The Green Bay Packers have sold somewhere around 250,000 shares of stock, which was the most they planned on selling in their initial offering.
That was predictable. The demand was high for the team’s first offering of stock since 1997. Hell, I paid the $275 to get that piece of paper. So, the Packers are going to make 30,000 more shares available and fans can buy them until February 29, 2012.
“The support from our fans has been outstanding and we appreciate their enthusiasm,” said Mark Murphy, the team’s president and CEO. “We continue to receive interest in the offering, and this increase in the number of available shares will help ensure that we are able to accommodate all those who want to become shareholders.”
Blah, blah, blah.
The Packers are making more stock available because it’s going to make them more money. At $275 ($250 for the stock plus $25 for some bullshit handling fee), the Packers have netted more than $68 million from the initial sale. They’ll net an additional $8.25 million if they sell all 30,000 of the shares just released.
Other organizations are bitching that the stock sale is a license for the Packers to print money and to some degree, they’re right. On the other hand, if the Packers weren’t publicly owned, they wouldn’t be in Green Bay.
That being said, it seems like it’s time for the organization to admit what the stock sale is about — money. Yeah, the fans want it. I wanted it, but I’m not delusional enough to think the Packers gave two shits about that.
They did it for the money and so be it, but don’t tell us this is all about the fans.
The Packers will use the proceeds from the stock sale to help finance a 6,700-seat expansion to Lambeau Field that will cost $143 million. And guess what?
That will help the organization make more money too.