GREEN BAY, Wis. — There’s no person extra highly effective within the Inexperienced Bay Packers’ group than the crew president. But when Bob Harlan held that submit for 19 years and oversaw the franchise’s return to glory within the Nineties, he by no means masqueraded as Jerry Jones, Robert Kraft or some other rich NFL proprietor.
And he made certain nobody who labored at 1265 Lombardi Ave. did both.
“I all the time instructed the folks on our employees: ‘Each time any individual calls this group, keep in mind they personal the crew, we do not,'” Harlan recalled just lately.
And there are 538,967 of them who would possibly choose up the telephone at any time and dial 920-569-7500.
Whether or not it is Harlan from 1989 to 2008, Mark Murphy since January 28, 2008, or the just lately named Ed Coverage, who will take over in July 2025 after Murphy reaches the crew president’s obligatory retirement age of 70, none of them will ever personal the Packers — though the president basically acts because the proprietor on the subject of voting on NFL insurance policies.
Within the easiest of phrases, that is how the crew within the smallest metropolis in American skilled sports activities operates as the one one with out a controlling proprietor.
The Packers’ articles of incorporation prohibit any single individual from proudly owning greater than 200,000 shares — safety towards somebody making an attempt to manage the crew.
In line with the Packers, there are some 5,204,625 shares of the crew owned by the half-million-plus stockholders. The inventory pays no dividends and can’t be traded, subsequently it has no market worth, although it may be transferred to a member of the family.
“There actually isn’t any mannequin for this aside from this,” mentioned Rick Chernick, a Inexperienced Bay enterprise proprietor who served on the Packers’ board of administrators from 1998 to 2022. “It is not just like the board dictates something day-to-day; they actually do not. The staff who report back to Mark and to the chief crew, they’re those who do the lion’s share of the work. We’re similar to a sounding board and can hearken to what is going on on and make strategies and provides concepts.
“However it’s completely fascinating while you journey and also you say you are on the Packers’ board, folks say, ‘Who has a board?’ Baseball, basketball, hockey? None of them.”
THOUGH THE SHAREHOLDERS elect the board members, both on the annual assembly held in July at Lambeau Discipline or by proxy, it is not precisely an open election. This yr, for instance, there are two candidates for 2 seats. As well as, there is just one candidate to interchange outgoing government committee member Susan Finco, who has reached the obligatory retirement age. Certainly one of Finco’s final acts was to chair the search committee to select Murphy’s substitute.
Murphy performed a powerful function within the appointments, though there’s a committee of board members that implies potential candidates. The board is essentially composed of enterprise house owners and group leaders, however some have ties to the Packers and/or skilled or school athletics.
The present board of 43 administrators contains 4 former Packers gamers (LeRoy Butler, Johnnie Grey, George Koonce and Dexter McNabb), outstanding Wisconsin enterprise house owners and even a county circuit court docket choose. From the board, seven — together with the crew president — serve on the chief committee.
Previous board members embrace former Main League Baseball commissioner Bud Selig and former College of Wisconsin athletic director Pat Richter.
Board members obtain no monetary compensation. Nevertheless, the members of the chief committee usually journey to highway video games with the crew and sit within the visiting house owners field.
“It is a totally different type of board within the sense that it is actually a group board, it is made up of individuals from our state,” mentioned Richter, who served on the board from 1996 to 2011. “Everyone has a ardour for the Packers, and I believe that is the place it begins.
“Simply because folks have purchased groups or purchased into groups, the success of a crew actually will depend on the kind of folks you might have operating the crew. They have been very lucky to convey good folks in there, reliable folks. The board is actually like a check-and-balance system so to talk, which is nice. Should you mentioned all these skilled groups have been publicly owned, that is the mannequin you’d find yourself with.”
SINCE THE TEAM was conceived by Curly Lambeau and native newspaperman George Whitney Calhoun in 1919, there have been six inventory gross sales — 1923, 1935, 1950, 1997, 2011 and 2022.
The early gross sales have been essential simply to maintain the crew in enterprise. The newer gross sales have been to enhance the crew’s services, together with Lambeau Discipline. Within the final sale, about 198,000 shares have been bought at $300 every for upgrades at Lambeau Discipline, together with new videoboards and concourse enhancements.
Not one of the cash from inventory gross sales can be utilized to pay gamers, and all gross sales want league approval.
It was earlier than the 1997 sale when Harlan, for the one time throughout his presidency, mentioned he felt like an outsider among the many league’s different 31 house owners. Harlan wished to promote shares for $200 every to assist help the renovation of Lambeau Discipline, a $295 million mission that was funded largely by a half-percent gross sales tax in Brown County. The inventory sale, which added 105,989 new shareholders, accounted for simply $24 million of that whole.
After Harlan’s presentation to a small group of householders and the NFL’s finance committee, he left the room for the group to debate.
