Ebbsfleet Utd

Business type

Open Business

Service/product description

Since February 2008, Ebbsfleet - a club UK football club – has been owned by the web-based venture MyFootballClub, whose members may vote on team selection and player transfers, instead of those decisions being made exclusively by the club’s management and staff as at most other clubs.

What does 'openness' mean in this case?

Instead of the Football Club being owned by some rich guy who hires a few experts to decide on who to hire and who might play or not – this Football Club is being owned by mainly its supporters. Everyone who wants to have a say in who get’s hired and is playing can become a member of the website – MyFootballClub - and can vote on these issues. This way decisions are being made more democratically and people who normally are not inluded or don’t have a say in these kind of decisions are now involved as well. They’ve openned up the way the ‘business’ is being run.