The owner has filed for bankruptcy which suggests that he didn’t have the appropriate money. Rumour has it that the league had to take over paying the salaries part way through the season and that is the reason USL withheld to prize funds for winning the cup. The owners appear to be disputing this - but the owners are launching a bunch of legal actions against various people who claim the owners owe them money. Last season Northern Col averaged 1,522. If you assume an average ticket price of $25 that’s a little under 700k in revenue. The USL league specifies a minimum salary of $2000/month for a minimum of 15 players. So assuming players are contracted for 9 months that’s a minimum of $270k. Plus most USL one teams offer their players some form of accommodation. However my average ticket price of $25 is probably generous AND the team likely had more than 15 players and some of them probably earned more than the minimum USL salary. You also have to pay the coaching staff and other club staff. I would suggest the ticket revenue MIGHT at a stretch cover the basic payroll, although I think that might be a big stretch. There will be some other match day revenue but that is going to be limited due to the facilities available. That doesn’t begin to cover all the other costs - the cost of travel in league one must be brutal, particularly for Northern Colorado who were pretty isolated. All of this is fine if you have an owner willing and able to cover the losses, but it looks like Northern Colorado did not. I would imagine the league knows all of this and decided it wasn’t going to get better any time soon. Plus it’s pretty clear the owner doesn’t meet the $10m net worth annymore and I don’t believe 4Rivers stadium has the 1,000 seats - a big chunk of the capacity is SRO. I think the league is just enforcing its rules by terminating the franchise. It’s a great shame because on the pitch the Snowstorm were a good watch.
Lets not forget team and league sponsorship money (USL signed a bunch of new league sponsorships this year), etc. NoCo had New Belgium Brewing as their jersey sponsor. Terminix is all over both the USLC and USL1 websites for the playoffs. No idea how much money is involved in any of that, but the list of official USL sponsors is interesting: https://www.uslsoccer.com/partners. My only real issue with USL and NoCo is what happened to the money that's supposed to be put down as a bond for ownership? Is that what they used to pay contracts?
-------- And living in Southern California, I probably have been to a game in the majority of those leagues with the exception of indoor soccer which really doesn't mean anything to me. Then when I add in all the levels and teams in college soccer, I have been to way too many games
Yeah I also never got into the indoor game. When the old NASL folded, that’s all there was but the MISL games were rarely on TV unless you had cable channels. I don’t think it was the main reason on why pro soccer failed in those years but I do believe the indoor game hindered outdoor soccer and greatly contributed to the NASL’s demise.
I'm surprised (unless I overlooked it) to see no comments on this: https://www.independent.co.uk/sport/football/orange-county-fan-ownership-usa-usl-mls-b2560554.html
Interesting, I hadn't seen that anywhere. They've had a partnership for 5 years now, but nothing I remember said anything about fan ownership.
"The perception among English and British fans of US Soccer is that it’s all about MLS, shiny stadiums, corporate soccer - it’s important for them to experience that we can do it without billionaires swooping in. We had three employees and played in front of 120 people when I started. We’ve improved everything with local fans and local community.” So they wouldn't get into the USL Championship these days, which requires $20 million+ up front and a shiny 5,000 seat stadium.
Portland Hearts of Pine reveal their inaugural home kit. https://www.uslleagueone.com/news_article/show/1324432