about the trust - the history of the trust

The Posh Supporters' Trust was "born" in November 2002 against a backdrop of apathy, frustration and ill-feeling surrounding Peterborough United. The club, owned by Peter Boizot, the founder of Pizza Express, had been for sale for over 12 months but, despite interest from about 15 consortia, only three or four had made substantive bids. Fans had read so many times in the local press that a deal would be concluded "within 48 hours" that nobody took much notice any more. In addition large numbers of fans had been boycotting home matches in a running campaign against Barry Fry, now in his seventh season as manager.

Leigh Porter, a customer services manager in the travel industry and Posh fan for all of his 26 years, decided to hold a public meeting to see if there was enough interest to form a trust. On 8 November about 100 fans turned up at the HQ of PISA2000, the independent supporters' association, to hear Leigh outline his views and plans. His master-stroke was to invite Geoff Davey, the Chief Executive of Posh, and two officials from CFU, the trust formed by the fans of Cambridge United, our local rivals. While Geoff was very supportive of a trust, it was Steve Greenall of CFU who galvanised the audience with his infectious enthusiasm, exhorting the fans to dig deep into their pockets. Helped by PISA's generous gift of £500, the new trust started life with £976.

After the meeting seven volunteers signed up to help Leigh: two teachers, a policeman, a financial consultant and three early-retired people (including myself and my wife). With one exception none of us had previously been involved with a supporters' organisation. At our first working group meeting ten days later we agreed on a name for the trust, where and how often to meet and the date of the all-important launch meeting. In our total naivety we opted for 23 January 2003 (66 days thence). We also decided to write to all 276 Posh shareholders, asking them to donate or sell their shares or gift us their proxy voting rights.

At the next meeting, on 28 November, we decided to put back the launch to 6 February, purely to avoid the month-end. A few days later, when Posh played at Swindon Town, I called in at the office of TrustSTFC before the game. The committee members could not have been more helpful with advice and ideas, proving once again how real fans can support each other. They warned me how much hard work was involved in forming and then running a trust. I asked many questions, but the most important was: how long was it from the inauguration of the trust to their launch meeting? When they said six months, I knew that we needed to rethink our plans.

At our next meeting on 18 December we duly decided to postpone the launch until Monday, 10 March, thus giving us (we hoped) ample time to set up a first-class event. We designed an application form and (again noting wise words from TrustSTFC) agreed on an easily-affordable annual subscription of £10 (£1 for juniors). There would be no lifetime subscription or loan scheme for the time being.

Meanwhile, as the saga of the Posh takeover continued, we started to make contact with the existing owner and potential purchasers of the club, in order to build our profile among the powers that be. The need for a trust was underlined by a shift of power in the Posh boardroom, which gave rise to a bout of asset stripping, ostensibly to ward off administration.

Frustrating delays in obtaining our IPS status and a post office box number convinced us that the Christmas period was not the best time to establish a trust. We received 45 replies from shareholders with promises of 46 shares and 27 proxies. Since one man owned 99.6% of the paid-up shares, this was not a significant holding, but at least we could attend AGMs and EGMs and ask questions once we transferred the shares. (As I write we are still going through this long-drawn out process.)

The working group planned to start recruiting members at a 4th round F A Youth Cup tie against Manchester City on 22 January, but we were thwarted by the club's failing to open part of its facilities and then, contrary to what had been promised, preventing supporters from entering the bar in which we had set up a membership desk. This episode finally persuaded us to change the Launch Meeting venue from the club (capacity about 250) to much larger premises elsewhere.

While still acquiring raffle prizes and auction items and also engineering personal appearances by current and former Posh players, our next task was to sell tickets to the Launch Evening. We gave ourselves a month to do so, the main opportunities being home games against Cardiff, Stockport and Wigan. The first of these was postponed owing to a frozen pitch and the second only went ahead after two inspections. So we had to redouble our efforts to sell the tickets.

The launch meeting was eventually held on 10 March at The Cresset, Peterborough. Over 300 fans of the Posh were joined by the entire youth team and first team squads, coaching staff, and manager Barry Fry. Fans heard some stirring stuff from the representatives of the Chesterfield and Cambridge trusts, and our acting chairman Leigh Porter spoke of his hopes and aspirations for the organisation. Supporters were also given the opportunity to put questions to former Peterborough legends, including Steve Welsh, Lee Howarth and Peter McNamee. The highlight of the session was undoubtedly the comedy double act of former crowd favourites Jack Carmichael and Tommy Robson. A vote to give the steering committee the mandate to continue through to the first Annual General Meeting was carried unanimously. Finally, supporters were given the opportunity to bid for a fantastic range of football memorabilia, Posh past and present, as well as gifts generously donated by former stars including England goalkeeper David Seaman. Some bold bidding by the Posh manager helped take the total raised to over the £2,000 mark!

