A few months ago I was watching ESPN’s SportsCenter in the morning while getting ready for the day and stopped in my tracks when I heard NASCAR CEO and Chairman Brian France tell a group of reporters at a press conference that the circuit would be changing its rules to allow more “bump drafting” during its races in the year ahead. To quote France directly:
“NASCAR is a contact sport—our history is based on banging fenders.”
In fact, after France’s rule-change announcement another NASCAR executive, Robin Pemberton, NASCAR’s vice president of competition, said, “Boys, have at it….” My first reaction: Uh-oh.
It’s the same reaction I experienced yesterday when tuning into the highlights of Sunday’s race in Atlanta, where star driver Carl Edwards took revenge on fellow racer Brad Keselowski for something the latter did earlier in the race. The Edwards bump caused Keselowski’s car to flip over in midair at nearly 200 miles per hour and sent him to the hospital for observation. The car careened into the “catch fence” that prevents metal from flying into the crowd—but has been known to allow killer debris through in the past. Contact sport indeed—and potentially an example in which the marketing minds behind a violent sport should have kept their mouths shut.
I’m sure most people would at least agree that this was a poor choice of words by NASCAR’s most-senior management, but is a rule change to allow faster, more aggressive racing “Marketing with Meaning”?
Since its inception, NASCAR fans and outsiders alike have claimed that people watch the sport just to see the wrecks, and by encouraging its drivers to “bang fenders” an incident like this was only a matter of time in coming. It’s the easy knee-jerk reaction by the leaders of a sport who are experiencing their first business decline in several years. Television ratings are down, seats are increasingly empty, and many sponsors and teams have called it quits due to economic pressure.
But I believe that this knee-jerk reaction by NASCAR officials is a poor decision and one that might even worsen ratings and fan engagement if and when this “contact sport” next claims a driver’s life. I’ve seen my fair share of NASCAR races and I actually enjoy and follow the sport. I first got into it back when I worked on the Tide brand at P&G and we had a car. I had the chance to see our drivers race in Indianapolis, Phoenix, Charlotte, and Daytona. I sat in the stands, hung out in the pits, and even got to know our driver, Ricky Craven’s, family. I came to see NASCAR as a sport with fierce competition and passionate people. They fight hard for the checkered flag every Sunday, but they also live together on the road for much of the year, and drivers’ families say prayers at the start of each race that their loved ones make it back alive.
NASCAR rose to greater ratings because it found a spot as a family sport in many American homes. In fact, it was female fans who first started the ratings to rise about a decade ago. In 2004, 42% of NASCAR viewers were female—up from 35% in 1995—and there were more female viewers of these races than for the NFL. That was a big reason why brands such as Tide, Clorox, and M&Ms got into car-sponsorship deals. So any effort to make the sport more violent will likely risk alienating mothers and children from embracing the sport as before.
What can NASCAR do to add meaning to its marketing? Well, for starters, I would find ways to make the sport more interesting and exciting for fans to watch with a cell phone or laptop in the living room. One of the exciting differentiators of NASCAR is that the action is constantly intense and data about everything from speed to tire pressure is created continuously. Fans love the information, but NASCAR has frequently chosen to exact extra fees for access to additional information. I would start by making the in-car audio feeds and track data that it currently charges $30 to $80 a year for free to all. This is something that other sports cannot offer, and I doubt there are many takers of this pricey service.
NASCAR should do something immediately to show its drivers and fans that it is not hoping to encourage more danger in an already intense event—and look for ways to add value for the entire family.
