Going where work is has Wypall reaping rewards

Every Sprint Cup Series race has a bevy of award winners that have nothing to do with who crossed the finish line first. They're usually in the official results.

One of those programs, the Wypall Wipers Crew Chief of the Race Award, is really "cleaning up" for Wypall Wipers, a product manufactured by Kimberly-Clark Professional.

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The Wypall Wipers Crew Chief of the Race program is a season-long contest to determine the best crew chiefs in the Sprint Cup garage. After each race, a panel votes to determine which crew chief exhibited the most outstanding strategy and leadership.

The panel, which includes former crew chief and SPEED/FOX television analyst Jeff Hammond and current crew chiefs Todd Berrier, Bob Osborne and Kenny Francis, makes its decision and the winner is awarded $1,000. The winner of the season-long competition earns $20,000 at the season-ending Ford 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

Now, the Wypall brand isn't giving money to the crew chiefs just because they're good guys. They're doing it to increase brand awareness, just like every other sponsor in NASCAR.

"We've been doing our NASCAR program for four years, our Wypall Wipers Crew Chief program, and we started it for very similar reasons that a lot of companies do -- to increase our brand awareness," said Tom Merrill, Wypall Wipers category manager for Kimberly-Clark Professional. "We did a lot of research around our brand and what were some things we could do to increase our brand awareness. Our Wypall Wipers products are disposable rag and shop towel replacement products that are used in manufacturing by, most consistently, a lot of blue-collar workers. We wanted to find an image via a marketing program that matched that target customer and really connected with them."

"That's how we came up with the idea to get involved with the crew chiefs. They are the guys behind the scenes that do the hard work, and a lot more of them are getting credit on the national scene. We like to think a lot of that is due to the program we put in place."

Being behind the crew chiefs, who get less glory than the drivers who pilot the cars they build and service, fits the Wypall brand philosophy, which is to go where the work is being done.

"We believe that benefit [of being where the work is done] has really been able to drive through the Wypall brand name with that blue-collar customer," Merrill said. "We've done a lot of activities, sampling and advertising over the past few years to get people familiar with the brand. We've definitely seen a lift in excitement in the program and the products. We've had lots of people come back to the races that use our wipers at work, and for them to see what we are doing with the crew chiefs makes them proud to use our wipers." (Continued)