NFL Pop-Up Shop: Why Pro Football Must Keep the Store Open Year-Round

Everyone loves supporting their favorite teams and why wouldn't we? It's part of who we are as people and NFL gear can also be quite impressive as well.

The good news for NFL fans is that in April of 2012 pro football has officially opened a store for the draft. According to an article on NFL.com, the pop-up store opened on Monday:

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For the first time, the NFL will open a pop-up store in New York City to celebrate the launch of its new apparel partnerships and the 2012 NFL Draft.  The NFL SHOP AT DRAFT located at 1095 Avenue of the Americas at 41st and 42nd Streets will be open April 2 - 30 from 11 am – 8 pm, seven days a week.

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So, instead of having to just shop for items or merchandise online, fans can now go into an official NFL store and mosey around for the latest trends in pro football.

The disappointing news?

As the article mentions, the store will only be open for April, so when May rolls around it's likely us fans will have to wait until next year. To that end, here are some reasons why the NFL should consider keeping the pop-up store open year-round.

Updated News

Whenever a big trade or free agent signing occurs, the NFL can offer the hands-on view and purchase of the newest jerseys, hats and other merchandise right away: instead of having to wait for the items via mail from the internet.

It also keeps pro football one-step ahead on the sales end of things. Obviously, other stores throughout the country sell NFL merchandise and gear, but the league would have all the latest trends for sale before anyone else.

Personal Experience

This is more so for the sake of the customer's getting to speak with a person in person, as opposed to a computerized voice over the phone. Courtesy of the social media phenomenon like Facebook and Twitter among others, face-to-face communication doesn't happen nearly as much.

Just from the conversational perspective, fans can discuss football with other fans in an NFL environment. For anyone that's made the trip to Canton, Ohio to visit the Pro Football Hall of Fame, the personal experience enhances the atmosphere.

Having this store open year-round simply gives fans the opportunity to feel a direct connection to the NFL, just like the Hall of Fame. The difference, though, comes in the form of newer information which in the internet-era, rules above all else.

NFL's Popularity

Pro football's audience is arguably the most important reason to keep the store open. It's the biggest and more popular sport in America, and has owned that spot for quite a while. Just in TV ratings alone, the NFL simply puts all other sports on the back-burner.

According to Mike Florio of NBC Sports from an article in 2010, the NFL draft alone smashed the NBA postseason:

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The combined overnight rating for the first round of the draft was a 6.42, with ESPN generating a 5.47 rating and NFL Network getting 0.95. TNT got a 2.1 ratingfor the Chicago Bulls’ NBA playoff win over the Cleveland Cavaliers and a 3.0 rating for the Oklahoma City Thunder’s win over the Los Angeles Lakers.

The numbers are the latest reminder that in American sports, nothing even comes close to the NFL.

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Moving on, we see the NFL's regular season easily overlooking the MLB postseason. In an article by Michael Hiestand of the USA Today, pro football simply rules baseball:

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Fox's NFL pregame show Sunday got a bigger overnight rating than any of TBS' MLB playoff games so far.

Even in cities with MLB playoff teams, NFL teams dominate. While the Green Bay Packers' one-sided win over the Denver Broncos drew 44.1% of Milwaukee households, the Brewers' playoff game against Arizona Sunday drew just 20.3%. And in Phoenix, that Sunday Diamondbacks-Brewers game drew 5.7% of households — while the Giants-Cardinals NFL game drew 21.5% of local households.

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How about that? A pre-game show and MLB playoff teams couldn't outdue their counterparts of the same city as the NFL. On some level, it's almost impossible to believe. However, the NFL also dominates over Nascar.

In a piece by Pete Dougherty of the Times-Union back in November of 2010, pro football's regular season oversaw one of Nascar's biggest weekends:

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The season finale, in which [Jimmie] Johnson won his record fifth consecutive Sprint Cup championship, drew a 3.3 rating for ESPN.

CBS got the weekend’s top rating for its late afternoon Colts-Patriots game, whose 16.7 was 12 percent higher than last year’s Week 11 Jets-Patriots game (14.9).

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So, a Nascar record was set and pro football's late mid-season games simply crushed it. If the NFL keeps it's pop-up store open year-round, there's no limit for as to how much more gargantuan pro football can become.

John Rozum on Twitter.