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This interview is a small excerpt from a comprehensive interview published in The Wall Street Transcript as part of the Consumer Sector, available at (001-212-952-7433) or http://www.twst.com/sectors/consum.html

TWST: Could we begin with the history of Aberdeen Football Club (LSE:AFC.L) and the various services that you provide?

Mr. Wyness: Aberdeen Football Club is in a pre-landmark time in its history as we are coming up to 100 years of existence in 2003. The Club was established in 1903 and has been the main soccer team in Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire and in the whole catchment area of the North East of Scotland for all that period of time. We are a Scottish Premier League football team and are also involved with the development of youth football and the community development of sport and football in general throughout the North East of Scotland. The rest of the Club is built around services to the supporters and the fan base in providing them with different match day facilities such as catering, food, beverages, merchandise and corporate hospitality at our Pittodrie Stadium location in Aberdeen.

TWST: Could you outline the various revenue streams that you derive from these services?

Mr. Wyness: The revenue streams have changed dramatically for the Club as a business in the last 5-6 years. The main revenue stream traditionally had always been gate receipts, which are attendance numbers that have come in. Gradually over the period from the early 1990's forward the whole merchandise stream became a key area of revenue as well as catering and corporate hospitality, which also grew. But, in the last 5-6 years the advent of greater television coverage has meant that the club has been more or less dependent on a great deal of its external finance on receipts from television coverage, revenue and a share of the overall television contract that Scottish Clubs receive.

TWST: There appears to have been significant issues surrounding television rights and the broadcasting of games on both satellite and terrestrial television, for example BSkyB, how are these changes affecting the Club?

Mr. Wyness: As an industry and Aberdeen specifically, we are in a huge spell of change and a very difficult environment at present. The advent of the television revenue meant that there was a huge increased pressure upwards on wages, a bit of a wage spiral as players demanded higher wages and the money was there to pay those higher wages. At the same time, it spiraled up to an unreasonable percentage of somewhere between 85-90 percent of revenue being placed into the wage structure, which is a very difficult ratio for any business to sustain. In terms of the BSkyB issue, it has not had as much of an impact as Sept. 11th has done, I think with all of the clubs in England and Scotland having ramped up to these very high levels of wages due to the planning of having increased televisions revenues, they are now seeing the possibility of having a very high wage bill, but the television revenue is shrinking. Advertising revenue has shrunk for the television companies, therefore this has eventually passed on to the clubs and a lower television negotiated deal.

TWST: In the US, wages for sport players are particularly high and there is a great deal of discussion with regards to television rights, do you think that has filtered across into Europe and the UK? Will it become a greater issue?

Mr. Wyness: I don't think it will get any greater. Percentage wise it is just as difficult a situation as it has been in the States. For us, because the numbers seem to be less percentage wise of our revenue, it is probably of greater concern than in the States, so we have had it at the same time as you have in terms of the ratios.

TWST: With these current issues, how is Aberdeen Football Club intending to develop these various areas within the market? What is your growth strategy?

Mr. Wyness: Aberdonians are known throughout the world as being slightly frugal. As such, Aberdeen Football Club has been true to that traditional and probably grasp the nettle of this high cost structure probably about 2 years ahead of the curve in terms of the other clubs. So, we did institute a very strong cost cutting situation over the last 2 years, we also put a wage freeze in place and offloaded a lot of our players that were high wage earners, brought costs back under control considerably and will carry on with that. What we have had to do in terms of the players is really start a youth policy of growing our own star players internally and in the Aberdeen area. We have been extremely successful in that we are really developing home grown talent. An example of that would be the 2 major teams in the league, Rangers and Celtic, who are fielding teams with hardly any Scottish players in it at all. Last Saturday we had 9 Scottish players in our team and the majority of which are Under-21's and they are definitely being eyed by all the top clubs throughout Europe and the world right now as some of the most promising talent. Therefore, if they were to leave the club we would be able to command a very high transfer price for them.