NASCAR’s New Faces
For the first time in a thousand years NASCAR’s royalty won’t be present at Daytona. Today is the start of the stockcar racing season–in fact, it’s their superbowl, the biggest race of the year, held in Daytona to honor the roots of racing right there on the beaches of northern Florida. But today there’s no Petty in the race, either as driver or owner. No DEI car. (That’s Dale Earnbhardt Enterprises for the uninitiated, the very soul of this series for the past 25 years, but since Dale Jr. left the team, they’ve been unable to compete.) No Wood Brothers, which, while not a team casual fans recall, has been in this event since 1950.
It’s a sign of the times. At least a dozen drivers have switched teams. Advertisers have been dropping their multi-million-dollar sponsorships as they find it harder to justify the expense, either for branding or activation. Which means more partial sponsorships, more shake-and-bake deals (not the product, but the flexible, seat-of-your-pants style of sponsorship that marked this series when it began.) Office Depot sharing space with Old Spice, Cheerios selling off part of its contract to Hamburger Helper. Little Debbie, Kingsford and Clorox spreading the cost around. Two of the cars that qualified for the 500 today don’t even HAVE sponsors. That’s a lot of TV exposure that in years past would have been sold off with a phone call.
There IS good news, though. The top teams and drivers are still making headlines. Jimmy Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Kyle Busch and Dale Jr. are still driving for big brands like Lowes, Dupont, M&Ms and AMP/National Guard. Miller and Bud are still out there. But the belt-tightening means new opportunities for teams and drivers who couldn’t qualify before. Brands willing to SPEND while others are SAVING are finding new opportunities to get involved in this massive branding event. Ask.com is now part of the show. As are Golden Corral and something called Window World. Window World signed on just four days ago to appear in the race after Terry Labonte qualified without a sponsor. Good for them.
The drivers that win in NASCAR are aggressive, opportunistic and hype-competitive. So are the brands that are hanging in there, taking advantage of NASCAR’s rabidly loyal fan base and 3-hour live commercials every Sunday.
