Full Throttle

For the second straight year, SportsBusiness Journal/Daily teamed with Kansas City-based sponsorship measurement firm Image Impact to measure the exposure received by companies doing business with NASCAR.

Setting aside the study found a 44% increase in sponsor impressions this year (Six additional sponsored locations were measured this year), there are some interesting tidbits of data to be found.

Most interesting to me was the hit Budweiser took with the departure of Dale Earnhardt Jr. as spokesman.

Earnhardt generated $26.15 million in value for his three Hendrick sponsors — Amp Energy, the National Guard and Mountain Dew. That’s five percent more than what he delivered in 2007 for his former primary marketing partner, Budweiser.

With Earnhardt’s move, Budweiser put its support (and dollars) behind Kasey Kahne in 2008. It ended up with $11.75 million in exposure value, less than half of what it received with Earnhardt in 2007.

In a related sponsorship move from 2007, Kyle Busch’s eight-win season helped M&M’s, his primary sponsor, rise from a #61 ranking last year to #17 this season. The candy brand’s exposure value increased fivefold, to $22.3 million.

Other interesting numbers:

In 12 of the 37 races tracked, the driver who delivered the most value for his sponsors was not the winner of the race. Presumably because he led the most laps or was in the top five most of the day.

One of every five dollars in exposure went to Sprint. Gee, I wonder why?

AT&T, in its final year as a NASCAR sponsor, ranked No. 5 overall and more than doubled its exposure value.

For various reasons (mainly introduction of the Chase) fans and NASCAR insiders believe NASCAR wants to be more like the NFL.

This study shows that thought process should be turned on its ear. In terms of sponsor dollars NASCAR is number one.

Nascar is #2 to the National Football League by most measures, except for sponsorship revenue. The NFL pulls in about $1.2 to 1.5 billion per year compared with Nascar’s $3 billion; in third place is Major League Baseball, followed by the National Basketball Association and the National Hockey League.