This year Mars is rolling out what likely is its largest launch ever for a new kind of M&M’s with M&M’s Caramel, and the company will support the roll-out with a major push in NASCAR, and M&M’s will start selling the Caramel product in May. Part of that roll out will be in NASCAR, where the M&M’s Caramel brand will run as the primary paint scheme of Kyle Busch’s #18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota for a third of the season’s 36 races.
Due to the spring release of the candy, M&M’s will hold off on running its first Caramel paint scheme until the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series All-Star Race in Charlotte. M&M’s will support the launch with TV, digital, social and in-store activation, as well as shoot a digital content series with Busch about “unsquaring” caramel. Additionally, M&M’s is looking at having at-track activation on midway fanzones, and will have a non-Caramel display to start the season at the Daytona 500.
The other brands Mars will run paint schemes around this year are original M&M’s, Skittles, Pedigree Dog Food and Banfield Pet Hospital, plus special red, white and blue and Halloween paint schemes around the Fourth of July and Halloween, respectively.
Mars, which sponsors around 30 races a year with JGR in a deal worth eight figures annually and has been involved in NASCAR for more than 25 years, renewed its official deal with the sanctioning body last year through 2019.
TIL NEXT TIME, I AM STILL WORKING ON MY REDNECK!
