A quick look at www.hendrickmotorsports.com reveals that for his four race teams he carries ten primary sponsors and
nineteen associate sponsors. That’s a lot of financial resource for his organization. He’s got a stable
of top tier drivers and crew members that demand this kind of support. With 500 employees and a ninety acre complex where
the Hendrick cars and teams are developed, he’s the racing business model that everyone would like to emulate.
Okay, so maybe you don’t
have enough money to compete in Sprint Cup. You may want to start your effort in the Nationwide Series (NNS). Again, you have
to face the competitive nature of the race for sponsorship. All the major Sprint Cup teams compete in the Nationwide Series
and are consistently running up front and winning. With the performance come the best sponsor deals.
Bobby Hamilton Jr., co-owner of
Sadler/Hamilton Racing, and driver of the #25 Smithfield Foods Ford, told me over at Nashville that it’s basically impossible
for his team to compete against the likes of Roush/Fenway and Richard Childress Racing. When tires are costing near two
grand each, the tire bill for a weekend can easily eclipse thirty thousand dollars. Do that 35 times a year and you’ll
spend a million dollars just on tires.
The top tier teams are spending
$30,000 on the spring packages and thousands more for research and development.
So what is happening in
the NNS series is the little guys are getting pushed out and the Sprint Cup owners have a stranglehold on the bulk of the
available sponsor money. As rising costs and shrinking sponsor involvement collide, more and more teams may fall by the
way leaving a shortfall of competitors in the series.
Consider the McDonald’s
sponsorship carried by Bobby Hamilton Jr. in 2007. According to Team Owner, Ed Rensi, past CEO of McDonalds, the corporation
evaluated the costs of car sponsorship and determined they could save millions by putting their marketing dollars into television
ads during race events. For example, if television air time for a race is $100,000 or so, across 35 races the total tab would
be around $3,500,000, several million less than funding a full time team.
2006 StockCar Review.
