Everyone can see how far the Pilgrims have progressed since a change of regime in 2001. Dan McAuley's exit pathed the way for Paul Stapleton to take the reins as Argyle's chairman, and with a new stadium and highly-regarded new manager in Paul Sturrock, the club has been in ascendance ever since.
In this, the fifth season under Stapleton's setup, the club have announced that profits have broken the 7-figure mark for the previous year. News that will relieve fans, who can be assured from this announcement that the director's still have the club's best interests at heart. No-one would even have dreamt it any other way with the Mayflower sailing up the football league when some feared that it wouldn't stay afloat.
Now though, especially with two changes of managers, the club has had to fund the acquistion of a better, thus more demanding, standard of player and agent. Occasionally, it has been the premature exits and exiles that have been the unaccounted-for cost. Plus, with rival clubs such as Leeds, Sheffield United and Reading, to name a few, spending £1million plus on a single addition to the playing staff, the cheque-book needed to be on hand to secure the talents of Buzsaky and Chadwick.
One topic often a concern amongst supporters has been the sharp increase in tickets prices, which has turned out successful despite crowd's being a little lower during bad spells. But it has all come together to put the club in good stead for it's future assualt on the promotion spots.
It's the one hurdle where the club has stumbled on a couple of occasion in the latter half of it's 100+ year history. This time however, ambitious chairman Stapleton sees no reason why thoughts of playing in the Premiership in the near future are that farfetched. "The promised land of the Premiership is there and we can see from what we have done this season, with the right appointments in the right areas, we can get there," Stapleton said when delivering the financial summary to the media. "We're building a platform to go forward, providing a period of stability so we can go on pushing towards, first, the play-off area, and then the Premiership", he added.
Again, with former manager Bobby Williamson still costing the club and a little more investment into the plans of new man Tony Pulis, Stapleton is warning that this season may have cost the club a good 12 months profit, which could be put down to the stumble at the start of the season with Argyle staring relegation in the face. Coupled with the fact that the Pilgrims' board have budgeted for the second and final phase of the stadium's reconstruction to be finally be put to bed.
Plans for the project's completion will be confirmed at next month's annual general meeting, where an uplifting ambience is expected with Plymouth Argyle sitting nicely in the black with an estimated £2 million in the kitty.
Stapleton was delighted to thank the club's loyal at-all-cost followers. "The fans' support is vitally important to this club. We've got the superstore and sponsorship deals, but we haven't really got anything else that compares to our gate income". However, he was quick to address of how the drop in attendance has hurt the club when it had planned for a larger wage budget, £1million larger than last year's, as Stapleton himself confirmed. But with the prices so steep, comparitable to Premiership grounds, the poor standards set at the beginning of campaign are to blame for sure and the club can have few complaints.
"We increased the wages budget by £1 million. We knew very well that the average attendance would not keep up, but we did not expect it to drop off as much, which has been a bit of a shock to the system. I always budget for a reduction, but not as significant as it has been, and I am hoping that our fans will come between now and the end of the season to push the average back up". Just recently though, it has with an improvement in results and performance.
The club has 'tended to punch above it's weight' in terms of finance, like Stapleton said, but the setup is all in place, the catchment area is plentiful and good few years, with progression on the playing field and there is no reason why Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United won't be making there way to Plymouth for a league fixture.
In this, the fifth season under Stapleton's setup, the club have announced that profits have broken the 7-figure mark for the previous year. News that will relieve fans, who can be assured from this announcement that the director's still have the club's best interests at heart. No-one would even have dreamt it any other way with the Mayflower sailing up the football league when some feared that it wouldn't stay afloat.
Now though, especially with two changes of managers, the club has had to fund the acquistion of a better, thus more demanding, standard of player and agent. Occasionally, it has been the premature exits and exiles that have been the unaccounted-for cost. Plus, with rival clubs such as Leeds, Sheffield United and Reading, to name a few, spending £1million plus on a single addition to the playing staff, the cheque-book needed to be on hand to secure the talents of Buzsaky and Chadwick.
One topic often a concern amongst supporters has been the sharp increase in tickets prices, which has turned out successful despite crowd's being a little lower during bad spells. But it has all come together to put the club in good stead for it's future assualt on the promotion spots.
It's the one hurdle where the club has stumbled on a couple of occasion in the latter half of it's 100+ year history. This time however, ambitious chairman Stapleton sees no reason why thoughts of playing in the Premiership in the near future are that farfetched. "The promised land of the Premiership is there and we can see from what we have done this season, with the right appointments in the right areas, we can get there," Stapleton said when delivering the financial summary to the media. "We're building a platform to go forward, providing a period of stability so we can go on pushing towards, first, the play-off area, and then the Premiership", he added.
Again, with former manager Bobby Williamson still costing the club and a little more investment into the plans of new man Tony Pulis, Stapleton is warning that this season may have cost the club a good 12 months profit, which could be put down to the stumble at the start of the season with Argyle staring relegation in the face. Coupled with the fact that the Pilgrims' board have budgeted for the second and final phase of the stadium's reconstruction to be finally be put to bed.
Plans for the project's completion will be confirmed at next month's annual general meeting, where an uplifting ambience is expected with Plymouth Argyle sitting nicely in the black with an estimated £2 million in the kitty.
Stapleton was delighted to thank the club's loyal at-all-cost followers. "The fans' support is vitally important to this club. We've got the superstore and sponsorship deals, but we haven't really got anything else that compares to our gate income". However, he was quick to address of how the drop in attendance has hurt the club when it had planned for a larger wage budget, £1million larger than last year's, as Stapleton himself confirmed. But with the prices so steep, comparitable to Premiership grounds, the poor standards set at the beginning of campaign are to blame for sure and the club can have few complaints.
"We increased the wages budget by £1 million. We knew very well that the average attendance would not keep up, but we did not expect it to drop off as much, which has been a bit of a shock to the system. I always budget for a reduction, but not as significant as it has been, and I am hoping that our fans will come between now and the end of the season to push the average back up". Just recently though, it has with an improvement in results and performance.
The club has 'tended to punch above it's weight' in terms of finance, like Stapleton said, but the setup is all in place, the catchment area is plentiful and good few years, with progression on the playing field and there is no reason why Chelsea, Liverpool and Manchester United won't be making there way to Plymouth for a league fixture.