It was a great night that enabled the trust to drive the membership to more than 250, and we resolved to do everything we could to build on that. In five months eight strangers, with a common belief that trusts are the way forward, had come together and worked their socks off to make it a success.

By March 2003 Peterborough United had been for sale for 18 months and the threat of administration or demise by asset-stripping was becoming stronger by the day. The Trust steering committee was manfully striving to keep pace with the ever-changing situation by talking to the existing owner and various potential buyers, but our lack of funds and sparse membership (125 before the launch) constrained us significantly.

The events since our launch in March prove what a roller-coaster life is in the world of supporters' trusts. There have been two changes of ownership at Peterborough United. A week before the end of the season the club was bought by Barry Fry and long-standing director Alf Hand, the deal being underwritten by Barry's close friend Colin Hill. Within five months of this Barry had bought out Colin's interest and thus owned 99.6% of the shares. However, to achieve this the ownership of the stadium and the football club was split respectively between Colin Hill's Peterborough United Holdings Limited and Barry Fry's Peterborough United FC. In a deal that is somewhat shrouded in mystery, the club will pay a peppercorn rent for the use of the ground for ten years. Although there is a covenant requiring (a) that the site be used for sporting purposes and (b) that the city council should have the first option to buy it back if Posh discontinued or wished to dispose of the ground, the club's predicament in ten years' time is a matter for some speculation. Until then, perhaps manana is the operative word....

The launch and then the first change of ownership gave the Trust a momentum that has never diminished. Ignoring the words "close season", the steering committee toiled throughout the summer to recruit new members, build its profile and work towards a place on the club board. We combined with the Supporters' Club to arrange a successful open day. We established a squad of ball boys (and one girl), obtaining sponsorship of the kit from a firm of solicitors. While we had been toying with the idea of trying to acquire the club's merchandise franchise, the club suddenly offered to let us run the shop and we immediately jumped at the chance to gain a higher profile, recruit new members and sell our own goods. As we had persuaded the club to offer discounts to members on shop merchandise, this gave us the ideal opportunity to demonstrate the merits of membership. But it was only part of the strategy, because Keith Jennings, our business development director, negotiated a wide range of discounts with more than two dozen local businesses. Consequently the membership benefits became a major selling point.

As a result of all this effort we have welcomed over 500 adult and 130 junior members to the Trust within ten months of the official launch. But the highlight of the year was the moment when, on 1 November, having held a press conference to announce that he had bought the football club from Colin Hill, Barry Fry invited our Chief Executive, Leigh Porter, to be his first directorial appointment on the Posh board. At 27 Leigh must be one of the youngest football club directors in the country.

Although the appointment stemmed from a strong personal bond between Barry and Leigh, our Chief Executive made it clear that he wanted the position to belong to the duly elected representative of the Trust. The club accepted that Leigh would have to stand for re-election as the supporter-director each year.

Since, during all this activity, fund-raising has suffered, we are now urgently exploiting further sources of revenue, such as old football programmes, balloon races, a New Year party, a weekly lottery etc.

All this has been achieved by nine Trust directors plus a few volunteers willing to help with bucket collections, distribution of newsletters etc. Our strategy has been to obtain sponsorship wherever we can, so that our biggest outlay has probably been postage. For 14 months from our inception we did not pay a penny to the club - we left player sponsorship and other gifts to the official and independent supporters' groups - but now we have started to fund projects in exchange for shares. We are the third biggest shareholder - not too difficult when one person holds 99.7% - but we intend eventually to increase our holding substantially. Barry Fry has stated publicly that he wants to hand over the club to the supporters. It is too early to know how this can happen and what we would have to do, but we are already preparing for that day.

As we expand our links with other trusts - and we have only just discovered the existence of the East Midlands Trust Collective - it will be fascinating to see how each one develops its own set of strategies to tackle the issues that confront it. Although Northampton, AFC Wimbledon, Chesterfield and others were the pioneers, we are all blazing a completely new trail across uncharted territory. It is truly exciting to ponder the future of trusts in the governance of football.