An ambitious Melbourne Storm want to have an AFL-style membership of 50,000 within five years and will wean themselves off poker machine revenue as the NRL premiers promise to be an Australian sporting powerhouse.
The Storm, who are gunning to be the first back-to-back premiers in 25 years, will soon unveil a strategic plan which will hope to double their membership base within five years.
Growth: Melbourne Storm is working towards 50,000 members.
AFL club memberships topped 1 million for the first time this season – underpinned by Richmond cracking the 100,000 mark – as even the lowest ticketed Melbourne-based club, North Melbourne, boasted more than 40,000 members.
And the Storm want to tap into the sport-mad Melbourne market even further having consistently been recognised as one of the NRL's best gameday experiences.
"We want to see membership go from 25,000 to 50,000 and based on the modelling we've done and the experience of the last five years … we genuinely believe we can get there," Storm part-owner Matt Tripp said.
"Everyone laughed at us when we said we wanted to go from 12,500 to 25,000 [five years ago]. They might scoff at us again, but I'm pretty bullish with the team we've got in place and the foundations we have laid we can get there – and get there within five years.
"Knowing the DNA of Melburnians and how they value their sport, if ever we were going to do it in a city where the code is foreign [it's here]."
BetEasy chief executive Tripp, Jayco Caravans boss Gerry Ryan plus lawyer and former chairman of global sports marketing agency TLA Worldwide, Bart Campbell, will enjoy their third NRL grand final appearance in five years since taking over the Storm.
The trio have nursed Melbourne from perennial loss makers off the field into one of the most financially viable clubs in the NRL, highlighted by the fact they will be one of up to eight to break even or record a small surplus in the first year of the code's new funding model.
And it's convinced it will soon be able to offload its poker machine licence at the Kealba Hotel in north-west Melbourne, which has helped prop up the Storm in recent years.
Several Sydney clubs such as the Bulldogs, Eels and Panthers have had rivers of gold from their powerful leagues clubs to underpin their football operations.
There has been a backlash against AFL franchises cashing in on club-owned poker machines in recent years.
"It has been a necessarily evil to own a hotel in order to stop the bleeding in the club, for it to stand on its own two feet," Tripp said.
"We're not reliant on the gaming venue which means the gaming venue might not be necessary for us as we progress. I would prefer to just focus on the club rather than other moving parts of it."
Tripp, Ryan and Campbell have no immediate plans to ease themselves out of the Storm, which is run by one of the brightest sporting administrators in Australia in Dave Donaghy.
They staved off a poaching bid from the Broncos to lure Craig Bellamy north some time after the end of his exiting deal – the supercoach eventually signed on for a further three years – and will hope to formalise a deal with Cameron Smith before ramping up talks to keep Cameron Munster.
"I think whilst part one of the equation has been taken care of and we've ticked all the boxes for the club to be in fantastic shape, we want it to be a powerhouse," Tripp said.
"It's a remarkable outfit and is entitled to the mantle of one of the premier sporting clubs in the country. I think there is a lot more to do. In five years time I would love to look back on our first 10 years and be pretty happy with that, but we're only part of the way there."
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