Information in accounts might not tell the full story, but for what it is worth here is a bit of data from Burton:
| Year end | League finish | Turnover | Operating profit/(loss) | Staff costs |
| May 2018 | Championship – 23rd | 12,920,591 | (292,711) | 9,953,274 |
| May 2017 | Championship – 20th | 11,442,662 | 1,344,266 | 7,671,313 |
| May 2016 | League One – 2nd | 4,240,834 | (3,983) | 3,641,823 |
| May 2015 | League Two – 1st | 2,708,642 | (444,514) | 2,652,712 |
In 2017 Burton showed it was possible to survive in the Championship. They increased turnover by 170% whilst total staff costs went up 111%. They also turned a tidy profit of £1.3m.
In 2018 Burton got relegated. Turnover increased another 13% (which at least suggests it isn't entirely dependent on survival) although staff costs began to catch up, increasing by 30%. It's worth noting that the operating loss turned into a profit of circa £0.5m when you took into account player trading.
In their 2018 accounts they also show a split of turnover - £11m was commercial, the rest gate receipts (therefore we can say commercial actually means 'things that aren't ticket money'). In 2017, just shy of £10m was commercial. That gives a pretty big hint at where the jump in turnover from League One to the Champ comes from.
More importantly, last year Burton finished 9th in League One and reached the semi final of a major cup. This year they are currently 14th, and they taught us a lesson on our own patch. Their stadium holds less than 7k, and given their history I think it's fair to say they are still punching way above their own weight. They are probably an exceptionally run club and it wouldn't be easy to emulate, but I'd suggest romping through the leagues has hardly been ruinous on the pitch (although it'd be nice to see accounts for May 2019 and see how things looked back in League One).
Anyone interested in how OUFC stack up:
| Year end | League Finish | Turnover | Operating profit/(loss) |
| May 2018 | League One – 16th | 5,589,591 | (4,247,615) |
| May 2017 | League One – 8th | 6,987,288 | (1,521,411) |
| May 2016 | League Two – 2nd | 5,148,655 | (1,814,396) |
| May 2015 | League Two – 13th | 2,923,623 | (2,371,803) |
You can see that we were actually in a pretty similar place in 2015. Burton then started to move ahead of us on the pitch, but we had higher income in 2016 in League Two than they had, a full division higher (Wembley probably helped!). However, if you compare like-for-like numbers in League One or League Two then we are always ahead.
Our operating loss figures should be taken with caution because we all know that Ox have sold plenty of players during this stretch, which isn't included.
It's also worth remembering the John Lennon quote, '
life is what happens when you are busy making other plans'. I would never wish away a charge for promotion just because the infrastructure might be better in two years time. If you could win promotion whenever you really wanted it, every team would be promoted every year. We could sell players, lose players, lose managers, there could be better teams - football changes overnight, if we don't go up this year there is no reason we couldn't be relegated back into League Two the year after.
The price of the stadium probably increases with promotion, but it must be easier to secure financing when you are higher profile, when you have more fans coming into the ground and more commercial money through the door. When you sell players, they probably sell for more. Besides which, promotion would mean we have had a 2019/20 campaign that will be talked about in the same way as 2010, 2015 or anything before that. We'll have a better shot at keeping our best players, and we'll have at least a season in the Championship, testing our mettle against bigger and better sides. And Reading.
