NASCAR recently announced that it is overhauling the championship points system for its top-tier product, the Nextel (formerly Winston) Cup Series. That means the marketing programs of the top sponsors in NASCAR will change. The problem is that no one yet knows how, or to what extent.
Driver Matt Kenseth won the 2003 championship with team owner Roush Racing and sponsor DeWalt tools. By winning only one race, yet scoring more top-10 finishes than anyone else (26), Kenseth and his team unfairly caught media and fan heat last year.
Yet all they did was work the NASCAR championship algorithm devised by the late Bob Latford and used by the Winston Cup Series since 1975.
Kenseth took the points lead March 9 in the fourth race of the 36-event, February-to-November season and never relinquished it. By midsummer, tracking his championship progress was like watching a python eat a pig — slow, effective and inevitable.
By August, former NASCAR chairman and CEO Bill France Jr. said the points system would be changed. The full details of the new program had not been announced at press time.
But the upshot of the new system is that all teams will spend the first 26 races trying to qualify as one of the top 10 championship contenders grouped together in the final 10 races. New bonus points will be awarded to race winners. The concept is informally referred to as the 26-10 plan.
The top 10 competitors in the last 10 races will compete in a points chase of their own that will be promoted independently by NASCAR and its media partners. This is the key issue that raises questions for sports marketers.
NASCAR's 26-10 plan has potential. This should make the championship chase closer.
It will create interest late in the year, when NASCAR TV ratings sag, and thus bring more advertising dollars to NASCAR media and merchandising. It provides NASCAR with yet another property available for sponsorship. It may generate new ad-buying by companies whose cars are in the title chase.
The 26-10 plan benefits the host tracks of the last 10 races through increased ticket sales and media coverage at a time when interest usually droops. It gives NASCAR a rationale for changing the host tracks of the last 10 events, in order to make the final events a better test.
It also gives NASCAR a rationale to move its all-star non-points race, formerly known as The Winston, to different locations, supporting the 26-10. If three to four drivers are floating just outside the top 10 while the process narrows, it gives Nextel an excellent promotional platform to involve its customers in the selection process.
And the 26-10 plan should elevate TV viewership, making NASCAR TV rights more valuable as the TV package renewal process begins soon.
But so far the process has produced more questions than answers.
Will a NASCAR-directed 26-10 plan diminish the investment of other sponsors through reduced TV, print, Internet and radio recognition late in the season?
If a team sponsor commits to a fall TV ad buy with NASCAR and its team is out of the 26-10 program, will it yank its ads?
The biggest question yet is whether sponsors of mid- to lower-level teams will continue to spend money while they're worried about a perceived institutionalized reluctance by NASCAR and its media partners to pay attention to teams outside the top 10 in the latter third of the season.
Sports marketers frequently link NASCAR investments to retail activation promotions that can take a year to plan and execute. Will those marketers chill their NASCAR promotions, not knowing if their cars will be in the "10" of 26-10?
Kenseth and the Roush team proved that it's time for the NASCAR points system to change. The new system will reward aggressiveness and achievement on the racetrack.
But it's possible this system will enrich the few at the expense of the many — resulting in a loss of confidence in NASCAR by the very sponsors whose retail promotions were the primary building blocks of NASCAR's popularity.
Just like their race teams, sponsors doing business in NASCAR should be rewarded for aggressiveness and achievement in the marketplace. But now there is concern that NASCAR sponsor promotions scheduled to activate in the fourth quarter may hit the wall because of factors out of their control. And if they crash hard enough, they may not get back in the race.
Mel Poole (mpoole@sportsbusinessjournal.com) is president of consulting and marketing firm SponsorLogic.
