RELATED: Danica inks deal with new sponsor Nature’s Bakery
Not to be lost in a week of highly emotional and impactful news of the sport, is the encouraging and positive outcome from the reigning Sprint Cup champion Stewart-Haas Racing.
Because what’s good for Danica Patrick and good for that team is actually also good for all of NASCAR.
Tuesday’s announcement that Nature’s Bakery will begin a multiyear primary sponsorship of Patrick’s No. 10 Chevrolet beginning in 2016, is a significant sign for the sport.
It’s a fresh start and prime opportunity for this young and ambitious company, and a real indication that NASCAR is considered a thriving destination and viable option for a diverse group of potential corporate partners — not just for the petroleum, tire and tool brands that have historically laid the foundation.
“To have somebody new to this sport, that’s a victory on top of a victory, just getting a new partner,” Stewart-Haas Racing owner Tony Stewart said Tuesday after the team’s formal announcement.
“To bring somebody new into the sport, I think that shows the sport is still solid, it’s still marketable and we have a lot of good things going on in this series.”
Even the way this partnership materialized feels serendipitous.
The bakery’s two production facilities in St. Louis and Nevada use products supplied by Haas Automation, SHR co-owner Gene Haas’ company.
The company executives are longtime NASCAR fans and … one relatively innocuous conversation between a bakery representative and a Haas representative led to another, which led to a Patrick “taste test,” which rather quickly led to a multi-million dollar sponsorship deal between an up-and-coming company and one of the country’s most marketable professional athletes.
“Roughly about 100 days from beginning to end,” said Nature’s Bakery co-founder Dave Marson, who called it a “kind of a crazy idea that we’ve made reality here today.”
Marson explained, “We flew out, we met with Tony and Danica and instantly we knew that this was right. We were honest with them and said, ‘Hey, we’re not Coca-Cola. If you’re looking for Coca-Cola, if you’re looking for General Mills, you’ve got the wrong people, but if you believe in an up-and-coming brand in a category that’s growing, we’re your guys.’
“They believed in us.”
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In many ways Nature’s Bakery — which started as a family-owned bakery and now bakes and sells healthy snack bars in 22 countries — embodies exactly the kind of spirit and fundamentals that NASCAR fans embrace. The fact that it’s a family-owned American company with 420 employees — not 50,000 — is a concept well received.
This is a sport whose fans appreciate the underdog and cheer for those putting in the hard work.
“This is the next natural level and evolution of our brand,” said Marson. “It brings us to the forefront. It lets us play with the big boys now, so we’re ready for it.”
On a practical level, this buoys Patrick’s confidence in her pursuit of NASCAR success and it allows SHR to continue its focus on defending its 2014 championship run with one less major distraction.
And for Patrick and Stewart, sealing a deal between them was the only option considered.
“I just think it makes everything seamless to where we’re just continuing business as usual,” Stewart said. “There’s no change; she just gets to keep building on what she’s been doing up to this point with us. For us, it’s the same deal, too, we don’t have to worry about a transition.”
Added Stewart, “We continue to see progress in her.
“Everyone puts so much pressure on her that everything that she does — or if she makes a mistake — it’s magnified by everybody, so I think considering that, she’s done a pretty damn good job up to this point.”