Patrick Brennan

pbrennan@enquirer.com

ERLANGER – Futbol Club Cincinnati is now targeting a 2018 launch for the training facility it's sought for months.

FC Cincinnati President and General Manager Jeff Berding said during the question-and-answer portion of a Tuesday morning address that the club is still weighing its options for facility sites and hopes to complete a deal this spring or summer with a goal of having an operational training facility for 2018.

“We’ve had a number of communities and developers pitch us sites,” Berding said. “Every time we get a call, we vet the site. We have a particular site that we like and the folks that would be our partners are still working on the financing of the land and infrastructure. We’d build the facility.”

Berding previously told The Enquirer he had hoped to break ground on a facility in early 2017, but whenever the facility arrives, it will be a sizable addition to FC Cincinnati's bid for Major League Soccer expansion.

FC Cincinnati submits expansion bid to MLS

Berding spoke Tuesday morning at a Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce’s “Eggs and Issues” event. He fielded three audience questions after an approximately 30-minute long, bottom-up recap of the club’s successes to date.

One of the questions was regarding stadium solutions.

In his reply, Berding said he remained confident in Nippert Stadium as a short-term solution, should FC Cincinnati be successful in its ongoing bid to be one of four clubs to be selected in Major League Soccer’s ongoing expansion process.

“We have a great opportunity at UC. We have a great relationship with the university. The economics are good for both of us as a USL franchise,” Berding said. “But if we were to have the opportunity to go to the MLS, the feeling from the league and, having done a five-year pro forma, I see it with my own eyes – the economics of the MLS are certainly much better served by having the opportunity to have our own stadium.”

In the event a stadium is required, Berding said the club’s ownership group is in the process of raising up to $250 million – money that would cover both the MLS’ expansion fee and leave $100-plus million for facilities.

FC Cincinnati: No point in responding to stadium rumors, speculation

FC CINCINNATI FINANCES

Berding has stated previously that FC Cincinnati was profitable in its first year of operation. He pulled back the curtain on some of those finances Tuesday as he discussed team merchandise sales and the cost of airing home matches during the 2016 season.

Berding described how FC Cincinnati fronted the cost of airing matches on television after TV executives informed him they were unsure of the monetary value of the would-be product he was pitching.

Berding said the hardest decisions the club made in its first year were on the TV front.

“We put out an RFP and not a single offer came back,” Berding said. “I went to (FC Cincinnati majority owner) Carl Lindner III and said, ‘Here’s the deal. It’s going to cost us about $350,000 to put our games on TV. The best-case scenario is we only lose $150,000 if we sell all of the advertising, but chances are we won’t sell all the advertising.’ And I said I think we need to do it.”

Berding said it was imperative to create a “water cooler effect” that could lead to building a fan base – something only TV visibility could provide.

Berding’s pitch to Lindner worked. They opted to sign off on taking what they hoped would be a short-term financial hit.

“You have to have ownership willing to take that risk,” Berding said.

“We only lost about 200-something thousand,” Berding later told the audience, eliciting laughter.

Berding said TV ratings for FC Cincinnati matches were terrific last season, and that MLS officials were “blown away” by the numbers.”

But TV is just one area.

Berding noted that merchandise sales far-exceeded projections.

After initially projecting the club would sell about $600,000 profit in team-branded products, Berding told the NKY Chamber audience they sold $1.5 million worth of merchandise.

OTHER TAKEAWAYS FROM BERDING'S REMARKS

• FC Cincinnati is “reasonably close” to closing a deal on its international friendly for this summer, Berding said as he spoke about last summer Crystal Palace FC friendly match.

• FC Cincinnati and MLS have been talking, but no more than was expected when the club submitted in January its bid as part of the league’s ongoing expansion process. Berding said the club has already had some back-and-forth discussion with MLS. More is expected as the process unfolds.

MLS is expected to announce the first two expansion entrants to the league by the end of 2017.

Get the latest FC Cincinnati news. Download the FC Cincinnati Soccer app on both the Apple App Store and Google Play.