“No one actually likes the Yankees…it’s just herd theory.”

To follow-up my earlier observations on baseball, I would like to examine loyalty. Why are people loyal?

Sports epitomize the sentiment of loyalty. In many instances, devotion to a specific team is ingrained from an early age. Most fans support their local team, feeling a sense of pride in the locality in which they live. In big cities, like New York and Chicago, where two teams reside, sports can cause a poignant rivalry and divide during the season with sports allegiance passed down along with the more conventional family traditions. Of course, there are always sports enthusiasts who support a specific team, outside of their immediate area, for a multitude of personal reasons,

In a sense, sports allegiances are built artificially – the love merely is passed down from generation to generation, without actual examination of merits. That is not to say that a fan’s desire to root for their favorite team is not out of genuine concern, but had someone been born in a different region to a different set of parents, they could potentially feel loyalty to a different team. Once a feeling of loyalty toward a certain entity is built, the foundations of the faithfulness are rarely scrutinized.

In many aspects of our lives, loyalty is established for a plethora of different reasons.

When you dip a salty french fry into ketchup, can you immediately tell if it is Heinz or Hunt’s? Does the organic butter taste any different than the cheapest store brand? If the answers to these questions, and many similar inquiries, are a resounding no, then brand loyalty has been built. Marketers attempt to build the same type of unwavering devotion that sports teams garner for the items that they are marketing. Even celebrities attempt to build a following so strong that the biggest movie flop or song recording will not cause their fans’ loss of support. If the brand is built solid enough, declines in quality and moments of corporate weakness will not tarnish their reputation and the customers will remain.

The aforementioned Phillies example of herd theory again applies to loyalty. When a spectator/customer lacks particular attachment to a brand, team, or other type of entity, they seek to feel a sense of inclusion by aligning themselves with a crowd. In many cases, the most popular group is the most attractive group. If a brand is able to build itself up sufficiently, the momentum can take over, causing exponential growth.

Whether you support the Phillies, the Yankees, or any other baseball team, remember that the true fans support their team not matter what. It is so easy to get caught up on the hype and jump on the bandwagon, but it is when a team is losing that you really can see who the true supporters are, regardless of the source of their devotion.