Chelsea takeover: Todd Boehly speaks about his ownership philosophy

Prospective new Chelsea owner Todd Boehly, whose consortium was chosen as the ‘preferred bidder’ last week, has discussed his ownership philosophy at a conference in Los Angeles.

Boehly is already a part-owner of baseball’s LA Dodgers and more recently acquired a stake in the LA Lakers. He fronts the bid that also includes Swiss billionaire Hansjorg Wyss, which is expected to be successful despite late competition from British petrochemicals magnate Sir Jim Ratcliffe.

The American initially made his fortune in finance and has spoken openly about ensuring there is affordability for fans in order to fill stadiums – the example he used was Dodger Stadium. He also mentioned pursuing big brands, which could be a huge revenue opportunity for Chelsea.

“There’s nothing like sports to excite passion. And if you have passion, then you have people who care about things. And if you have people who care about things, you have great opportunity. And really, it’s about curating that experience, that access, that opportunity,” Boehly said.

“We’ll have four million people coming out to Dodger Stadium this year. So, our goal is to give them the best possible experience. We still have the most affordable tickets in the league basically, for a stadium that’s full regularly,” he added.

“When you look at how we think about price points, and how we think about sports, we just believe they’re not making more of them, so implicit in that is scarcity value.

“We’ve been really focused on just the super big brands. In some sports like the NFL, they share all the media money. In baseball, you’re really a derivative of your local market.

“The Premier League is similar. If you look at the way it works, to be one of the big brands, you have a structural advantage. And for us, we’re always looking for structural advantages.”

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