Green Bay Packers Ownership Explained
The Green Bay Packers of the National Football League (NFL) are a professional football team headquartered in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Their official name is Green Bay Packers, Inc.
Who Owns Green Bay Packers?
The Packers are the only NFL team that is owned by the public. They do not belong to any one person, partnership, or corporation; rather, as of 2022, they are held by 537,460 investors.
Aaron Jones has long seemed destined to be a captain of the Green Bay Packers.
And now he officially is one. pic.twitter.com/Q6Z7nKMd0g
— PackersHistory.com (@PackersHistory1) September 9, 2022
A maximum of 200,000 shares, or around 4% of the 5,011,558 shares now outstanding, may not be held by any one person. Despite being the smallest market in all of North America’s major professional sports, the club has remained in Green Bay for nearly a century thanks to this broad-based community support and non-profit organization.
The team has been a publicly owned non-profit since August 18, 1923.
Can you buy a share of the Green Bay Packers?
In 2021 shares were sold at $300 each.
After missing all three preseason games while recovering from a knee surgery, Green Bay Packers rookie receiver Christian Watson will make his NFL debut during Sunday’s season opener against … https://t.co/xg2cmydJnU
— The Packers Wire (@ThePackersWire) September 9, 2022
Exception To Corporate Ownership
The NFL does not permit corporate ownership of clubs, but because the Packers have been a publicly owned corporation since the rule’s inception, they are exempt.
Four years after the team’s founding, in 1923, when it was on the verge of filing for bankruptcy, everything began.
Dear NFL,
Sell ownership of the Washington football team to the public. Adopt the Green Bay Packers fan / share owner model
Thank you
— david chang (@davidchang) July 16, 2020
The Packers have been run in this manner ever since they offered shares to the public to keep the franchise solvent.
However, because stocks do not have an equity interest, do not pay dividends, and cannot be traded or sold, investors cannot profit from their investments.
Rules Of Ownership
The only fan-owned, non-profit NFL franchise is the Green Bay Packers. The Conversation points out that it will undoubtedly remain that way. “Charitable organizations and/or corporations not organized for profit and not now a member of the league may not hold membership in the National Football League,” in other words, the Green Bay Packers are grandfathered in as the only publicly-owned team in the league, according to the NFL’s 1960 constitution.
The league doesn’t keep an eye on discussion forums or comment sections for unfavourable remarks. Journalists, for example, who occasionally have to criticize NFL players as part of their duties, may be impacted by the restriction. Owning a stake in the Green Bay Packers would present a conflict of interest for those authors. As it turns out, investing in an NFL club might present some intriguing moral conundrums.
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