For the fifth time in their history, the Packers are offering a sale of what they call stock, though purchasers receive no more than a piece of paper saying they own a portion of the city-owned franchise. With no voting rights, cash value or any other benefits accompanying the purchase of the non-transferable stock selling for $250 plus handling fees, it is essentially a donation without a tax deduction. Naturally, Packers fans are lining up.
“I love the Packers so I’d do anything for them, even if it means writing them a check for a piece of paper that says I’m a part owner of the team,” said Lonnie Dohrmann of Kewaunee, Wisc. “I read there’s a limit of 200 shares per person but I’m hoping to find a way around that because I’m dying to hand over way more than $50,000 on this deal.”
Dohrmann is just one of thousands of fans clamoring to get in on the action, which starts Dec. 6 and ends Feb. 29. Packers message boards are bursting with fans ecstatic at the prospect of forking over their hard-earned cash to the team in exchange for nothing.
The Packers said they never thought something as foolish as a sale of openly worthless stock would catch on, but the team has raised hundreds of millions of dollars so far and stands to bring in more than $60 million with this latest round of financing.
“These guys aren’t getting anything other than a piece of paper that says whatever we want it to,” said Packers President/CEO Mark Murphy. “But, hey, we figured we’d throw it out there and sure enough, these morons bit at it. Kind of makes you wonder what else we can do to bring in a few hundred million, doesn’t it?”
