Charlotte Motor Speedway's ambitions to enhance the fan experience and broaden its audience ahead of the 2019 Coca-Cola 600 are paying off.
Greg Walter, executive vice president and general manager of Charlotte Motor Speedway, told the Charlotte Business Journal the race is pacing about 10% ahead on ticket sales, despite declining admissions revenue and television ratings for NASCAR events in recent years. Walter and his team have made adjustments to the fan experience in order to draw more people to the event.
In an attempt to encourage more fan interaction, the speedway replaced the grass down by the track with synthetic turf. The turf will allow a more walkable surface for fans participating in the pre-race festivities taking place by the track, where there will be a stage and large Memorial Day celebration with over 600 troops from all five branches of the military. There will also be games and other activities for fans on the turf, which has already had to be repaired due to a celebratory burnout by Kyle Larson after winning last week's Monster Energy NASCAR All-Star Race.
"Fans can get right up to the competitors," Walter said. "Imagine if the Panthers allowed half the stadium to go walk on the field prior to the game. That's kind of what we do here."
Attracting new fans, however, is something that Walter stressed.
In addition to continuing its offer of $10 grandstand tickets for children, Concord-based track operator Speedway Motorsports Inc. (NYSE: TRK) hopes a scheduling tweak will also attract fans from another type of racing. The Dirt Track at Charlotte is hosting the United Rentals Patriot Nationals, a sprint-car dirt race, on Friday and Saturday, ahead of the Coca-Cola 600 on Sunday.
Prior to this weekend, the race has only taken place on Friday. Walter is confident many dirt-racing fans, which he praised for traveling well, will be more inclined to stick around for Sunday's race after the scheduling change.
The speedway also converted a bar into a beach-themed food and drink area called "Pit Stop Pier," complete with sand and beach chairs with a view of the race and has added a Ferris wheel with a view over the speedway on the Turn 4 sun deck.
Skyrocketing hotel rates have been a constant complaint this season at NASCAR race sites across the country. Driver Clint Bowyer took to Twitter in April to criticize hotels in the Bristol, Tennessee, area for significantly raising rates for race weekends.
Mike Boykin, CEO of Bespoke Sports & Entertainment, told the Charlotte Business Journal it is "criminal" for hotels to double or triple their rates for race weekends. But, he added, it's something out of the control of the track, and it's "highly likely" many race attendees will make the event a day trip to avoid high hotel costs.
Those types of expenses could cause fans to stay home and watch. Despite falling television ratings for races over the years, Walter said television is one of his biggest competitors because fans enjoy watching a strong product.
In fiscal year 2018, admissions revenues were down 9.9% from 2017 and 22.3% from 2014 for Speedway Motorsports, which owns eight major racing facilities, including Charlotte Motor Speedway. As admissions revenues have dropped, so has the seating capacity at the track. Charlotte Motor Speedway currently seats 79,000, which is down from a capacity of 156,000 in 2008.
According to the Sports Business Journal, the 2018 Coca-Cola 600 averaged 4.09 million viewers on television, a new low for the marquee Memorial Day weekend race. The number was down 11.9% from 2017, which had the previous low average of 4.64 million viewers, and was down 28.6% from the 2016 race.
However, the NASCAR ratings drop has slowed significantly in 2019. Through the first nine races in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series, the viewership total was 31.11 million. The 2018 total through the nine-race mark was 31.28 million, a decline of less than 1%.
Boykin said this year's Coca-Cola 600 got a "shot in the arm" during last weekend's All-Star Race when a post-race fight broke out between Bowyer and Ryan Newman, and when drivers raced four-wide. That type of drama and presence of characters will help drive higher viewership and ticket sales for a sport that has lost momentum in recent years, Boykin said.
Charlotte Motor Speedway will hope that Boykin is correct.
By all indications, getting fans to show up in droves for a race has been an uphill battle recently. But Walter and his team are trying to make positive changes to improve fan experience, and he said he has "never been more bullish" about what is going on at the speedway.