GREEN BAY, Wis. -- The NFL's only publicly owned team said Thursday that it sold 185,000 shares in the first 48 hours of a stock sale that began Tuesday morning. That's almost three-fourths of the 250,000 shares made available in the fifth stock offering in team history.
The team set a Feb. 29 deadline for the sale, but at the current rate all available stock will be gone long before that.
The team is selling shares for $250 each, plus a $25 handling fee. As of Thursday, the Packers have raised about $43 million, which will go toward a $143 million expansion of Lambeau Field. Plans call for adding 6,700 additional seats, new high-definition video screens and a new entrance by 2013.
The shares went on sale at packers.com. Stock can only be purchased by individuals, not businesses.
The stock isn't an investment in the traditional sense: Its value doesn't increase, there are no dividends, it has virtually no re-sale value and it won't give buyers a leg up on the 93,000 people on the waiting list for season tickets.
Buyers get voting rights and the right to attend the annual stockholder meeting at Lambeau each summer before training camp.
Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press
