Motorsports Marketing Mail Tips
BARTERING GOODS OR SERVICES
Posted on: Wednesday July 26, 2023
BARTERING GOODS OR SERVICES – WHEN IS IT A GOOD FIT?
According to Webster’s dictionary, barter is “to trade (e.g. goods, services) without the exchange of money.”
In sponsorship, barter can be an effective way of offsetting bottom-line expenses and enhancing your racing operation with added elements.
When considering any type of trade of a product or service in exchange for advertising space on your race car, hauler, race uniform and crew shirts, etc. it only makes sense to trade out with something that can directly benefit the race team.
Striking a deal with a beverage company has been a popular one for many years regionally. Although the beer companies have greatly scaled back their involvement in racing (there hasn’t been a Budweiser or Miller ‘beer car’ at Wisconsin International Raceway in Kaukauna, Wisconsin for more than ten years now) there are multiple options available with flavored water, soda and other non-alcoholic beverage companies.
Same things apply with food products. You always have to feed and hydrate your hard-working crew members. Trading out for those type of things saves your race team money and provides a needed product or service.
Think car washes. Gas stations. Some gas stations have sponsored teams X amount of gas cards to fill their haulers with. Again, a great example of a service or product you won’t have to pay for. Maybe even a local dry cleaner to keep those crew shirts and driver uniforms looking spic and span.
A couple of things to remember with this. No matter what the arrangement is between the team and a business is to GET THE DETAILS IN WRITING. I cannot stress enough how important this is that both parties know what is expected of them.
The benefit to embracing ‘trade’ or ‘bartering’ with a business is that it can perhaps down the road lead to some actual money eventually if you can over-deliver on your end of the deal and provide maximum exposure.
Good luck!