#1 Green Bay Packers
Hometown Crowd Rank: 1
TV Audience Rank: 2
Stadium Attendance Rank: 1
Social Media Rank: 1
Merchandise Rank: 7
Fuck yeah Packer Nation
next year here we come
Where is Green Bay? It’s where the Packers play. That’s all you need to know.
According to market researchers Nielsen Scarborough,
84% of adults in Green Bay are Packers fans, identified as such having watched, attended, and/or listened to the team’s games this past year. It seems little else goes on there to compete for their attention, and anything that does revolves around the team.
Like Church. So many of the faithful flock to Lambeau Field on Sunday that a Roman Catholic priest decided last season to bring mass to them — to a tailgate party.
And love. A dating website for diehard fans, Packers Backers, launched in April of this year and claims to be the fastest growing relationship site on the web. Member “Lucy411″, a college-educated, gainfully employed 29-year old is satisfied. She started dating a fellow Packer Backer in June and attested that they were both looking forward to the upcoming season.
Our ranking is based on five criteria: hometown crowd reach (defined by Nielsen Scarborough as a percentage of the metropolitan area population that watched, attended, and/or listened to a game in the last year), 3 years worth of television ratings (per Nielsen), 3 years of stadium attendance based on capacity reached, 3 years worth of merchandise sales (per NFLShop.com), and social media reach (a combination of Facebook likes and Twitter TWTR -4.55% followers based on the team’s metro area population).
We adjusted our methodology from prior years: We abandoned fan club counts since the numbers are less reliable than Nielsen Scarborough research, and scratched sellout streaks from our stadium attendance equation since we tired of listening to teams boast a sellout streak and then observe blocks of unoccupied seats on TV. Additionally we made no differentiation among teams who reported attendance figures beyond capacity — everyone over was given the same consideration as if they reported 100%.
Comparable television ratings were only available for 3 years so that is the time frame used for stadium and merchandise sales. In absence of having this data since the beginning of time, this was the best way to minimize the effect of frontrunners. So even though Johnny Manziel has had the top selling NFL jersey spot since Cleveland drafted him in May, the Browns failed to make our top 10.
Packers fans scored the highest marks in all categories but TV rankings where it came in 2nd and in merchandise where they came in 7th, (because those ubiquitous cheesehead hats are excluded from tallies since they are not NFL licensed merchandise). Of course some of this can be attributed to the fact that the team sits in the smallest market with a metro area population of 306,241 with zero competing sports interests. But then again the team has 4.4 million Facebook fans and over 701,000 Twitter followers. Clearly its fandom extends beyond Green Bay; members on Packer Backer live across the country.
Six other teams among the list of the best fans also demonstrated their fans reach beyond their hometown crowd – the Dallas Cowboys (tied No. 7), Denver Broncos (ranked No. 2), Indianapolis Colts (No. 6), New England Patriots (No. 4), New Orleans Saints (No. 3), and Pittsburgh Steelers (tied at No. 7). All have social media followings that exceed their possible local fan base populations.
The Broncos placement is proof interest can wax and wane with bandwagon fans. Prior to Peyton Manning’s arrival the team had three consecutive years of below capacity attendance. The past two seasons it has reported 100.7% and 101% capacity. The team’s merchandise moved up among the best selling during the same time also. The elder Manning went from having among the best sold Colts’ jerseys to the best selling Broncos’ jersey, remaining among the best selling jerseys in the league the whole time. Curse them all you want. Bandwagon fans can be good for business.
There was no correlation between market size and ranking on our list. The Chicago Bears, second in market size behind the New York Giants and New York Jets (neither which made our list) ranked No. 10. Additionally, our NFL Valuations had no bearing on the list and proved no correlation to the ranking either.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/christinasettimi/2014/08/20/the-nfls-best-fans-2/
