Even after the President condemned the NFL

Your San Fransisco quarterback, I'm sure no body ever heard of him

NFL owners don't want to pick them up because they don't want to get a nasty tweet from Donald Trump, you believe that

Then there were the TV ratings that took a nosedive in 2016 and 2017

But it's still proving to be a big success for all 32 NFL teams and their owners

28 NFL teams are valued over $2 billion

So how is it that these teams are worth so much?

To answer that you have to look at how hard it is to start your own franchise

The last time an NFL franchise was started was back in 2002

It's rare to start a new NFL team but when it happens owners have to pay something known as a franchise fee

Some NFL teams have been around since the National Football League started in 1920

Back then the franchise fee was about 100 bucks

By 1960, the Dallas Cowboys had to pay a million dollars to enter

And in 2002 the Houston Texans, which are the newest team to join the league, paid $700 million

Some NFL teams are still owned by the same families who started their franchise nearly a century ago

The Chicago Bears were founded for $100 in 1920 by George Halas and as of 2018 the team is still in the family

It's owned by his 95 year old daughter Virginia McCaskey and it's now worth an estimated $2.9 billion

And let's say you want to buy your own NFL team, most recent sales have been in the billion dollar range

The Buffalo Bills went for $1.4 billion and in 2018 the Carolina Panthers were sold for a record $2.2 billion

So what kind of return are team's getting back from their billion-dollar investment?

There's only one team we definitely know what they're making every year and that's the Green Bay Packers

The Packers are non profit corporation, the only one in the league, so we have access to their annual filings

They made $454.9 million in 2017

The other 31 teams are privately owned but Forbes releases the valuation for all 32 teams across the league each year

The values are based around each NFL team stadium along with revenue of historical transactions

non NFL events held at the stadiums as well as purchase and investment offers for each team

In 2017 Forbes said the Dallas Cowboys generated $864 million in revenue

the New England Patriots made $593 million and the New York Giants made $493 million

But a lot of that income isn't generated by the team itself, it actually comes directly from the NFL

For the 2017/2018 season the NFL generated a revenue share of over 8 billion dollars from TV deals

merchandising, and licensing deals

That's known as the national revenue and no matter how well or how bad your team does

teams split the national revenue evenly thirty-two ways

Meaning teams around the league received more than $255 million from the NFL in 2018

But that's just one way a team generates income

There's also something called local revenue, that's everything a team generates itself

For the 2017/2018 season the local revenue for the Packers made up about 43% of the team's total revenue

Ticket sales and stadium attendance are part of the local revenue

Not only do NFL teams make money on game day but they can also make money from non NFL events

by renting out the stadiums for concerts, live events, and tours

The Green Bay Packers spent more than $370 million to upgrade Lambeau Field including adding thousands of seats to the stadium

Since renovations began back in 2010, the Packers have seen ticket sales jump from $48 million to $71 million

But game attendance isn't the only source of revenue for teams

There are also a lot of corporate sponsors

Some teams like the Philadelphia Eagles have over 40 corporate sponsors

In the 2017/2018 season the NFL sponsorship revenue totaled more than 1.3 billion dollars

These sponsorship deals range from putting company logos on practice jerseys, renting out retail space and stadiums

to landing the sole naming rights to NFL stadiums themselves

The New York Giants and New York Jets share a stadium called MetLife Stadium

And the asking price for the naming rights?

Well according to the New York Times that deal's worth an estimated $19 million a year for 25 years

Which remains one the highest naming rights deals in the NFL

Teams may be generating hundreds of millions of dollars each year but there are a lot of expenses that come with it

Of the $454.9 million that Green Bay Packers made in the 2017 and 2018 season

More than $420 million dollars went to expenses

Most of it went to player costs which made up $212.7 million that year

Stadium upkeep, marketing, team costs, and general administrative costs totaled $208 million

So after all the bills are paid, the Green Bay Packers are left with an operating the income of $38.5 million

The Cowboys Patriots and Giants have huge expenses that eat up a large chunk of yearly revenue too

The Cowboys' operating income is $365 million

The Patriots is $235 million and the Giants is $149 million

But not every NFL team is rolling in cash

Some NFL teams find themselves strapped for money with large overhead costs for their teams

Just take the Detroit Lions, the team had a total revenue of $361 million in 2017

But according to Forbes, the team had an operating income of $4.1 million

Another issue weighing down on the NFL, a drop in popularity among up-and-coming sports fans and players

In the wake of the concussion debate, more than 67,000 fewer high schoolers are playing football today than in 2009

But that controversy isn't affecting the NFL's bottom line

It's still seeing revenue growth

From the 2016 season to the 2017 season the NFL's national revenue grows nearly 5%

The NFL is also seeing a boost in television ratings this season too

In September the top 15 most watched TV shows were all NFL games

Our Thursday night game, our first game on Fox and Amazon and NFL Network was up 8% last night

You know, in '07, 22 of the top hundred programs were NFL games

Then ten years later in '17, 72 of the top shows were NFL games

So despite all the controversy it may be a while before NFL teams take a hit