For anyone following the sick nasty Packers this season, they’re not only stompin’ everyone on the football field, but they’re now giving *anyone* a chance to OWN a part of their team as well! That’s right, as of yesterday afternoon YOU too can own a piece of your very own NFL team :) Woop Woop!
Of course, we all know that investing in my beloved Redskins would be the ultimate ticket around (hah!), but needless to say my interest was piqued w/ the Packers too. That is until I found out that not only are they going for $250 a piece PLUS a $25 handling fee, but they’re virtually not worth a thing! They don’t increase in value, there are no dividends coming out of them, and you certainly can’t bump the line of the thousands of people waiting to get their grubby little hands on season tickets. I do hear they make for good mantle pieces though ;) You frame those bad boys up and the Wisconsin girls just go wild for it.
Overall an A+ on the cool factor though… And it reminded me of something I read a few years back about how up and coming players were “selling off” portions of their future income as high-risk investments. I can’t remember their names, or what teams they played for, or where I even read it for that matter (it’s a good thing I’m not a journalist, huh?) but I do remember the whole concept went a little something like this: “You give me $XX,XXX now, and you’d get X% of alllllll my future earnings for the next 20 years!”
So pretty much if you BELIEVED that this guy or girl would just kill it in the professional leagues, your money would pay off BIG time over the years. And all advertising deals, future contracts, businesses, etc would just mean even more money for you as time goes on. How you would even track that, I haven’t a clue, but the concept was pretty fascinating to me because it was like you *owned* a part of someone’s life. Or at least their professional one…
Imagine if someone invested in YOU? They’d pony up $25,000 and get 2% of your future income for years and years to come? That would be crazy… and also, kinda awesome J Unless one day you decided you were good to go and didn’t feel like working again after nabbing a few hundred G’s off everyone, haha… or you got hurt on the job or had a baby or anything else that would require you to cut back on your career for an extended amount of time. Too risky in my books.
Actually, the real reason I’m blogging about this today is to let you know that the Stock of J$ is now for sale! Yup! For only $199.99 you can own 1/25th of all future blog income! Woohoo! Who’s in? I’ll even add a part of my brother’s and sister’s salary in there too – I’m sure they won’t mind ;) (All serious inquiries can sign up here.)
As crazy as all this sounds though – from both the Packers to these wanna-be-entrepreneurs, I gotta admit it’s a nice change from reading about gold conspiracies and mutual funds every other second. At least here we get to dream! We get to be a part of something legendary and we may or may not lose a fortune in doing so ;) It’s the American Dream baby! It’s our money and we can risk it in any damn way we please, right?
Now if you’ll kindly excuse me, I gotta hurry up and pick me up a little piece of some Justin Bieber action. I heard that kid’s about to blow it up!
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(Best photo in the world by joelrivlin)
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As a Wisconsin girl, I have to admit I do go wild about the Packers! Although at this point in time, personally wouldn’t pay that much to be able to say I owned part of the team. I am pretty pumped though about the aditions to the stadium since I am one of the thousands of people on the waiting list for season tickets. This should bump me up by like 5000 so I should be about 25,000 something on the list! Which is crazy since I am think my parents put my brother and I on it soon after he was born 20 years ago. Anyway, at least for the people in Green Bay buying the stock it really is an advestment into their hometown. The Packers are really quite vital in the economy for area with how many people they bring in not only for games but also just to see the staduim itself year round.
Darn, I was hoping to jump on the J$ bandwagon and get some stock.
You make some interesting points here J$ – I too saw the packers offering and tried to bait a friend who is moving to madison soon with it.
As for the “investment” and having someone give you X dollars for a % of future income, that sounds a lot like a credit card to me.
I can’t remember if it ever happened in real life or just the movies now, but I seem to have a memory of it being possible to buy a star in the sky and name it. Now that’s my kind of investing. Would investing in a black hole be a good or a bad thing?
You know, I have a “wasting money” fund that this would be perfect for. I’m a Patriots fan (of course, who isn’t?) (yes, that was said to aggravate people…), but I think I’m going to get a share to hang it on my wall to remind people how stupid I am. Good conversation piece at least.
Oh and @smartasset – there’s a sky in the star named after my high school ex. :)
I heard about this on NPR yesterday! It sounds like a pretty cool scenario – but only as a souvenir!
Yeah, not actually a real investment here hah! Do you at least get an invite to an annual meeting or something? I guess if you’re a real fan just owning a small piece of the team would mean a lot.
I wish more teams were owned in this way, but it’s just not the case (and I think I heard that it’s not allowed any more, either).
I was reading through the fine print on this (like you, I don’t think it’s a justifiable investment, but I do think it’s super cool), and it says that if you are a partial owner, and the league catches you betting on football, you will be subject to a $5,000 fine from the Commissioner. I’m not sure how he would know I place the occasional bet in Vegas, and I’m also not sure how he could *force* me to pay as he is not the law, but I thought it was interesting that some of the fine print considerations give me other things to think about (other than just losing $275 for a souvenir).
