Sorry for jumping in here but the transfer of ownership from Les Hutchison to The Well Society took place in October 2016.
The first year in full fan ownership was the 17/18 season which resulted in financials of record turnover and a profit of £1.72m: https://www.motherwellfc.co.uk/2018/11/28/2017-18-financial-results-announced/
Neither of those financial results have anything to do with fan ownership but rather are to do with the break-even business model and taking £1m+ in transfer fees and reaching 2 cup finals. For comparison Motherwell were posting losses when they were finishing 2nd in the league under McCall and with Leeann Dempster as CEO.
The c.£500k loss for last season was the second full season and the word from the AGM last week is that worst case projection for this season is that the club will be a cash neutral position.
There was a summary of the AGM over on SteelmenOnline: https://www.steelmenonline.co.uk/forums/index.php?/topic/16088-2019-financesagm/&do=findComment&comment=547937
That's after paying off the outstanding debt in roughly 3 years (c. £1.6m) to John Boyle and Les Hutchison (though including a write-off on the part of Hutchison). Ultimately the fact that Motherwell were able to absorb a £500k loss as a fan owned club is actually an endorsement of sorts.
Fwiw: this post from @Norgethistle nails it:
I can't speak about Hearts/FOH but The Well Society as a vehicle had been around from the Boyle/Dempster days (as far back as the turn of the decade https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/17588327) largely because Boyle wanted to sell up but couldn't find a buyer however there was no real momentum. Les Hutchison took over the club in 2014 and there was supposed to be a 5 year plan in place however he bailed just over a year later in March 2016 you can read about it here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/35826768
The key part as @Norgethistle highlights is that "a long term phased in plan to slowly in stages take over the club" had been in place. Hutchison handed over a loan of something close to £1.6m that was variously invested initially in keeping the club afloat and in the Premiership but also saw investment in the commercial, academy, medical and strength and conditioning departments.
The point at which Hutchison handed over was after the business had been restructured and investment made, he spoke about it in the BBC article above:
It wasn't simply a case of taking ownership then 12 weeks later saying "go do fan-ownership lads" it took a fairly ruthless (and informed) approach to restructuring the business to make it work.
The fact that Motherwell have a competent CEO in Alan Burrows is probably one of the key factors in the model being viable. Just because it works at Fir Park doesn't mean it'll work at Firhill.
Fans are right to be sceptical and really it's up to those pushing the model to convince them that it's a viable business model. Simply saying fan-ownership is the only show in town doesn't really cut it.
Anyway, apologies for jumping on your thread and the length of the post.
