YOU would have to go back a while to find the last time Rangers fans were envious of their Motherwell counterparts.

That day, however, could soon be upon us. Debt-free, ambitious and on course for Champions League football next season, it seems the Fir Park club have everything they could wish for among an increasingly frustrated Ibrox fanbase.

Supporters running the club? They're further down the road with that one, too. The benevolence of John Boyle, the former owner and chairman, in gifting them his shareholding has presented the Motherwell fans with a chance to control the destiny of their club. To that aim they have established an industrial and providence society in which supporters have been asked to contribute at different levels in return for different benefits. The hope is to build a rainy-day fund of £1.5m to be used over a two-year period on the occasions when Boyle used to dip into his own personal fortune to help the club through difficult times. Excess profits and sums from major player sales will also be added to the pot.

There are four levels of membership initially, to be topped up by a small annual fee thereafter. Steel, the one most supporters will plump for, costs £300 – payable in instalments – Amber is £1000, Claret is £5000, and the 1886 tier – the year the club was founded – will set back a would-be investor £25,000. Should the society reach their initial target of £250,000, and they have until the end of this month to do so, then they will be given the chance to elect two contributors on to the Motherwell board on the premise of one member, one vote. Should the model prove sustainable and the scheme a success, the plan is for the entire board to eventually comprise members of The Well Society. That would be a first for Scottish football.

The society was formally constituted just before Christmas and the take-up so far has been brisk. A sign-up night last week, where members of the board made themselves available for fans to discover more, pushed them further towards their total, with 120 new members pledging their commitment, including one proud uncle who registered his day-old nephew. Players Michael Higdon and Henrik Ojamaa have signed up as well, putting them in the rather unique position of perhaps one day having a say in choosing their own manager.

With just over two weeks to go until the self-imposed deadline, Motherwell are edging ever closer to their initial target. At the end of last week, they had 320 members, plus 102 kids who had signed up for the Junior Steel package, with a total of £190,000 pledged. The hope is more will soon follow. "The fan support has been overwhelming," Andrew Wilson, a Motherwell director, told Herald Sport. "I'd say where we are now is really ahead of expectation, given we only have one person who has signed up to the 1886 membership so far. We're in discussions with others at that level but, in terms of the broad body of the fans, we're really delighted.

"There are just over two weeks to go until the deadline and we're fairly confident we'll meet our initial target of £250,000. Once we do that we will be off and running. Beyond that we'll look to get our total funds up but we're also keen to get the number of members up, too. It would be great to have 1000 members then keep growing it."

There is an understandable reluctance on Wilson's part, however, for Motherwell to be held up as role models, to be seen to be thumbing their nose at the likes of Rangers in their current predicament. It was only a decade ago that Motherwell suffered their own shame of administration, with Boyle forced to make 19 players redundant as part of a drastic cost-cutting exercise. The memories of that experience, as well as Rangers' recent troubles, have perhaps prompted some Motherwell fans to explore this alternative ownership model in which they retain control of their club's destiny.

"Everyone I've spoken to recently – and not just Motherwell fans – wants this to be successful to show that there is a sustainable way for this sport to be run," said Wilson. "We're very careful, however, not to be holding ourselves up as an example. We've been there [in administration] a decade ago and know what that feels like. Any situation of a business in trouble always feels bleak and grim but there is always light at the end of every tunnel. We might fail in this venture but we're trying our very best to succeed. There is always hope and we have to stay focused on that fact."