Also, it’s a tough year to be a Redskins fan. It’s almost as tough as being a Chargers fan. :-) I guess we have Norv in common.
@Rachael – Yeah I bet! I think it’s a brilliant fundraising idea for sure – and would totally do it if we were were talking about the ‘Skins instead :) Hope your team continues to wreak havoc! Just please be nice to us the next time we meet again – we can’t take any more blow outs :(
@cashflowmantra – I never said it wasn’t an option ;)
@Jeff @ Sustainable life blog – Haha, really? Even if you believed the person was gonna be the next great star? I think there’s a lot more skill involved in that than with credit cards ;)
@SmartAssetTeam – HAH! That’s not a dream! And people do it everyyyyyy day! Especially during holidays — check it: http://www.starregistry.com Nothing says love than with a shiny light billion of miles away!
@Nick – Haha nice. It’s certainly something different!
@Well Heeled Blog – Yup, for sure. Expensive piece of art :)
@Jeffrey Trull – Yeah probably not… I’d totally do it though for my team. And yeah, you do get to go to the meetings and get other preks like special discounts on merchandise and little things like that too – so that’s kinda cool.
@Bryan at Pinch that Penny! – Hah! The fine print monsters will get you all the time ;) I’d trade quarterbacks with you any day of the week too. $hit. I’d take ANYONE’S quaterback any day of the week!
I personally may buy a piece of stock in the Packers. I think it is great that they raise money this way rather than increasing the price of concessions or parking or many of the other things that privately owned teams do.
Yeah, it isn’t stock in the sense that you will gain any money on it, but if it’ll help this team add more seats to their stadium (which I had the pleasure of visiting last year) I just may do it. Green Bay as a town doesn’t have much to offer (it’s a ghost town on non game days) but when the Pack is in town, you can just feel the pride that the City of Green Bay has in the THEIR team.
Which is what may set me over the edge to spend the money. Even if the only thing I may get out of it is a piece of paper, and like Rachael said, maybe it’ll bring me that much closer to season tickets. (But probably not because people will those things down generations and generations and families hardly ever give them up!)
Is that Hammertime image free for anyone to use? Because I am so totally ganking it for one of my posts if it is. :D
If the Falcons did it I would pay double! lol
Also I would 1000% buy 1/25th of this blog for 200 bucks lol but then you are only valuing the site at $5k a little low HA
Since I grew up near Green Bay and am a die hard Packer fan, I do think it would be cool to own a share. If anyone ever asks what I do, I could just say I’m a partial owner of an NFL team :)
Unless you’re a hard core sports fan, this seems a little extreme (and risky!)
I grew up in Green Bay and my dad owns stock from when they sold some in the 90’s (he also has some Frozen Tundra from the old stadium in his freezer – gotta keep it cold!). It’s not about making money; it’s about contributing to the team and the town. As a stockholder, you do get invited to a shareholders meeting and you get updates in the mail. Plus, last year when they won the Super Bowl, shareholders had the option to buy a Super Bowl ring since they own a part of the team. My dad was a bit miffed the ring said “shareholder” instead of “owner,” but still – what other team and what other fans have the option to have their very own Super Bowl ring?
When the Packers win, people come to Green Bay and spend money, which gets recirculated into the city through the people who own and work for hotels, restaurants, shopping centers, and yes, the Packers as an organization (everybody knows somebody who works there). And if that’s not enough reason to be a fan, then I don’t know what is.
“The Packers intend initially to offer up to 250,000 shares of Common Stock in the Offering, but the Packers have the authority to offer up to 880,000 shares of Common Stock and reserve the right to increase the size of the Offering at any time without further notice.”
You know, there are going to be a quarter million shares, or a million, or infinity. Whichever’s more. ;)
I think I’m going to print off a bunch of certificates that allow people to own a part of me. But this shouldn’t be construed as “owning” me in the common sense of the term. It should only be construed as owning me in the sense of buying a piece of paper.
@Mercedes – Yeah, that’s MUCH better than raising rates/prices for sure — good call ;) You should totally pick up one up! Maybe someone will see this and get it for you for Xmas?
@Cordelia – Haha… I dunno I just found it on the internets ;) There’s probably a ton in Flickr creative commons? (best thing I ever linked to, huh?)
@Evan – Okay, then you get only .00001% ;) Better?
@Justin Wright – Haha… you can say that anytime you want anyways ;) It’s like you’ll ever have to prove it!
@Jenna, Adaptu Community Manager – You know you want one.
@lindsay – Wowwwwwww!! Super Bowl Ring??? I WANT!!! haha… Sold! Give me 100 shares! :)
@Matt, Tao of Unfear – I’ll happily buy one of your pieces of paper, sir. $5.00? $10? I only want to own you 1 hour a week in the summer. I hate doing my lawn.
I had written about investing in fashion models, where I mentioned the minor league player selling part of future contract. The player you are looking for is Randy Newsom.
Ooooooh maybe I got it from you??? Thanks dude! I’d LOVE to invest in a model ;) (bow chicka wha wha)