Just what the topic line says. The tv shows a full and fully engaged crowd. Lots of NFL merch being worn. Are there that many loyal NFL fans in Europe? Are they following specific teams? If so what makes certain teams more popular?
I’m guessing a substantial number of them are American expatriates.
In London it’s seems to be a mix of three types:
- US Expats, who tend to be quite well off
- Corporate types who aren’t paying
- Locals who follow football to some extent or another
I was surprised how knowledgeable some native English fans (and German, Dutch, Swedish) are about football.
Gridiron football is gaining in popularity in Europe and the NFL is trying to expand that. A college friend of mine moved to the UK and I was surprised that the high schools (or whatever the equivalent is) have teams that play that. His son was on the team and is now in college and there’s a club team of some kind there.
I still believe the best gridiron football team name ever is the Bologna Warriors.
Out of Bologna, Italy of course.
Maybe, but they were ill-prepared for Milano.
They never saw the Seamen coming.
mmm
I’ve been to 2 different NFL Europe games (both London). My anecdotal assessment is this.
20% - Americans traveling to Europe to watch their team and have a fun vacation.
15% - Expats living abroad coming to see a game, a substantial percentage not local to the game’s location. Ex: Irish workers popping over to London for a weekend.
50% - Local NFL fans. The Bears have a large English fan club and the Jags have legitimately built up a fan base there. I saw the Cowboys and Raiders each play and there was no shortage of local fans for those teams too. Even fans of clubs not playing will show up too, but there are non-trivial numbers of local fans of most popular franchises.
15% - Lookyloos and corporate types. Basically locals who are just going to see what all the hubbub is about and to party a bit. They are indifferent to the whole thing but a party is a party. Lots of these guys are footy fans attending a game at their regular venue.
I’m sure the NFL has real data on this and their entire goal is to grow that 50% number to closer to 90% so they don’t have to rely on Americans traveling to fill the seats.
Is there are specific reason why some teams have a following over there? In my experience Premeir League fans in the US tend to follow the big name teams that win a lot. Today the announcers mentioned it was a partisan crowd for the Patriots. That makes sense due to their relatively recent history. The Jaguars not so much or the Bears.
This is just a guess, but I think it’s a combination of fame, coolness and city affinity.
The Jags are a special case since they have been playing at least one home game a year in London for a while. The team is actively promoting itself as London’s NFL team and everyone would predict them as a likely candidate to relocate there if it’s ever a serious option. They’ve built that fan base the old fashioned way.
The others are more predictable. Teams like the Cowboys, Patriots, Raiders and Niners have a lot of fans across the US. There’s no real good reason to be a fan of those teams in Toledo or Boise, but they will still have lots of fans there. Works the same in Europe. People like the colors (lots of us grew up seeing the Raiders gear in every hip hop video in the 90s) and people like the reputation. People like to be associated with “winners” and people follow teams with super famous players (Brady, Montana, etc,). If you are able to buy a jersey in south London there’s a damn good chance that it’s a Brady jersey.
I think to some degree if you’re a NFL fan you’re probably also a bit of an America fan. You love pizza, burgers, Jack Daniel’s and any NFL team that could be called “America’s Team”.
And lastly, there some cities that just resonate with Europeans, especially the English and Germans. Chicago is definitely one of the most famous cities in the world. Blue collar reputation, cold weather, tough, a skyline everyone recognizes, and lots of Europeans have visited Chicago at one point. If you’re living in a former manufacturing town in England you probably will gravitate towards the best known Midwestern teams in the US. For different reasons teams in LA, Miami and a New York are going to click with people.
Jacksonville is a relatively small market which made the Jaguars an ideal guinea pig to try to build up a European fanbase.
Might be a guess but sounds good to me.
I think both those team names are awesome! 
Much simpler reason - Shad Khan is a well known soccer fan and bought a Premier League team not long after buying the Jags. The League Office doesn’t do squat without approval from the owners. And most owners would have to be heavily induced to give up a home game (along with all the money involved) to play in a foreign country.
Khan’s easily the most willing to use his team to promote the NFL in England, at least, and indeed they signed an agreement (since extended) to have a game in London ever since 2013 - not coincidentally the same year Khan bought Fulham FC
Good points @omniscient, and I’d add that I think there’s actually a gap in the market for team sports.
I know that might sound mad, given all the sports Britain has, but when you put together a long history, complex rules and snobbishness, many don’t seem all that welcoming to casual people with (initially) only a passing interest.
A “new” sport like this can entice a whole different audience (I put “new” in scare quotes, because I don’t know how long american football has been going in the UK, but it will seem fairly new to most people).
The NFL has been growing in Europe for a long time. In the UK in the early 80s a niche TV channel started a weekly highlights show that was surprisinfgly popular and that is really what started it. I was of the generation that started getting hooked on football thanks to that. A lot of people started to support teams based on the stars of that generation, Marino, Montana, Elway and the likes, teams successful in that era still have a lot of fans in the UK. I had a pen pal in Seattle so started supporting the Seahawks.
The NFL having a saturated market in the US saw Europe asa chance to expand and encouraged interest this side of the pond by having pre season games over here and the World League (which had various names), at the time I was living in near London and went to see the Monarchs when I could.
As things developed fans in Europe got tired of only having “second class” games so interest in watching either practise games or games involving players who couldn’t make the NFL waned in order to maintain growth in Europe the NFL started having regular season games here.
The MLB and NBA are also trying to get a foothold in Europe but are currently way behind the NFL.
The NFL Europe league, which existed in various forms from 1998 to 2005, ended up being comprised of 5 German and 1 Dutch team. Previous seasons had teams in the UK and Spain as well. Germany always had the strongest market for gridiron football, probably heavily influenced by the American GIs stationed there.
The World League of American Football actually started in 1991. The league involved teams from both the USA and Europe, it was very popular in Europe but ignored in the US, play played 2 seasons before being suspended. In 1995 it reformed but only involved European games and was renamed NFL Europe in 1998 but after the 1993-4 suspension it became less popular in the UK leading to the Monarchs closing down in 1998 and the Scottish Claymores in 2004.
The Sunday night show on Channel 4 was what got me into NFL in the 80’s too. My team back then were the Patriots, for no other reason than they had England in the name. Wasn’t so great at the time, but it worked out quite well later on.
Only tangentially related but it’s a fun story. Several years ago the Reddit moderators of the NFL and Premier League subs did an April Fools prank where they switched their front page templates. People with team flairs got switched so something like all of the Raiders were switched with Manchester United and vice versa. That led to them becoming members of their respective team pages and learning from each other about how the different sports worked and many of them becoming fans of their new teams and continuing to follow them.
It’s not just who goes to the stadium. I have friends who moved to Portugal, and they love a chance to watch a game on TV at a “reasonable hour.”