than in a swanky stadium. Secondly just as an idea my friends at Edinburgh are involved in the Trust fund set up for the Monarchs, maybe something that could be considered if a future for Newcastle is at all possible. Where people that can and want to set up a monthly direct debit of an amount they are happy to donate into the fund. The fund has a board and the club actually approach the Trust Fund to ask for a specific amount and what it is to be used for. I feel this is something that could be invaluable to Newcastle if a future can happen. It allows an element of control of both parties both the club and its supporters on where money gets spent and provides a safety net for the club as and when they may need to invest or have unexpected costs arise. It also allow supporters for feel more vested into the club. Thirdly I am not minted I wouldn't even consider myself well off however I have worked hard to put some savings away. If anyone on here is involved in anyway with a consortium I could donate a small sum in the thousands if a package could be put together (please feel free to get in touch). Similarly the lad I come with said the same he would happily chuck a few grand in and is in a position to do so... if it allowed the club to survive. This will not be ground breaking money it will not scratch the surface of what it is going to take but non the less it will help boost the fund... Lastly hats off and my personal thank you to Rob and the team that tried. The club would have been in this position years ago had he not come in, then to run in what is still a covid year is an unbelievable achievement of determination. Something that we need to hold on hope to and explain to potentially interested parties is that attendances this year cannot truly be used as future indication. We will not know the true figures of regular attendees until the immediate effects of Covid have worn off. I can see in my work/business figures that covid has still got a grip on things (entertainment industry). Edited September 20, 2021 by speedy19902006 14 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Mamapotts 17 Posted September 20, 2021 Was devastated last night that I could not attend as I broke my ankle on Friday. However I would still like to help if there is a chance we could keep the club alive through a monthly payment. I will keep an eye out for any further information. THJ sorry I couldn't meet up but hopefully we will get some news on here. Jill 2 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
diamonds7 112 Posted September 20, 2021 im open to a monthly payment to if it helps a little 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TotallyHonestJohn 3,078 Posted September 20, 2021 4 hours ago, Gaz said: So the positive news was people interested in getting together to buy the club? Just curious what are the start up costs? Gary I know you are passionate about your team however it is difficult just to pluck a figure out of the air but I will give it a go to try and get peoples minds focused at what you will be looking at to run a successful venture for the first season. If you read the BSPL rule book start up costs of £30k for your bond with the BSPL and £15k against your rider asset's will need placing with the BSPL; now if you don't screw up this is returnable and just sits with the BSPL for however long you want to run until the next person comes along and takes over those costs. You have the good will of the current promotion so buying what few assets he has (very few) riders; the tractors; water bowser; grading tools; sound system; amplifiers; starting gate fencing and air fence; so lets say for arguments sake £25k for those; then you have your annual seasonal fees to the BSPL that have to be paid for licences; insurance; management and administration costs and other essential items (which again you may get back at the end of the season from the shared events however that's not guaranteed) and you have your start up costs at the start of the season to get the track ready set up the team and you need funds in the bank to run your first couple of meetings and especially if you start with a few away meeting as these will need to be paid for before you generate any cash through the turnstiles and at a conservative estimate you need about another £40k in the bank to cover these costs So as a start up and as a very rough guestimate you will need around £110;000 to set the thing up and running. Then the next thing is addressing the crowd numbers and what type of team you can procure that will give you a chance of being competitive and this has two main factors crowd numbers to rider costs and a hard core of 350 dedicated home fans only gives you £7k at 20 quid a head for rough figures and to put a meeting on at Brough costs around £2500 leaving you £4.5k for points money so over 2 meetings that's a rough average of 45 quid a point and when you see the rising star riders on 40 quid a point guarantees it means really that the rest of the team need to be around the 45 to 50 quid a point mark and that is really stretching it as top riders are looking for 65 to 95 quid a point at this level which will mean if you over extend this budget you will need to find the short fall from somewhere which could be as much as 4k over the two meetings that you need to find which is either 200 on the gate or other revenue streams to cover an average team cost on say an average of 80 quid a point across the full