“Apparently, one of many house owners instructed the group, ‘Let’s get these goddamn farmers and their frozen tundra out of this league,'” Harlan mentioned. “One other proprietor got here as much as me the following morning and instructed me what occurred. After three journeys to the finance committee, I lastly did get approval.
‘[Steelers owner] Dan Rooney stood up and mentioned to the group, ‘Inexperienced Bay is essential to this league. I believe we have to offer Bob the complete help or we’ll by no means get this executed.’ And we ended up getting a unanimous vote on it. Aside from that one time, there was by no means a difficulty.”
Murphy, who oversaw two inventory gross sales, by no means felt any pushback.
“The newest one, [Cowboys owner] Jerry Jones got here as much as me and mentioned, ‘I might prefer to study a little bit extra about this, it is a fairly whole lot,'” Murphy mentioned. “Now the league is taking a look at promoting non-public fairness. That is a manner for groups to get money out.”
Since then, the NFL has held inner discussions about permitting non-public fairness cash to be invested into groups. The Packers wouldn’t have the ability to take such cash, in response to Murphy.
Nevertheless, the crew has a reserve fund that Murphy mentioned final month was valued at $537 million. Murphy, who served because the athletic director at Northwestern and Colgate earlier than he was employed to run the Packers, likened that to a college’s endowment.
“Or it is the cash a deep-pockets proprietor has,” he mentioned.
“From a soccer standpoint, each determination we make is: Is that this going to assist us win?” Murphy added. “We do not have an proprietor that is seeking to make a revenue or promote. We’re laser-focused on profitable.”
If there are downsides from a enterprise standpoint, Murphy does not see any.
“Clearly a whole lot of our [financial] success is because of the success of the league,” Murphy mentioned. “However most groups are all profitable financially.”
THE BOARD AND government committee weren’t all the time as hands-off as they’re at the moment. Harlan made a major change after he took over as president in 1989 by distancing the chief committee from soccer choices.
Had that not occurred, he believes he would have by no means landed future Professional Soccer Corridor of Fame government Ron Wolf as basic supervisor in 1991. Wolf had turned down the job 4 years earlier, partially, in response to Harlan, as a result of he didn’t need to reply to soccer outsiders on the committee.
Up to now, members of the chief committee meddled in soccer affairs and choices. Workforce historian Cliff Christl wrote in 2021 that “[Vince] Lombardi and the three earlier coaches who adopted Curly Lambeau had all been chosen by the chief committee.”
Interference continued after Lombardi’s departure in 1969, though Christl additionally wrote in 2018 that he “would not blame the chief committee any greater than the coaches or gamers for a way dangerous issues received. On the identical time, that is the place I might begin as a result of the committee was 0-for-4 when it got here to hiring coaches.”
Harlan’s coverage was to rent soccer folks to make soccer choices. He employed Wolf in 1991. Wolf employed coach Mike Holmgren in 1992. And the Packers received Tremendous Bowl XXXI after the 1996 season.
“We needed to change the way in which we did enterprise,” Harlan mentioned. “We needed to get all people on the board and all people on the chief committee to again off. So I went to the chief committee and instructed them that now we have received to get the chief committee and the board of administrators to again off from being concerned in soccer choices. We endured 24 years of dangerous soccer [after the Lombardi era], and happily they did [agree to back off].”
Murphy continued that apply.
“If it wasn’t for Mark and his management and the way he runs issues, it in all probability could be troublesome and there might be some challenges,” present Packers GM Brian Gutekunst mentioned. “However due to him and the folks concerned, I believe it has been actually easy.”
THE ONLY MAJOR distinction within the construction at the moment is that Murphy, when he employed Gutekunst as basic supervisor in 2018, determined to have each the GM and the pinnacle coach report back to him. Up to now, the coach reported to the GM and the GM to the president.
Today, the one duty Gutekunst has to the chief committee is to offer a soccer report at its month-to-month conferences. Entrance workplace sources from different groups have mentioned they envy Gutekunst for not having to reply to an proprietor.
“I believe there in all probability is [envy],” Gutekunst mentioned. “I believe, simply, it is the power to have the persistence we’re doing issues the precise manner. However yeah, I believe there in all probability is, and I do know there’s a whole lot of satisfaction in our group in how we go about issues in that truth as effectively.”
There’s motive to suppose that the chief committee and board of administrators will stay hands-off when Coverage turns into the eleventh president in crew historical past a yr from now. Coverage, whose father, Carmen, served as president of each the 49ers and Browns, has been with the Packers since 2012 and has a full understanding of how the group capabilities.
“The entire story of this crew is sort of like fiction to me,” Harlan mentioned. “The best way it began, the way in which folks stepped ahead continuously to avoid wasting the franchise each time it was in bother by passing the hat and having inventory gross sales, I believe it may possibly work as a result of the individuals who have the inventory do respect the president. It is a distinctive scenario, however it does work very effectively, I believe.”
