Six Months Into A “Crisis” Year and NASCAR Continues Its Strong Refinement…

July 1, 2009 by Joe Favorito · Leave a Comment 

If any sport could be hurt by the global economic problems it should be NASCAR. The essence of the “traveling circus” of a circuit, especially one built around the auto industry and legions of fans that have to travel to see their stars, makes survival problematic and growth questionable. Outside the US, racing in the form of Formula One has been devastated, with more bad news that good. Yet NASCAR, although taking a hit, has continued to build its brand, redefine itself and find ways to satisfy its core audience and find new, casual fans in these crazy times. How? By staying on message, looking for new avenues, listening to their fans and doing everything possible to keep their TV, digital and brand partners happy in these tough times. A look around this week sees the NASCAR story told point by point in USA Today , and in an indepth all access show on CNBC . Prior to that, away from the sports and business pages, the New York Times spent A Night Out with driver Jimmie Johnson recently in Manhattan, while SUNOCO re-launched their campaign for Free Fuel for NASCAR fans and loyal customers in early June. Are things all rosy? No. The discretionary dollar for many fans has dried up, which will hopefully lead them to TV or more digital coverage, but NASCAR has done a great job of showing all partners that they are remaining strong in these tough times and will do whatever it takes to reward all involved with their brand. Great mid-year push by a sport fueled by loyalty.

Playing On The Global Stage

October 18, 2008 by Joe Favorito · Leave a Comment 

Businessweek this week put out their Top 100 Power Brokers In Sports, and in that was a Top 25 worldwide (meaning outside the U.S.).  The list is a great one for anyone to have on hand as sports becomes more global, and continues to show the domination of motor sports (notably F1 despite its financial issues) and soccer as the world players.  In an Olympic year, the key Olympic players also move up the list, and the presence of Yao Ming (the only basketball element) and Lalit Modi show the continued diversity into the Far East and the power the Indian and Chinese markets will have going forward.  One interesting aspect is that there are only four names probably…David Beckham, Maria Sharapova, Roger Federer and Yao…that the casual sports fan in the United States may know.  The smart marketer or ardent fan will at least know almost all, but as brands expand (no names from the Middle East made the list, something that will change in the future) both globally and into this country (as non-American brands look to capture the sports marketplace here) this list and its offshoots will become increasingly more valuable, and the crossover from this list to the largely American 100 will become much bigger.  The entire list as well as the features can be seen here.