BestPlaces.com Manliest Cities Article ranked what makes a city manly from 50 major metropolitan areas. Using criteria such as number of professional sports teams, popularity of power tools and frequency of monster truck rallies, BestPlaces.com found Nashville to be the Manliest city in the U.S.

Manly Study Highlights

Nashville is the Mecca of manliness. With its high number of NASCAR enthusiasts, popularity of hunting and fishing and concentration of BBQ restaurants, the Middle Tennessee stands alone atop the mountain of manliness.

Rankings for "America's Manliest Cities"

Manly Categories / Criteria*

Below are the broader categories on which each city’s manliness was measured along with a brief description of the criteria that went into each category.

Sports --- In addition to the number of professional major league sports teams in a city (football, baseball, basketball and hockey), the number of nearby NASCAR tracks and events, NHRA events, local drag racing strips, monster truck events and triathlons/marathons were analyzed.

Manly Lifestyle --- Various consumer behaviors in each city were analyzed, such as the number of US-made cars and full-size pickups registered in the city, membership in motorcycle owner groups, sports TV viewing, bowling, fishing, hunting, woodworking and home improvement work.

Concentration of Manly Retail Stores --- The number of manly stores and businesses were evaluated for each city, including BBQ and chicken wing restaurants, steak houses and sports bars, sportsman stores, general hardware and home improvement stores.

Manly Magazine Subscriptions --- The percentage of households subscribing to manly publications were analyzed. Examples of manly publications include Sports Illustrated, Car & Driver, Maxim, Playboy, Men’s Health, Popular Mechanics, Boating, etc.

Salty Snack Sales --- Total sales for the “Salty Snack/Cracker” retail category were measured for each city. Combos is a product in this business category.

Manly “Kryptonite” Category Criteria

Cities also lost points for an overabundance of emasculating criteria – factors that reduced a city’s manliness rating. These criteria were derived out of some of the “manly” categories above, but were the opposite of manly.

• Lifestyle --- The number of minivans and foreign cars that were registered in the city was measured. The more of these types of vehicles, the less manly a city was rated. 
• Concentration of Retail Stores --- The number of home furnishing and décor stores, cafés/coffee shops, sushi restaurants and “modern” male apparel stores was analyzed in each city and cities with higher concentrations of these stores lost rating points. 
• Magazine Subscriptions --- The percentage of households with subscriptions to unmanly publications was analyzed. Examples of these publications include Martha Stewart Living, O-Oprah Magazine, Vanity Fair, Bon Appétit, Real Simple, Vogue, etc.