A friend had a brilliant sponsorship idea. You know how there’s the classic Martini livery? The classic Marlboro livery?
With all these states having legal marijuana and a growing business footprint, isn’t this where we should be looking for sponsorship dollars?
Also, my understanding is that this industry has benefitted from our current predicament, further making this seem appealing.
What say you folks? Giant leaf on the car for sponsorship? This kind of has the same vibe as energy drink sponsors which was definitely a thing for a while there.
For karting at the club and regional level I don’t think the roi will be there for even the local pot shop. I mean I’m sure there is a small crossover but with the lack of spectators what does the company get in return? I mean I’m all for new ideas for sponsorship. But I think it’s hard to pull in a company when the people watching/racing aren’t going to frequent the place.
Maybe at the higher level. Some pretty big companies now like canopy. They could easily do a NASCAR, you would think.
Further, think of the National kart teams. They have pretty big presence and probably are savvy in terms of strategic partnerships.
Also the rise of sim racing… it may be here to stay.
Thinking on this further… as a sim racer, what do I need from a sponsor? Do I even need one? No. But that’s not stopping folks from using their sim racing as their actual racing too and looking for partners.
Maybe I’ve got this backwards. Rather than looking for exposure via the drivers or teams, perhaps these companies could be the backer of race series.
Interesting. All this will get changed. I do not see, ultimately, how one can prohibit a legal company from advertising. Despite the fact that cigarettes clearly are killers, they still advertise (limited now). Also, the hypocrisy is apparent when it’s ok to advertise booze? Gambling? End of day, money talks.
I suppose it would be an unusual helmet order for @tjkoyen.
This topic has been debated for literal decades, so I won’t get into that, but on the topic of sponsorship… What does say, the local pot shop, gain from having their little green cross on your decal kit?
The marketing budget for a small local business is probably not big enough to allow admittedly odd projects like exposure to 100 go-kart racers on a weekend. As has been discussed ad naseum for years, karting is a niche sport with very limited actual ROI for most businesses. There are opportunities, but there’s not really real money being made off of “sponsorship” deals within karting.
If a company’s goal is to increase exposure, think of what you as a potential partner are competing against. Any company can drop $20 on a Facebook ad and get their product in front of literally thousands of people multiple times a day. So why should any company be offering you any sum of money to put their logo in front of a hundred people two Saturdays a month? The human partnership aspect of it means as an actual person controlling the company’s message, you have some value there, but I think that value is decreasing as we progressively tunnel ourselves deeper into the depths of the Internet, and actual face-to-face interaction loses value.
Major corporate sponsorship at high levels of sport where there is actual television coverage is a different beast. But anything that isn’t being televised or receiving major media coverage feels relatively useless to me from the perspective of advertising. And when it comes to sports that don’t receive major media attention, local or regional karting is king of that segment.
Tobacco have found it harder and harder to advertise. Aside from using shell companies and cryptic bar codes on Ferraris, I can’t think of anywhere that it is prevalent in most developed countries.
My source here is my wife who previously worked for the Institute for Global Tobacco Control out of Johns Hopkins school of Public Health. There is a lot of global legislation regarding this.
Also, until marijuana companies are allowed to do business in the US and don’t have to be cash based. It’s not going to catch on.
I thought the Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement limited the amount companies could advertise, certainly in something like motorsport? Also, cannabis is a banned substance, so that would further complicate things depending on your governing body.
The best thing to do would be to take your karting budget and start a cannabis business and then come back in a year or two with some spare cash to go racing with
I know a guy doing this, actually. It’s not an easy process.
That being said, any discussion of karting sponsorship does raise the “Meh” comment in that karting really doesn’t make any sense for the reasons of limited interest/coverage.
I was just thinking, given the tradition of alcohol and cigarette sponsorship in nascar/f1/everything else, this would make sense.
Ultimately it will be a thing. InBev bought a marijuana co., I think. Pretty sure constellation brands is looking at it. Bud is releasing a CBD product I heard etc.
Me being me. I communicate a lot and try to get people stoked. Granted I am a nobody, but for a somebody, that’s a thing if they are really out there on social media etc.
For sure, you are enthusiastic and friendly, we all know that! But my point was, for $20 worth of social media ads, they can cast a much wider net, so even if it is less personal, they have minimal investment and reach a ton of people’s eyes.
How much money have you spent based on things that Ryan has recommended? Or how much would you spend on things if he was like “this is the best blah blah blah product”?
There’s a very big difference between brand exposure and convincing someone to actually pull their credit card out and spend money.
I agree re karting. There really is never a case where it makes sense other than at highest levels maybe. That being said, it’s totally relevant for those forms of motorsport that exist on partner dollars.
My next pair of gloves will likely be those trendy gloves that he (Ryan)wears. Since I see him using them and other drivers that are really good, might as well see what the fuss is about.
I for one am looking forwards to a silly nascar livery.
Also @tjkoyen in your experience, being from a karting family (multi-generational) and Pro…
I imagine that even your sponsorship was to a certain extent good will and connection based? Ie relationships your family forged in the karting biz etc? Or was there a real value add to those that helped you compete? In other words, is ROI the primary thing for the sponsor? Or other reasons? Perhaps relationship matters for other aspects of the 2 businesses?
and then come back in a year or two with some spare cash to go racing with 
But my point was, for $20 worth of social media ads, they can cast a much wider net, so even if it is less personal, they have minimal investment and reach a ton of people’s eyes.