team... ARC may be open to offering a two year lease if whoever comes in can show a sustainable business plan and meets all their rules on how they want their facility used and to run the following year my estimate would be another 50k to run that second season (as all bods would be in place)… Now this is where the fun starts as it would give you 2 year to get the next stage sorted which would be to get into your own venue (note I have not said stadium) and again there needs to be some hard talking on this one but my angle would be "lets stop blowing our collective brains out trying to make a profitable business out of this club; many have tried over the years and it is just not achievable so thinking outside the box (hopefully) lets look at running a not for profit organisation that will potentially open up funding streams not normally available to normal businesses" here are a couple of links for light reading which will give an idea... What we need to know about CIC and CIO organisations... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_interest_company https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charitable_incorporated_organisation Now I do not want to build up any false hope here its only an idea and it may not even be allowed but to my mind it needs explored further and the funding will need to be in place to run for a couple of seasons until we get to a position where we can jump ship to a new venue but it will be a very long hard slog and potentially a very expensive one. Unless there is an entrepreneur out there who likes a gamble and a risk; because if we could get 3/4ers or even 2/3rds of the crowd who came to last nights wake against Birmingham then "jobs a good un" as the saying goes and the thing is viable for someone to have a go at for sure and I was very surprised at the turn out figure last night of 1232 and many thanks to everyone who turned out (blew my guess of 750 to 850 right out of the water) I am off on a break now for the next 5 days and wont have a signal (or a very limited one that's for sure) to answer all those who pull my figures apart however they are only educated guesstimates for a rough guide to give people an idea of how big the task is... By the way I am just the facilitator and the ideas man... I'm too fat and too old for a job... Honest... Regards John 7 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
SlicktrackSandy 67 Posted September 20, 2021 27 minutes ago, diamonds7 said: im open to a monthly payment to if it helps a little Not a bad idea in principle actually. If for example if 100 - 200 willing souls could be recruited to contribute £5 ( or more ) per week and sign up for 12 months by Direct Debit - that could generate £2,000 -£4,000 per month or up to £48,000 per year. A broadly similar arrangement was initiated a few years back by an Edinburgh Monarchs Supporters Group, completely independent of Management of the club - i.e. Monarchs Fans Trust . The initial aim was to set up a fund to assist with things like Ambulance cover, unexpected costs such as rain off losses and other types of help. Prospective members sign up to join the Trust and either make one off contributions or pay monthly by direct debit. Perhaps using that as a template for starters could help to stimulate a few enthusiastic individuals to come up with something along those lines to help the Diamonds stay in existence for 2022 - and hopefully well beyond. It is certainly a complex challenge to be faced with on many fronts, but in the absence of any other options at present, maybe worth investigating. Newcastle Diamonds have always been my "second" team and as a young lad living close to Meadowbank ( Edinburgh ), George Hunter and Ivan Mauger were my two heroes. Have only ever had two Speedway badges in all my ( many ) years following Speedway i.e. Edinburgh & Newcastle, so in a way, losing the latter would almost be as bad as in 1967 when Meadowbank was bulldozed for the 1970 Commonwealth Games Stadium and Monarchs kicked out homeless after starting off there in 1948. Am really rooting for all concerned in Diamond land that a solution can be reached in time for declaration time. 3 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Diamonds85 688 Posted September 20, 2021 It may sound stupid... But could we drop down to the National League for that first £110,000 season... Maybe cut the costs down slightly with the riders wages... Get the season's costs down to say £90,000, it is closer to reality than the £110,000... Let's face it, the 350/450 hardcore fans who have been going week in week out will still probably go to watch NL racing as they love the club and go whatever, and imo it is some of the most exciting racing in the country. Just an idea of cutting costs somewhere to help reduce the costs in that initial season? Could still include some good riders in the NL, some local talent too. Max at number 1, Archie at number 5, Josh Embleton and Danny Smith. Even Jack Shimelt at number 6 and 7, as I feel the standard of NL racing will drop even further next year and if Jack can progress well over the winter, he may not be too far off come the start of the season... Some very cheap to pay riders there... And you're only looking for another 2 riders to make a team? Just an idea, I'm sure someone will explain to me why it can't be, and please do £110,000 is a scary sounding figure, I know a few fans said they can give a couple grand here and there, but £90,000-£110,000 is just too high a figure imo, we desperately need a new Rob Grant to come in to supplement the generosity from the fans... