I am disappointed. For those who are not aware, Helsingør Stadium houses a privately owned floor in the main building, known as ‘1st Floor’. At FC Helsingør, we are frustrated that the owner of this floor, Vida Byg (VB), is profiting from the hard work provided by the players and staff at FC Helsingør. We are a football club, and our goal is to entertain on the pitch and win football matches. That is why we charge for fans and sponsors to come to the stadium and watch our matches at Helsingør Stadium, so we can pay the people who work incredibly hard every day for the success we are currently experiencing week after week. It is neither cheap nor easy to stage home matches for FC Helsingør, and every single krone that comes from beer sales, ticket revenue or sponsorships helps keep the club running.
This season, however, VB has been exploiting our matches to take 350 kroner per visitor in their lounge on the 1st Floor, from where customers can then watch our matches. We estimate that over the course of the whole season, the matchday revenue will be between 250.000 and 300.000 kroner. Not a single krone of this goes to FC Helsingør, and that is simply not fair.
I have always wanted it not to turn out this way and for us to be united in working to support and cheer for FC Helsingør – together.
The background story may perhaps help explain how it all ended up being the way it is today. I will try to be brief and only provide the facts as I see them.
Originally, a 1th floor at the stadium was not budgeted for. I do not know the details of the process, as I was not employed by the club when the stadium was being planned, and how the agreement came about. As I understand it, it was proposed that VB should build and own the floor. It is also my impression that FC Helsingør’s former director had made an oral agreement with VB that the club would rent the floor and use it as an additional lounge as well as office facilities. But there was absolutely no documentation for the agreement. There was no contract or letter of intent or anything at all. I have absolutely no idea what was agreed between the parties. That became a problem later.
We fast-forward two years. The club is in trouble, as it is heading toward a second consecutive relegation, and it is in serious financial difficulties. The previous administration has no choice but to seek outside investment to avoid the club going bankrupt. A new ownership group arrives, a new director is appointed, and the changes deemed necessary to prepare for a season in the 2 division are made.
As the new director, I was given clear objectives from the board: clean up the finances, create an improved working environment on and off the pitch, and get FC Helsingør back in the 1 division as soon as possible.
One of the first meetings I had as director was with VB regarding the first floor at the stadium. The meeting was intended to be about the layout of the premises, the amount of the rent, and the time frame for takeover. Beforehand, I had asked for the documents detailing the rent, but as is well known, there were none. I met with VB to better understand the situation and to make it clear that renting yet another lounge would be a major financial burden for the club, which had just been relegated to a very economically unattractive 2 division.
The conversation laid the foundation for the relationship going forward. VB asked for approximately one million kroner a year in rent, and that was nowhere near an amount the club could afford. Without any agreement on renting the 1th floor, the meeting ended – and so did the relationship between FC Helsingør and Vida Byg.
The following year, FCH played in the 2 division at the new stadium, and VB’s floor stood unfinished. Towards the end of the season, work began on completing the top floor, and it was finished when we returned to the 1 division. Then Covid-19 came, and therefore spectators were not allowed at the matches.
At the beginning of this season, it suddenly became clear that VB intended to use our matches for lounge activities on the 1th floor. VB sells tickets for 350 kroner per person for food and drinks with an unobstructed view of our football match.
I was not surprised when I heard about it. In anticipation that the intention was to use our matches to create their own events, I had written a letter a couple of months earlier to Helsingør Municipality about how it could be possible to hold events with an entry fee in premises that were registered as residential apartments. The municipality’s response then, as now, was that the 1th floor is not part of the stadium, and that any disagreements between the parties had nothing to do with the municipality. Not exactly a response in our favor, but I understand that the municipality did not want to end up in the middle of a dispute.
Let us, for a moment, forget that VB charges admission for events the company does not itself stage. My question is the same: How is it legal to hold that kind of event in premises that were not built for that purpose?
That is the short version of what I understand the situation to be. I hope it can shed light on why the club views things the way it does in relation to the stadium building’s 1th floor. My hope is simple. I want to see the people from Vida Byg and their guests down on the lower level, in the beer queues and in the stands with the rest of us, so that together in good harmony we can support the players and all the other people who work every single day to move the club forward. For that to be possible, we need to stand together. Literally. Many big tasks and matches lie ahead of us.
Jim Kirks, Director
