Menard sees the value in racing to reach his target audience
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla.—Menards has expanded its support of the ARCA Series as the entitlement sponsor.
The 65-year-old tour will now be called the ARCA Menards Series.
Principals from Menards, ARCA and NASCAR announced the multi-year deal which debuted with the season opener at Daytona International Speedway on Saturday.
“For the past decade, Menards has played a tremendous role in growing our series and we couldn’t be happier to continue this journey during this historic time for ARCA,” said Ron Drager, President, ARCA. “Menards is a growing company and a committed supporter of motorsports, we are honored to have their brand along-side ours as title sponsor of the series.”
While other home improvement retailers have come and gone from motorsports, John Menard, owner of the Eau Claire, Wisconsin-based company, has continued to contribute to the growth of the sport.
The company not only underwrites the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup program of Paul Menard at Wood Brothers Racing but is part of Ryan Blaney’s sponsorship at Team Penske and Matt Crafton’s deal in the Gander Outdoors Truck tour. Menard has supported grassroots racing and was listed as team owner for Tony Stewart when he won the IndyCar title in 1997.
Menard believes that his target consumer and the average race fan are one-in-the-same. And to partner with another family-run company from the Midwest made sense to the President/CEO of firm that was ranked by J.D. Power as "highest in customer satisfaction among home improvement retail stores” in 2018.
“Our demographics are very similar and we feel like we need to be in racing to be connected with that demographic,” Menard told RacinBoys.com. “We also are probably more involved in racing than either one of our competitors were from the standpoint that we’re in a lot of the lower levels of racing where they were just in the highest level.
“We certainly enjoy the Cup Series. We have a strong commitment to that with my son racing, but a lot of our very best customer connections are with the lower forms of racing at the local tracks in the smaller communities that we’re in the Midwest where racing is a bigger deal than in the larger series.”
Over the last four decades, Menard has seen a return of investment in racing as his empire has expanded to 300 stores throughout the Midwest with over 45,000 employees. There’s no better direct marketing for Menards than racing.
“At the end of the day it is a business and we have to justify thing on whether there is a return on investment,” Menard added. “As we can tell, advertising is becoming an increasingly complex thing to accomplish. It used to be if you were a retailer, you could buy the 6-o’clock news, the 10-o’clock news and the local newspaper and you had it covered. Life was good.
“Now, you tweet it. You do this or that on social media, digital. It’s very confusing to get to people. But you can still reach a lot of people through racing—and that’s overlooked by some that a racing connection is pretty good, particularly in the age of digital things.”
The ARCA/Menards partnership began in 2009 when the company invested as a presenting partner and has grown over the last decade.
“This multi-year agreement is a great victory for racing fans,” said Mike Helton, vice chairman, NASCAR. “Our sport thrives on great partnerships and Menards stands out as one of the best in motorsports. We appreciate their commitment to growing this series for years to come.”
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