NASCAR New York Office - NASCAR's Secret Weapon

Being there made sense from the point of view of the sanctioning body, but not immediately to the team owners, track operators, and others involved in the sport.

At the start there was a general sense among participants in the sport that NASCAR's office was there to divert money to the sanctioning body's Daytona Beach, Florida, headquarters and away from the pockets of competitors.

"Our constituents took a wait-and-see attitude," Yormark admits. "As we gained momentum, as we started bringing in tangible new business prospects, we gained credibility. And just like any job, you've got to prove yourself."

That's easier said than done. Realizing they had to win over the teams and tracks first, Yormark and his colleagues set out to convince them they were all partners, rather than adversaries. Before knocking on Madison Avenue doors, Yormark and his teams pounded the pavement at track garages around the country.

Moreover, the NASCAR office has one rock-solid mandate: Any company that comes into play as a corporate backer must first have a deal with a team, track, or other related business. This, Yormark says, was to assure the teams that NASCAR wasn't there just to raise money for the corporate coffers.

It took a few deals with companies such as Old Spice, which were clearly made to help teams, for the insiders in the sport to understand and begin backing the New York efforts. In 1998 Yormark's team put together a deal with Old Spice to back driver Tony Stewart and be a sponsor on the Joe Gibbs-owned car. Old Spice had no financial ties to NASCAR at the time, and did not become an official sponsor, indicating to teams that the organization was working for them, as well. "When we started hitting some deals that were not taking money from the garage, rather we were putting money into the garage, the attitude changed," Yormark says.

But with the New York office, the thinking is that by luring a company into racing, be it either as a team sponsor or some other promotional platform, NASCAR will benefit as well. The results, of course, can be difficult to quantify. And not all companies go right into team sponsorship without providing some financial benefit for NASCAR. For example, larger companies may opt to back a team and also become an official sponsor of the sport, thus delivering a direct financial gain for the sanctioning body. For example, UPS backs Dale Jarrett's car and is also the official express delivery company of NASCAR.

Keeping with company policy, Yormark declined to discuss any figures regarding how much money flows through the office. But based on some of the deals, it's a significant figure.

Home Depot and UPS are just two of the companies that have been educated and convinced they must be part of NASCAR. And, in keeping with the mission statement, they became team sponsors before working with NASCAR directly.

Six years ago, the folks at Home Depot, having constantly heard about the interest in racing from their employees, headed to New York for Yormark's NASCAR 101 training.

Soon after, Home Depot was behind Joe Gibbs' team and driver Tony Stewart and became an official status sponsor of NASCAR. "I think the New York office is a hidden gem," says Hugh Miskel, director of event marketing and community relations for the home-supply chain. "They service the team, the sponsors, and the track, to whom they feed leads, so they serve a really good purpose from both an educational perspective and sponsor management."

For an outsider, it might seem odd for an Atlanta-based company such as Home Depot to go to New York-rather than Daytona-for a NASCAR education. But for a company that has been dealing with the broadcast networks and other major media outlets in the big city, it wasn't strange at all.

And that's exactly why NASCAR officials wanted to be in New York in the first place-to level the ground between the sport and the traditional stick-and-ball operations already there.