By OnMilwaukee Staff Writers   Published Aug 21, 2014 at 10:49 AM

People love the Green Bay Packers, both in Wisconsin and around the country. But exactly HOW much do they love them? Enough to be named the best fans in the country? Forbes got to the bottom of it with a new ranking released on Wednesday.

The publication ranked fans in the following categories:

  1. 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).
  2. Three years' worth of television ratings (per Nielsen).
  3. Three years' worth of stadium attendance based on capacity reached.
  4. Three years' worth of merchandise sales (per NFLShop.com).
  5. Social media reach (a combination of Facebook likes and Twitter followers based on the team’s metro area population).

According to Forbes, "Packers fans scored the highest marks in all categories but TV rankings where it came in second and in merchandise where they came in seventh."

Interestingly, the cheesehead hats were excluded from the merchandise total because it is not officially licensed NFL merchandise.

So, soak it up Packers fans -- you sit atop another list.

(Oh, and by the way, the Chicago Bears' fan base rated No. 10 on this list.)