Crystal Palace: Steve Parish casts doubt on long-term future and eyes return to Adland
Crystal Palace chairman Steve Parish has cast doubt on his long-term future in football, revealing that he is tempted by a return to the advertising industry.
Parish, 60, made his fortune with marketing production company Tag Worldwide before leading a consortium of wealthy Palace fans who rescued the club from administration in 2010.
Subsequent stake sales have reduced his shareholding to around 10 per cent, an asset valued at around £40m following Woody Johnson’s investment earlier this year.
Parish is also responsible for running the club, however, and insists he wants to make sure Palace are set up for life under the independent football regulator before exiting.
“I’ve often thought about going back into advertising,” Parish told the Winning podcast hosted by Ian Rosenblatt, founder and Rosenblatt Law.
“I had the happenstance to exit a moment of change. And there’s another one happening with Gen AI. When you can make a commercial from words… it’s extraordinary. So I think that’s quite interesting.
“But right now I’m focused on what I wanted to achieve with the football club. I want the club to make sure it uses that [winning the FA Cup last season] as a platform to go on without me.
“It’s a football club, it’s going to go on forever. I do think I know a lot about it; I think that the way that we do it is more or less right, but in an ever-changing world where you can’t rest on your laurels there’s always a different way of doing it.
“But with the new regulatory environment, what is the best for it? I’ve got to work that out, I’ve got to make sure that that’s really on solid ground. And then, who knows?
“Maybe marketing services as that is what I innately know. I was never a professional footballer, I’m not a coach, but I can set the scene, I could pick the right people. But sometimes it’s nice to get into something where you can do every facet.”
Parish hails Chelsea long contract approach
Parish also praised Chelsea’s US ownership, led by Behdad Eghbali and Todd Boehly, for being brave enough to go against conventional wisdom in football.
“We looked at Chelsea recently, when they came in and they were doing the eight-year contracts, and everyone was saying, ‘Oh, it’s ridiculous’,” he added.
“Well, why ridiculous? Maybe it’s a good idea. They’re just doing it differently to the way anybody else did it. And so it’s proving to be the case.
“Behdad, I deal with a lot. I mean, I think he’s a very, very, very clever guy. I love watching people do something different.”