Hacker News Reader

Comment by will_brown | Hacker News Reader

I think it’s just the start, soon there will be a much larger paradigm shift.

Especially in tech where there is generally a large community of supporters who are willing to fund the projects they believe in directly.

I think the Green Bay Packers is a perfect example, it’s the only “publicly owned” football team in the NFL and as a result when they need funding for large projects (like stadium renovations) they go straight to their community supporters with “public offerings of Packers stock”...which isn’t really stock at all but a certificate and small voice in corporate governance (ie election of a small number of directors). It’s so successful of a legal structure the NFL publicly takes the position they are at a competitive advantage to the other teams which are owned by billionaires.

There is no reason Startup’s shouldn’t look at the same model and cut out all VCs, incubators, etc...

View on HN

The Packers model works because it's basically a scam, no one in Green Bay actually has any say over what the Packers do day to day but it feels good for Packer fans to say they own a part of the team. There's emotional buy in, it's not a rationale way to invest your money, and no one lends money with the idea that they're not going to see it again as a business.

Community support projects work for Kickstarter or Indiegogo marketing to the general public consumer, that's not the same thing as trying to build a B2B SaaS platform fixing a specific problem marketed at Fortune 500 companies.

The Green Bay Packers are valued at $2.35B...not bad for a non-profit.

How is the Packers model a scam? Because people support it and don’t get profits? Does that make the 90% of VC funded startups that fail scams? Are other NFL teams that are privately owned scams, because as I said the NFL publicly acknowledges the Packers community ownership is a competitive advantage over the other teams.

Sure maybe people won’t directly support your b2b software application marketed at Fortune 500 companies, but as a counter example many of the next fourtune 500 companies could easily adopt a community ownership model in a similar fashion as the Packers (only for profit).

People like community ownership and governance...there are many examples beyond the Packers to establish that. People don’t necessarily like the VC model and having to take money from wealthy people who take a chunk of your company just to compete on a level playing field.

It's a scam because the equity have any decision making power. It's still controlled by a small group of people aka the board of directors, the stock structure is setup that fans could not mount a hostile takeover. It's called ownership, but it's not, it has no value, it cannot ever be sold back, it doesn't grant you any say over how the team operates. The Packers are not a community owned organization, it's operates no different than any other NFL team, decisions are not made by the fans. The Packers aren't really community owned organization, a real community owned organization whose members have actual power over the organization. Those are very few and far between, are generally non profits, and in the end, no ability for outside investors to get the profits they're looking for, thus they won't bother to invest.

You hear from time to time small to mid sized business that are "employees owned and operated" but that doesn't mean every employee has the same equity, the generally ownership will have the largest stake anyway with employees having very little control or equity compared to ownership

>It's a scam because the equity have any decision making power.

Well there is no equity as there is no equity in any non profit corporation. That doesn’t make nonprofits a scam.

The shareholders elect the board and the board elects the officers and the officers control the day to day operations.

>It's still controlled by a small group of people aka the board of directors, the stock structure is setup that fans could not mount a hostile takeover

Well stockholders do get invited to the annual meeting and vote for a number of those directors.

You can claim all you want investor won’t invest when they can’t get their investment back, but again the Packers are proof you are wrong, no shareholder can recoup their investment much less make a profit, but they have no problem raising as much as $250M when they had their last 2 public offerings.

Edit: another example is the Gates foundation, supporters donate because the believe in the organization (like the Packers) yet supporters have even less rights than the Packers shareholders and obviously no chance of a “hostile takeover” and yet people “invest”/donate.

There's three ways to raise money. You can finance it (debt) or you can sell ownership (equity), or the last one, people can randomly throw money at you and expect nothing in return. The last method of raising funds are donations, those aren't an asset that can produce dividends, or earn interest, that's the opposite of an investment, it's an expense. A charitable one generally to get more favorable tax incentives.

Of course you can have equity in a non profit. That doesn't mean your entitled to profits that don't exist, it means you have a stake in the organization. And the # of outstanding stocks versus the # of stocks held by the general public is a tiny fraction of what the Packers are worth, but again those silly pieces of paper are not proof of equity or ownership, it's literally memorabilia fans traded cash for a piece of paper that says they own something even though they have no power of ownership, the annual shareholder meeting is for show, so to call it an investment like a traditional stock would be isn't fair, it's really not the same thing.

What you are describing is development office, going out to ask for donations for a cause. That's not the same as running a venture that's going to make profit for shareholders.

Would the Packers ever move the team? Perhaps it buys the fans at least that much.

This is what Wefunder (YC W13) does with equity crowdfunding. It's great for companies that have passionate user bases. Even if the individual check size is small (e.g. min $100), it's a great for users who want to be part of something and great for companies who don't have to go to VC + can grow their user base.

The primary downside for startups is the cap table, but there's regulation in the works (already passed the House with near-unanimous bi-partisan support, waiting on the shutdown shitshow so the Senate can vote) to fix that.

Disclosure—I work at Wefunder, both on crowdfunding and very early cohorts (https://xx.team)

While the concepts are similar, there is a legal difference between equity crowd funding (presumably under the JOBS Act) and a a non-security instrument Public Offering exempt from securities laws (ie Packers Stock or similar)

Who makes money off of the Packers? Startups may not be willing to take this model on if its less profitable for founders

The organization does, it's a non profit, it gets reinvested into the team coffers to be spent. There's no dividend or anything like that.

Packers are nonprofit but there are other sports teams/organizations that have similar public offerings to raise funds/capital that are for profit entities.

You keep calling it a public offering, but the reality is, a public offering is selling parts of your company for cash, aka a stock, ownership has it's privileges, without those privileges, you aren't selling anything to the public, the public is giving you money in return for a piece of paper and a fuzzy good feeling inside. I don't invest to get a fuzzy good feeling inside. I donate for that.

Donations are not investments. They're expenses. Investments must have a return of some monetary vale, or else it's an expense.

I call it a public offering because it is a public offering ...according to the Packers and according to the SEC.

You’re really acting like an authority on “public offerings”, do you think you know more than the SEC about public offerings and they don’t know what one is? I understand your definition, it’s just not the legal definition is all.

What’s at odds is Packers “Stock” which isn’t “stock” in the common definition and understanding, but it’s still called stock, it’s just not a security or investment.

Have you even seen the Packers Public Offering Document(s) or subscription agreements? Because I’ve never seen a donation/charity issue “public offering documents” or require subscription agreements.

Edit:

>public offering is selling parts of your company for cash, aka a stock, ownership has it's privileges, without those privileges, you aren't selling anything to the public,

You should also really take a look at SEC enforcement actions against ICOs because almost none of them are “stock” nor carry privileges yet are considered public offerings.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com