Wrexham: a model for other clubs?

As a supporter of another Championship club, I get mildly irritated by the way in which The New York Times coverage of the highly competitive division focuses on Wrexham.  But I suppose I am just jealous.

Is Wrexham a model for other clubs?  Or does it represent an unwelcome Disneyfication of football (soccer)?   In the wake of events surrounding Manchester City, the answer might be a bit different from a few weeks ago.  But, as Simon Kuper has argued, why not let foreign owners spend as much as they like on a franchise, particularly if the club is located in an area with economic and social challenges. Wrexham may be just 50 miles from Manchester, the so-called capital of the north, but it is a different world.

The trend of Americans taking over British football is long established — two-thirds of Premier League clubs are now at least part-owned by US investors. But Wrexham’s new owners added an improbable twist. Using a documentary series that mixes an underdog narrative with salt-of-the-earth sentimentality and comic Hollywood stardust, they turned a failing non-league team in a post-industrial city into a thriving global brand. 

It is the very embodiment of Disneyfication. (Even before Mac and Reynolds had decided which club to buy, Mac had sold the idea of documenting the adventure to Disney-owned production company FX, a longtime collaborator.) But that does not mean it is insincere,  CEO Michael Williamson insists to the Financial Times,.“Millions of [people] worldwide that aren’t necessarily football fans . . . have fallen in love with the city and the people . . . because they’ve connected with them, they’ve shared similar emotions.” 

The commercial benefits for the club are vast. The distribution of replica kits has ballooned from only a few thousand pre-takeover to 100,000 a year. “And we definitely punch above our weight class when it comes to sponsorships,” Williamson. told the FT He relates the example of the club’s new back-of-shirt sponsor, Royal Bank of Canada, which Reynolds signed up himself, exploiting the fact it was his first bank as a youngster. 

Since Rob and Ryan, as they are universally known here, acquired the club from the Wrexham Supporters Trust for £2mn in 2021, it has become a fairytale success story. The world’s third-oldest professional football club was promoted from the lowly National League to League Two, League One and then the Championship in three successive seasons. 

A few months ago, it narrowly missed out on a final potential promotion to the top-flight Premier League. “That really stung because I felt we were so close,” Williamson told the Pink 'Un, in an interview overlooking the Cae Ras (Welsh for Racecourse) ground. Even so, the repeat league promotions, an expanded list of sponsors and a fast-growing fan base — all turbocharged by the global brand-building of Welcome to Wrexham (and its nearly 5mn regular viewers) — have transformed the club in all senses.

TThere have been two significant capital raisings since the 2020 acquisition. The first was backed by the Allyn family (New York entrepreneurs and philanthropists best known for founding, then selling, the Welch Allyn medical equipment group). The second, which brought in private equity group Apollo (whose other European football asset is the rather larger Atlético Madrid), reportedly valued Wrexham at close to $500mn.   Williamson dodged the question of whether Apollo's arrival as a minority investor is a prelude to Reynolds and McElhenny exiting.

For Reynolds and Mac, who retain close to 75 per cent of the club, it looks like a phenomenal financial return. But Williamson points to the vast outlays of cash — the £69mn cost to expand fan capacity at the Cae Ras from barely 10,000 to 18,000, a net €39mn (£33mn) spent on new players over the summer, £7mn on a training pavilion and nearly £2mn on a new pitch. The last published accounts show the club made a £15mn operating loss on £33mn of revenue in the year to June 2025. Shopping lists in big-time football get pricey.