The Commanders have announced that they are moving their business operations from FedEx Field to College Park, taking up space at the University of Maryland because there is “increased demand for stadium suites” and they want to “make an effort to expand the franchise's footprint in Maryland."
“If they’ve gone from not having anyone gill up the suites they had and using it as office space to this, that’s a big deal,” Grant said.
“Yes, and that’s more about partnerships, because that’s usually a business-type thing to have a suite,” Danny replied. “Every now and again you have private citizens who want to be away from the riff-raff and fork over the dough, but that’s about business relationship-type stuff. That’s a major first step, and we’ve already seen some dominoes fall with relationships that came back the minute Dan Snyder left.”
One of Grant’s buddies texted him a crazy idea that this was perhaps the start of a relationship with Maryland so they can play there for a season or two if they have to build a new stadium on the FedEx site, but Grant sort of shot that down if only because FedEx 2.0 is maybe the lowest of the options for a new stadium locale.
But, if they want to move back to DC proper for a stadium, Danny has an idea about this move.
“I say yes, but not for the exact reason your buddy says – it’s a way to keep one finger in each municipality,” Danny revealed. “This keeps everyone in Maryland. Your games are in Maryland, but if you’re only there eight or nine times for games, that’s less of a relationship. You’re now working, living, eating, breathing Marylanders.”
Maybe, but as Grant noted, they could’ve moved operations to Commanders Park…but there’s no room there right now, either, and sometimes, obvious answer is obvious.
“Let’s just say they can’t continue to work out of FedEx for the reasons they’re claiming – wouldn’t that mean that if they were to move out of state, they’d have to build some major-scale office?” Grant said. “That would cost a lot of money versus renting out space from someone you already have a relationship with. To me, this is the efficient, economical thing to do: essentially slide over to UM and use those offices, or move everyone an hour to Loudoun County and build offices that may be irrelevant in a few years? If I was selling my house, I’m not dumping 30 grand into the best versions of things right before I move, so I wouldn’t be in the business of trying to build something in Virginia. Like the stadium, you’re just trying to buy time to figure out how to get to the finish line where you know where all of your operations will be in one footprint.”
