It was a pretty good day for Petty Enterprises. Seems like everybody is merging together these days—Ray Evernham, Jack Roush, and now the Pettys. Is it because the sport is becoming too expensive to do on winnings alone?
The answer to that question is probably, "yes." When people merge they get better. Take for example Evernham Motorsports, they merged last year with George Gillette and now they have won three of the last four races in the Sprint Cup.
Now look at Rousch Racing. They also merged last year, with Boston Fenway. They won multiple races last year and four this year.
- B/R Ticket Guide
This makes us wonder who is next to make the big merge. Could it be Hendrick Motorsports with their struggles this year? Or could it be Joe Gibbs Racing, so they could improve and keep up with everybody else?
Now, let's take a look inside the Petty merger. The company to which they actually sold majority ownership is Boston Ventures.
This company buys a lot of family owned businesses. What they are doing with Petty is just giving them money. They basically just see what they are doing with the money, and approve the spending. This led Bobby Labonte to re-sign with the Pettys to drive the 43 car.
The Pettys said that because of this merger, they want to add a third car and bring in a younger driver to drive it.
I personally see this as a good thing for the Pettys. They haven’t won a race since 1999, and I feel that they are the most deserving group that hits the race track every week.
I look for the results of this merger to start showing next season. I predict that they will win at least three races and possibly be in contention for the championship.
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6 months ago
What you missed in this is what Boston Ventures actually do what the properties they buy. While you correctly state they buy and monitor the purchased property what you failed to note was the average time the hold onto a purchase is only 5 years.
They buy a controlling interest, improve performance, in Petty's case on-track, but more importantly financially regardless of on-track performance, then sell the company off with-in 5 years.
This merger is very different from a business stand point from the others of the last few years.
6 months ago
I don't see where Hendrick Motorsports would even be considered in "merger" discussion, nor Joe Gibbs Racing. Both have consistent high levels of performance, plenty of sponsorship money, performance, and a stable of talent (beyond the driver's seat) that allows them to thrive in this environment.
Roush and Evernham made merger deals to allow them to keep up with HMS and JGR. Evernham's struggles last year were because of bad engineering that ruined the first half of the season. Roush was more of him looking to divest some of the financial load of having 5 Cup teams, plus 2-3 Nationwide and the same number of Truck teams. Roush has been on a roller coaster since they won back-to-back cups with Kurt Busch and Matt Kenseth. They will be leaner and meaner next year once they pare down to 4 teams.
Petty Enterprises simply fell behind in the 1990, and never made moves to catch up. They're so far behind the curve it will take years before they compete for a title. Bobby Labonte can still win races, but the team has to get rolling, as they've been surpassed by the likes of JGR and Red Bull Racing.
Petty is languishing with third-tier teams like Bill Davis Racing and Haas/CNC. The influx of cash should allow them to move up to second-tier with DEI and Red Bull. but the talent pool in NASCAR has been either grabbed up by the big teams or diluted among the others (and the NNS and NCTS).
from 6 months ago
Hendrick and Gibbs should consider it. Look at where Petty was 30 years ago, winning a big percentage of races. Then everybody started making changes, like today with the mergers except then the changes were a little bit different. Gradually everybody started getting better than the Pettys today the Pettys haven't won a race since 1999. So I think everybody should consider a merger, just to stay on top of what could happen.
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