The "meaning" of scarcity: from accidental participation in the acquisition of European football clubs

Meaningful things, trustworthy people, executable plans, and light-weight participation opportunities, when these come together, it is possible to form broader community participation, which in turn produces benign interactions and an enhanced ecology .

Written by: Wang Chao

Recently, there is an interesting thing that I want to talk about. Some time ago, an overseas sports investment team contacted me and introduced an opportunity to acquire a European football club. Most of the share of the project has been subscribed by sports capital, but the new team hopes to introduce more extensive global support, so they want to provide a small share to friends from different regions and industries, so that everyone can form a group to vote . At first, my reaction was "What the hell, don't lie to me." But after all the posts came, I looked at the information. As a result, I was really attracted to it, so I made an appointment with the team. Time formally chatted several times.

News such as the acquisition of a team is not uncommon, but the impression it gives people is often negative. Most of the scripts are some upstarts who don't know how to mess around, and finally ruined a good team. Specific to this acquisition, I see that there is no need to spoil this time, this is a team that has been spoiled in place. It has a long and rich history of playing in the first division, producing superstars, and now struggling in an amateur league with 200 spectators per game. There is a huge contrast between the glorious history and the current desolate status quo.

For sports club investment, the acquisition is never the end, but the beginning of the toss. This time too, the money needed for the acquisition is only a small part of the total funding plan, and most of the money is used to strengthen the team's operations in the next few years. Among the participating parties are old guns in the European club circle, brothers who are good at sports commercialization, and local authorities of the team. Looking at it, I feel that the overall operation plan is okay. But after all, I don’t understand sports and venue operations. From the perspective of operation and investment, I can neither deny nor confirm the feasibility. But halfway through the information, I began to understand this matter from another angle.

Isn't this a real-life Champion Football Manager game? Everyone owns this team together, starting from the low-level league, fighting monsters and upgrading, returning to the high-level league step by step, and then shaping and operating a commercial sports IP. If done well, there is a high probability that there will be good financial returns. If you don’t play well, you won’t get your money back, but it’s interesting to think about this process. Thinking about the past, there were quite a few projects that lost money. Even if they lost money this time, they can still gain a few years of interesting experience.

I talked with the team during the May Day holiday, and they said that they met many people who had similar ideas. Everyone is not just here for financial returns, but more about the fun of the participation process. The team is also keen to experiment with such a model. If the team can form organic interactions among a wider group, this model has the potential to be practiced in more fields.

That’s what we’ll be working toward implementing with the team - meaningful engagement and participation. we want that process to be open to the participating investors.

Team

What I want to discuss today is not the acquisition itself, but whether this kind of demand exists widely, and if so, what kind of products are suitable for this market. Still going back to this matter, I probably thought about why it attracted me:

Provides meaning - What this project provides me is not only an investment opportunity, it also provides a meaning. As a sports enthusiast and a person with a strong curiosity, such meaning has a lot of appeal to me.

Affordable cost - Neither the overall cost of the project nor the specific cost of individual participation is high, but the matter itself has a high ceiling. Participating in an interesting, meaningful, and potentially commercially rewarding event at an affordable cost, although the ROI cannot be calculated, I feel good about it.

Cultural Consensus- The team once had a proud history. In a well-known tourist city, the reason why this acquisition was successful is that the package contained some commitment to building the city's culture. These backgrounds bring about a certain cultural consensus, which in part constitutes the motivation and meaning of participation.

Growth Accompanied- The team is currently in a semi-amateur league, and the growth path for fighting monsters and upgrading in the next few years is clear, and the injection of funds will most likely effectively improve the performance. This provides an "I watched it grow" opportunity that leads to a fun experience and a deeper emotional connection. Just like when we look at Station B, we found a treasure up master when we had 1,000 followers, and then watched him grow up a little bit, and finally became a million-fan up master. In the process, we seem to have a relationship with this up master A deep connection was made. If everyone buys a top league team together, it may not be able to bring this kind of experience. These experiences lead to psychological ownership, and when psychological ownership is combined with actual ownership, the experience will be greatly enhanced and great motivation will burst out.

Opportunities for Learning and Engagement - Although the team's operational decisions will not be left to investors, the operations team plans to provide various communication and engagement opportunities to understand the team's actions, future plans, and decisions process. Outside of team management, investors will be encouraged to become more directly involved in things like franchises and field operations. And if the purpose is to learn, this is also a good opportunity to learn more about a specific field at low cost. Lightweight participation opportunities are more suitable for most people's situations. It's like I like playing games very much, but I often have more than enough energy to face the games I like. So I had to settle for the next best thing. If I had time, I went to station B to watch other people play, and it was very fun to watch. If I had nothing to do, I would send a barrage to interact.

Trust - The executive team itself has credibility and the plan appears to be executable. And the smoothness of communication channels also enhances confidence. This level of credibility gives me confidence in the process, even though I can't predict the outcome.

To sum up, meaningful things, trustworthy people, executable plans, and light-weight participation opportunities, all of which come together, may form a wider community participation, and then generate benign interactions and an enhanced ecology.

In my opinion, "becoming part of something meaningful" is the desire buried in everyone's heart. But people's lives are occupied by various trivial matters, busy with work, busy with investment, busy with tutoring children, busy with taking care of the elderly, and even visiting tourist spots. We don't have time to think about other things in life that we like and are worth participating in together. Even if you think about it, it is difficult to meet the right opportunity. Maybe it's because I'm so busy everyday that I don't have time to devote myself. It may be because you are not financially well off and don't have spare money to participate. It may be because of the asymmetry of information that there is no such thing at all. It is more likely that each field has highly exclusive professional requirements. So we can only be an audience and bury these wishes in our hearts.

Belonging is one of the most basic human needs - the feeling of happiness or comfort in being part of a group. People are finding new places online to feel a stronger sense of belonging. Many people focus on hobbies and activities that give them meaning and seek out groups where they can explore interests together. In Accenture's research, the vast majority of respondents said they had tried a new hobby or joined a new community in the past six to nine months.

Accenture 2023 Living Trends Report

But now both technology and social culture have produced significant changes. From the social level, people began to regard instability as the normal state of the world, and everyone hoped to find a place with a greater sense of belonging. Technological advances have enhanced our ability to communicate and coordinate, and to distribute ownership in a more efficient and cost-effective manner. So we began to provide the highly professional and exclusive experience of the past to the public. This change has brought about the fusion of psychological ownership and actual ownership, which will bring new vitality to many industries.