R
Restrictor Plate King!
Guest
Hard to believe but as often as Kyle Busch drives his truck into victorylane, even he is having sponsor issue's. Do none of these large companies across america have any NASCAR fans as employee's? WTF, c'mon costco, or how about Exxon, or HESS or Nike or Puma. How about LEGO, there's gotta be someone out there, it would truly be a shame if Kyle had to close shop...
Sponsor crunch has Busch weighing future of KBM
Busch joins Cup champions Gordon, Stewart as drivers still looking for sponsor
By David Caraviello, NASCAR.COM
September 17, 2010
07:12 PM EDT
LOUDON, N.H. -- On the race track, the first season for Kyle Busch's entry in the Camping World Truck Series can easily be defined as a success. Busch has won four races on the circuit this season, and has his eyes on a fifth after a strong pair of practice sessions at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. The organization's No. 18 truck, which has used four different drivers this year, even has a shot at the owners' championship.
But in the ledgers, this season has been starkly different. Kyle Busch Motorsports' planned-for main sponsor, Miccosukee, departed before the season opener at Daytona. Busch's two young drivers were granted their release to drive cars on the Nationwide tour. From a sponsorship perspective, the year has been such a struggle that Busch sounded Friday as if he might have to close the doors on the organization if the financial picture does not improve before next season.
"I think it's going to be pretty detrimental to not have myself in the series," Busch said. "The series is, as we all know, is a lower-budgeted series, but there's a lot of guys struggling to find funding. I know a couple of guys out there that put sponsors on their trucks for almost a whole year for 250,000, 300,000 bucks. That's flooding the market. That's just killing the Truck Series. You can't do that. They've got to get something. For myself, it's hard. It's very hard."
Busch said he didn't have a timetable set on deciding whether or not to continue the team, which employs about 50 people and also fields a late model program. But given the dearth of sponsorship, he's had to dig into his pockets to keep it alive. Kevin Harvick, who operates a namesake organization that fields vehicles on both the Truck and Nationwide tours -- and whose championship-winning Truck crew chief, Rick Ren, left to become Busch's general manager -- wonders if Busch underestimated just how difficult it would be to get the program on its feet.
"I think there was definitely an underestimation on his part as far as everything that went into putting it all together," Harvick said. "It's just expensive. It's hard to put the people together the first year. You wind up with a lot of people that don't really fit the style of how you want the race team to run and things to go. It's hard, and it's an everyday project in the beginning that you can't let your thumb off of or it'll go south fast."
And yet, Busch has also been caught in a recession-related sponsorship crunch that's affected the garages in all three of NASCAR's national series, and drivers ranging from young Truck pilots to multiple-time champions on the Cup tour. Hendrick Motorsports has yet to announce a 2011 sponsorship package for Jeff Gordon's No. 24 car, although owner Rick Hendrick said recently he was confident things were coming together. Tony Stewart still has gaps to fill on both vehicles in his two-car organization. Penske Racing needs a primary for Sam Hornish Jr.'s car for next year, and a recent report indicated that Justin Allgaier's Nationwide vehicle may soon need a sponsor as well.
Stewart tried to put a positive spin on the situation.
"We all understand why corporate America has had to pull the reigns back a little bit," he said. "So is it a surprise and a shock? No, not necessarily. If you look in this garage area, it's still a thriving sport and it's still represented by a lot of Fortune 500 companies. I wouldn't stand here and say that we're all in bad shape, because the sport is very healthy right now. All you've got to do is walk through the garage area and see that."
Still, it's clear that more teams are having to use multiple companies to fund cars that were once bankrolled by a single sponsor, and that sponsors are taking much longer to commit to spending money on a NASCAR effort. DuPont has been Gordon's primary backer since he entered the Cup Series in 1993, but the company has scaled back its involvement in recent years, and its current contract with Hendrick expires after this season. A potential new deal with Walmart fell through, leaving one of the sport's most popular and marketable drivers still waiting on a 2011 package to be finalized.
"Right now, my focus is on driving and trying to go out there and be as good as we can be in the Chase," said Gordon, one of 12 drivers in the year-end Cup Series playoff. "That is pretty much the message that has been sent to me through Rick [Hendrick] is, don't worry about it. We have got a lot of people working hard on it, and it'll come together."
The bottom line is, Busch is far from alone. Not that it makes his current situation any easier.
"Look at Tony Stewart, he's got to find half of a sponsor for next year. Jeff Gordon has got to find something for next year. Mark Martin, they have hendrickcars.com. That's not a sponsor, that's Rick Hendrick putting his money on that car," Busch said. "You look at a bunch of the Nationwide cars. It's all across the board. Harvick has been struggling trying to find stuff for his Truck program, too. It's unfortunate the way the economy is. It's going to be difficult for us race teams to stay in business without being able to have sponsors on our trucks or our cars. It's bad for the race teams to have to work through so many hoops in order to get a sponsor."
Exacerbating the situation, Busch believes, are exclusivity deals that bar certain types of companies -- like wireless carriers or insurance providers -- from becoming involved. Geico had to leave the former Busch Series after competitor Nationwide became title sponsor, and Sprint's presence has led Verizon to back a vehicle that doesn't feature its name or corporate logo.
"I can't thank Sprint enough. They do a great job for what they do for the Sprint Cup Series, but it locks out Verizon. It locks out AT&T. It locks out any other telecommunication company that you could try to get in," Busch said. "The tobacco debacle now with the United States government, that's locked out people that have the money to do it. The people that have the money to do it, [they] can't or don't want to do it. The guys that want to do it don't have the money to do it. You're fighting two avenues there, and being an owner and being able to talk to all these guys, I'm kind of finding that out."
