SMiSA Buy The Buds!

Date: 21st July 2016

We would like to congratulate our members SMiSA on the joint purchase of St Mirren FC this evening. The legal formalities around their joint offer with Gordon Scott were concluded earlier today meaning the trust is now the proud part-owner of the club.

Gordon now owns a 50.1% stake in the club, while SMISA own 29%, with the option to buy Gordon’s shares within the next ten years, and achieve majority fan ownership of the club. The deal means the Supporters Trust will now work towards community ownership over a ten year process, which Supporters Direct define as:

• A minimum of 50% +1 of the voting rights of the Club to be controlled collectively by a democratic entity which has an open and inclusive membership.

• ‘Democratic’ to mean the membership of the entity to work on a one member one vote principle

• ‘Inclusive’ to mean that there are no substantial barriers to participate as a voting member, with membership open to all that are sympathetic to the aims of the Club.

• Any profits are reinvested back into the Club as opposed to being distributed to shareholders.

• The Club is committed to running as a sustainable business.

With the deal, Gordon Scott will put a new board in place which will include himself as Chairman, joined by current club Chief Executive Tony Fitpzpatrick, financial advisor Alan Wardrop, current club secretary Chris Stewart and SMISA board member David Nicol as a temporary fan representative (elections will take place later in year for a SMISA representative).

We worked with SMiSA throughout the deal and they utilised our Club Development Scotland consultancy arm within the process. We acknowledge their journey is just beginning and stand ready to help along the way. Having worked with the Trust, we know they have extremely capable and professional people involved and can make a real success of the deal they have with Gordon Scott as they work towards majority ownership. We congratulate them on all their efforts which have made this deal a reality and wish them all the best.

With this deal, SMiSA will join several other UK football clubs owned by their democratic, cooperative an and mutually owned Supporters Trusts.

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