Be
Being someone who lives on the GC and has supported the bears and now the lions I know from experience catching the train up to Brissy that we have lost substancial numbers to the suns. There were so many travelling up to the games that QLD rail often put on another train or else it was standing room only. So we are talking hundreds if not thousands of fans. Now how many of them were members only the club would have those figures. Personally all my mates and people I used to travel with no longer do so as they support the Suns. Most afl followers on the coast come from elsewhere so they have another team but they mostly want to see live footy. So this idea that the AFL has been pushing from the beginning that the sun's haven't cost us supporters is not supported by my observations.Maybe, and I think most people do assume that but I don't see much proof. I'm sure we lost a little but our attendance figures didn't change much after they came in and if they did it could probably be explained by some declining performance in that period. Our membership numbers did drop so it could be there. I suspect (again without any real proof) that apart from people who were newly drawn to footy a lot of their fans/members probably came from those who were into footy and living on the Gold Coast but maybe following a Melbourne team. This was the case for a lot of Bears fans at team creation.