Everton secure sponsor partnership for Finch Farm

Same shirt sponsor for 10 years. Renew it for a bit extra every 3 years... Job done. Bobby Elstone lights another spliff.

"Oh, but what can we do, we've got no money."

Usmanov also on his way... or am I just putting 2 + 2 together and getting 9???

(I know, I know...)

Ah, who cares for 㾼m?

But look who is the majority holder

Metalloinvest Management Company LLC (Russian: Металлоинвест) is a Russian mining and metallurgy company specializing in the manufacture of steel. It was founded in 1999 and is composed of a mining division (Lebedinsky GOK and Mikhailovsky GOK) and a steel division (Oskol Elektrometallurgical Plant (OEMK) and Ural Steel).

USM Holdings owns 100% of Metalloinvest JSC. Alisher Usmanov is the major beneficiary of USM Holdings (48%), with other major beneficiaries — the companies of Vladimir Skoch and Farhad Moshiri — owning 30% and 10%, respectively.

Good job Moshiri never listened to some commercial "experts" on this site who insisted we had maximised our sponsorship opportunities with the Chang deal... (which was plainly down to lazy & unambitious marketing).

I didn't see it written on any report or tweet... or does somebody have inside info?

Many posters, led by our Caspian Correspondent Martin Mason, were continually telling us to prove the then Board were not maximising our potential etc etc etc.

Where is Mr Mason these days by the way? Anyway, changed days it seems. We just need Bill to retire and exit stage right, taking his sidekick Elstone with him.

We are getting new sponsors which will bring in 㿷M, don't think that is per year. Joe Anderson got a great round of applause when he finished his speech, which was about the new ground, him, the council are working very hard along with Everton to get the new ground.

Going by the applause, it seemed the Bramley-Moore Dock site was the preferred one – no more than preferred.

Mr. Moshiri seemed to know his stuff about football and when asked about the future, indicated that although the FA Cup was important he wanted to concentrate on and improve the league position, that seemed more important to him. He said he joined Arsenal because his mate was there but he is glad he joined Everton and feels like an Evertonian and is very happy he is part of the club.

Other news is the season ticket prices will be frozen again next season and some will be further reduced, no season ticket will cost more than 𧻲, that equals 㿊 a game, the dearest price any away supporter will pay next season.

Every director put themselves up for re election and all were voted back in. A few questions were asked at the end but none seemed of any importance as far as I could hear.

Elstrone also looked like part of the furniture, Jon Woods yawned once or twice but said nothing, Moshiri's right-hand man introduced himself by name, because Kenwright couldn't pronounce it, but said nothing else; seems he's an expert in banking, according to Elstrone.

I wonder what happened there...

Keep the insights coming on either or both threads. Good to hear the observations of someone at the meeting and not what the journos tell us.

Everton sold the land for Finch Farm to a developer, and leased it back once complete. The developer then sold FF to Liverpool City Council as a Strategic Investment for the Council (controversial at the time, natch) and so it's probably done with agreement with the owners (LCC).

Man Utd did this a few years ago. They had a Sponsorship deal with DHL for the training kit that was worth a few million a year. Then they were courted by Chevrolet, and so terminated early their main sponsorship with Aon, who then took over their training academy – which included the training kits, so DHL were bought out of their sponsorship contract.

Clubs like Man Utd and the RS have hundreds of sponsors. Chinese paint manufacturers; Japanese clock makers – all clamouring to have association with success, or the RS. They've had these deals for years and add more every year.

It's a nice move but many years too late. Any increase in income allows us to spend more on players, to a degree, that isn't swallowed up by wage inflation.

Moshiri isn't Russian.

£75 million sponsorship is likely to be over several years.

Why not last year? There was a far weaker business plan compared with our current plans. Business wants to attach it's name to a club with plans to increase exposure.

We are improving, possibly even reducing the financial distance between us and one or two clubs above us.

Stadium is vitally important for future growth but consider that our last stadium project was only forecast to earn an additional £6 million per year.

I can't understand how Elstone survived. Maybe had a silver guardian angel protecting him.

Everyone seemed in a good mood and I think actual shareholders are different to proxy voters; I am one of the latter.

If I'd have been there, there would've been 2.

Elstone has taken a lot of flack, but it seems to me that aligning the club with new sponsors whilst undergoing a take-over might not have been something worth getting involved with when you have a new owner coming in.

I'm not defending Elstone here, just thinking about it from a business perspective – it could well have been that the club didn't want to go making changes, or signing contracts with other sponsors until Moshiri came on board.

Just a thought.

Yes, Kirkby was projected to earn us an extra ٤ million a year. However, the financial uplift from a shit stadium in the middle of nowhere, with commercially inept owners in charge, isn't at all comparable to the one that we hope comes off.

A top stadium on the waterfront within a development unlocks much more potential. Naming rights alone would be much more significant in value. And we now have people at the club who can actually negotiate these deals.

We were clearly quite happy to muddle along with Chang for the longest shirt sponsorship in Premier League history. Who is ultimately responsible for driving that tactic? The board, of course.

That doesn't mean Elstone is the best we can hope for either. The new guy has clearly put a structure in place to improve this part of the business, and I imagine everyone who negotiates commercial deals was left in no doubt that they had to deliver improved numbers, or their position would be under threat.

These words from Moshiri told the whole story "It's not enough to say that we are special. We don't want to be a museum."

He knew precisely how this club operated in the past. Hopefully he can deliver. I believe he will.

There are an awful lot of subjective judgements in your comment that may or may not be true.

My experience of the waterfront is that it is a pretty deserted unfriendly place too, freezing salty winds will make the walk-up quite uninviting versus a pleasant Victorian park or even a retail carpark in Kirkby.

It might look good on a wideshot image of the famous waterfront but On a stormy day with a spring tide and a rise in water levels.... brrrrr.

If, however, this becomes the centre of massive social regeneration, all may be well – eventually.

If it comes off, a significantly better stadium than the Kirkby design, which it will be, on the waterfront, can open a range of opportunities for the club to potentially generate more revenue than the £6 million a year for the mid-range design in Kirkby. That's stone-cold, nailed-on.

Even with the wind blowing.