Furniture Row Racing will close down as an organization after the ’18 season, confirming rumblings that the team’s future was in peril amid sponsorship issues and an attempted sale to another team that collapsed. Team Owner Barney Visser in a statement said, “This is not good for anybody. The numbers just don’t add up. I would have to borrow money to continue as a competitive team and I’m not going to do that. This was obviously a painful decision to arrive at knowing how it will affect a number of quality and talented people.”
FRR, behind driver Martin Truex Jr., won last year’s Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series championship. However, talk of FRR shutting down after this year was the major topic in the garage this past weekend at Darlington Raceway. 5-hour Energy in mid July announced it was leaving as co-primary sponsor of the No. 78 car.
The team last month released a statement that it did not consider shutting down after this year as an option. However, talks to sell the operation to GMS Racing collapsed two weeks ago, in a move sources say was due at least in part to GMS and FRR not being able to come to terms with Joe Gibbs Racing on continuing FRR’s alliance with JGR. That led to Truex opening up talks with JGR to bring himself and Bass Pro Shops to the No. 19 car. That proved to be the final nail in the coffin for FRR.