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Diamonds85 688 Posted September 20, 2021 1 minute ago, SlicktrackSandy said: Not a bad idea in principle actually. If for example if 100 - 200 willing souls could be recruited to contribute £5 ( or more ) per week and sign up for 12 months by Direct Debit - that could generate £2,000 -£4,000 per month or up to £48,000 per year. A broadly similar arrangement was initiated a few years back by an Edinburgh Monarchs Supporters Group, completely independent of Management of the club - i.e. Monarchs Fans Trust . The initial aim was to set up a fund to assist with things like Ambulance cover, unexpected costs such as rain off losses and other types of help. Prospective members sign up to join the Trust and either make one off contributions or pay monthly by direct debit. If the majority could set up a direct debit of £5-£10 and we could get a handful of fans who are willing to put more in a month, up to £1,000 like some have suggested, we could be well up near £60,000 for the full year... BUT, we need an initial cash injection, sometime within the next 6 weeks, for us to even declare our intent... I just don't see that happening A fan direct debit type situation should have been set up at the beginning of this season, in hindsight... 3 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ch958 2,387 Posted September 20, 2021 I think thats a great idea D85 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Gaz 214 Posted September 20, 2021 12 minutes ago, Diamonds85 said: If the majority could set up a direct debit of £5-£10 and we could get a handful of fans who are willing to put more in a month, up to £1,000 like some have suggested, we could be well up near £60,000 for the full year... BUT, we need an initial cash injection, sometime within the next 6 weeks, for us to even declare our intent... I just don't see that happening A fan direct debit type situation should have been set up at the beginning of this season, in hindsight... I totally agree.. every day, week that goes by we are running out of time / funds. Newcastle Diamonds Facebook / Supporters club should be doing something but seem to have given up.. There should be a post similar to Twitter one “Save Newcastle Speedway” and get votes going etc to see who would be interested but just seem defeated. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
screm 7,987 Posted September 20, 2021 Daft as it seems raising the money to keep Newcastle alive could be the easy part, then who ever is running the show needs to get a lot more people through the gates on a regular bases to keep the business running. Failure to do that will see Newcastle back in the same situation sooner rather than later. 4 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ajr 11 Posted September 20, 2021 17 hours ago, Diamonds85 said: All sounds very promising? Any real interest from anyone would be great, hope it's enough to keep the club afloat? I'll keep EVERYTHING crossed that it is... It was nice to meet you the other week, hopefully the speedway can be saved. Still miss supporting the Comets. Once it's gone its hard to bring it back. Will hopefully catch up over a beer 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
lbw 862 Posted September 20, 2021 Just now, Ajr said: It was nice to meet you the other week, hopefully the speedway can be saved. Still miss supporting the Comets. Once it's gone its hard to bring it back. Will hopefully catch up over a beer Hopefully the Comets can get going at Northside? Met sum good folk at Workington, well i first met them on the Travel Plus tour to Poland in 2000. They put me up when I went up to Workington. Also Comets had a few of my club's rider's go there from Long Eaton after we had closed, the legend Stoney & Brent Werner. Also the association with Tony Mole & Graham Drury which was a great partnership at Long Eaton as well. 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Diamondboy 677 Posted September 20, 2021 19 hours ago, Diamonds85 said: @TotallyHonestJohn Hi John, What's the crack then? Did anything happen in the bar upstairs after the meeting? Would be great to know what happened... I would love to have came up but I was with my elderly relatives and couldn't have really expected to have made them come upstairs after standing for so long and they had to get their kids home ready for school in the morning too... I am very interested in helping out financially on a weekly basis if we can somehow manage to get a fan consortium put together to support someone in the future. I might not be able to put very much in, but I would be more than happy to do my bit. Looking forward to hearing from you. Cheers Your elderly relatives had to get their kids home for school in the morning???? 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
M.D 460 Posted September 20, 2021 6 minutes ago, Diamondboy said: Your elderly relatives had to get their kids home for school in the morning???? Thats a bit personal, for all you know they could foster.. 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Diamondboy 677 Posted September 20, 2021 3 minutes ago, M.D said: Thats a bit personal, for all you know they could foster.. Yes they could, have they? Hence the question marks!! Get off your box!! 1 Share this post Link to post Share on other sites