NFL TV Ratings: Sports Bar Traffic Dropped During 2016

Football may be America’s most-watched sport, but the National Football League’s sinking ratings last year has observers questioning how the league will fare this year, especially since live sports has long been viewed as crucial in keeping consumers and high-paying advertisers glued to TV sets.

According to AdWeek,  Foursquare has released some intriguing data about foot traffic to bars and restaurants suggesting that at the very least, sports fans aren’t watching games while out and about with friends at bars. Based on data from the company’s always-on foot traffic panel—which includes data from 2.5 million Americans—Foursquare analyzed visits to sports bars during the previous two seasons in cities with and without NFL teams.

The firm estimates that between 2015 and 2016, foot traffic on Sunday game days dropped 13 percent year over year for cities that do not have a team and 12 percent for cities with a team.

When looking specifically at a group of consumers who went to a sports bar more than six times during the NFL’s 17-week season in 2015, only 40 percent visited a sports bar as frequently in 2016. And among people who went to a sports bar more than three times during the 2015 football season, 2016 foot traffic sank 10 percent. Foursquare noted that women and millennials were most likely to ditch sports bars but visits among all demographics dipped.

While overall traffic to sports bars was down 4 percent for all of 2016, football season continued to drive foot traffic for sports bars compared to the rest of the year. Per Foursquare, foot traffic spikes 32 percent for bars located near an NFL team on Sundays during football season compared to Sundays during the offseason.