Sponsor crunch has Busch weighing future of KBM
Busch joins Cup champions Gordon, Stewart as drivers still looking for sponsor
By David Caraviello, NASCAR.COM
September 17, 2010
07:12 PM EDT
LOUDON, N.H. -- On the race track, the first season for Kyle Busch's entry in the Camping World Truck Series can easily be defined as a success. Busch has won four races on the circuit this season, and has his eyes on a fifth after a strong pair of practice sessions at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. The organization's No. 18 truck, which has used four different drivers this year, even has a shot at the owners' championship.
But in the ledgers, this season has been starkly different. Kyle Busch Motorsports' planned-for main sponsor, Miccosukee, departed before the season opener at Daytona. Busch's two young drivers were granted their release to drive cars on the Nationwide tour. From a sponsorship perspective, the year has been such a struggle that Busch sounded Friday as if he might have to close the doors on the organization if the financial picture does not improve before next season.
"I think it's going to be pretty detrimental to not have myself in the series," Busch said. "The series is, as we all know, is a lower-budgeted series, but there's a lot of guys struggling to find funding. I know a couple of guys out there that put sponsors on their trucks for almost a whole year for 250,000, 300,000 bucks. That's flooding the market. That's just killing the Truck Series. You can't do that. They've got to get something. For myself, it's hard. It's very hard."
Busch said he didn't have a timetable set on deciding whether or not to continue the team, which employs about 50 people and also fields a late model program. But given the dearth of sponsorship, he's had to dig into his pockets to keep it alive. Kevin Harvick, who operates a namesake organization that fields vehicles on both the Truck and Nationwide tours -- and whose championship-winning Truck crew chief, Rick Ren, left to become Busch's general manager -- wonders if Busch underestimated just how difficult it would be to get the program on its feet.
"I think there was definitely an underestimation on his part as far as everything that went into putting it all together," Harvick said. "It's just expensive. It's hard to put the people together the first year. You wind up with a lot of people that don't really fit the style of how you want the race team to run and things to go. It's hard, and it's an everyday project in the beginning that you can't let your thumb off of or it'll go south fast."
And yet, Busch has also been caught in a recession-related sponsorship crunch that's affected the garages in all three of NASCAR's national series, and drivers ranging from young Truck pilots to multiple-time champions on the Cup tour. Hendrick Motorsports has yet to announce a 2011 sponsorship package for Jeff Gordon's No. 24 car, although owner Rick Hendrick said recently he was confident things were coming together. Tony Stewart still has gaps to fill on both vehicles in his two-car organization. Penske Racing needs a primary for Sam Hornish Jr.'s car for next year, and a recent report indicated that Justin Allgaier's Nationwide vehicle may soon need a sponsor as well.
Stewart tried to put a positive spin on the situation.
"We all understand why corporate America has had to pull the reigns back a little bit," he said. "So is it a surprise and a shock? No, not necessarily. If you look in this garage area, it's still a thriving sport and it's still represented by a lot of Fortune 500 companies. I wouldn't stand here and say that we're all in bad shape, because the sport is very healthy right now. All you've got to do is walk through the garage area and see that."
Still, it's clear that more teams are having to use multiple companies to fund cars that were once bankrolled by a single sponsor, and that sponsors are taking much longer to commit to spending money on a NASCAR effort. DuPont has been Gordon's primary backer since he entered the Cup Series in 1993, but the company has scaled back its involvement in recent years, and its current contract with Hendrick expires after this season. A potential new deal with Walmart fell through, leaving one of the sport's most popular and marketable drivers still waiting on a 2011 package to be finalized.
"Right now, my focus is on driving and trying to go out there and be as good as we can be in the Chase," said Gordon, one of 12 drivers in the year-end Cup Series playoff. "That is pretty much the message that has been sent to me through Rick [Hendrick] is, don't worry about it. We have got a lot of people working hard on it, and it'll come together."
The bottom line is, Busch is far from alone. Not that it makes his current situation any easier.
"Look at Tony Stewart, he's got to find half of a sponsor for next year. Jeff Gordon has got to find something for next year. Mark Martin, they have hendrickcars.com. That's not a sponsor, that's Rick Hendrick putting his money on that car," Busch said. "You look at a bunch of the Nationwide cars. It's all across the board. Harvick has been struggling trying to find stuff for his Truck program, too. It's unfortunate the way the economy is. It's going to be difficult for us race teams to stay in business without being able to have sponsors on our trucks or our cars. It's bad for the race teams to have to work through so many hoops in order to get a sponsor."
Exacerbating the situation, Busch believes, are exclusivity deals that bar certain types of companies -- like wireless carriers or insurance providers -- from becoming involved. Geico had to leave the former Busch Series after competitor Nationwide became title sponsor, and Sprint's presence has led Verizon to back a vehicle that doesn't feature its name or corporate logo.
"I can't thank Sprint enough. They do a great job for what they do for the Sprint Cup Series, but it locks out Verizon. It locks out AT&T. It locks out any other telecommunication company that you could try to get in," Busch said. "The tobacco debacle now with the United States government, that's locked out people that have the money to do it. The people that have the money to do it, [they] can't or don't want to do it. The guys that want to do it don't have the money to do it. You're fighting two avenues there, and being an owner and being able to talk to all these guys, I'm kind of finding that out."
