Team Dilusi launches NZ's first multi-discipline motorsport lineup and invites businesses along for the ride

The official launch of New Zealand's first multi-disciplinary motorsport contingent, Team Dilusi, presents a unique marketing opportunity for businesses to become part of the country’s competitive motorsport scene.

The team is the first in New Zealand motorsport history to operate across four competitive disciplines - Rallying, Speedway, Drifting and Karting - offering corporate sponsors four times the exposure for their brands across the entire calendar year.

Speaking today at the team’s official launch event at Western Springs Stadium, Team Dilusi Director, Kingsley Thompson, said, “As New Zealand’s only motorsport team scheduled to compete across four popular racing categories, we are promising motorsport fans a new, combative and highly visible competitor. At the same time we are offering sponsors an innovative and highly visible marketing solution.

“ We are about to embark on an exciting ride for the 2012/13 season, that will take us throughout the country, and we want like minded companies to join us for every exciting twist and turn.”

Popular internationally for offering higher TV exposure than other sports, motorsport sponsorship is also favoured for targeting audiences that can be difficult to reach said Mr Thompson.

Team Dilusi is offering corporate sponsors a variety of options through Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum packages, as well as a main Naming Rights opportunity. The packages include branding of the team cars and drivers, as well as its highly visible brand ambassadors, known as the ‘Dilusi Girls’.

“The Team Dilusi marketing management package provides everything a sponsor wanting value for money requires, including presence at up to 25 racing events around the country and high visibility through television, radio, print and social media coverage,” said Mr Thompson.

Mr Thompson said that the Team Dilusi initiative was being spurred by his passion for motorsport. “I see innovative, progressive and effective sponsorship opportunities as the key drivers for the growth of motorsport in New Zealand.

“The team concept we are offering represents a unique Kiwi approach, by allowing companies to sponsor anything from a sticker on a mud flap to full naming rights. It also means companies of all sizes have the chance to play a dynamic, competitive and ongoing role in New Zealand motorsport throughout the year,” said Mr Thompson.

Chairman of Rally New Zealand, Peter (PJ) Johnston, welcomed the entry of Team Dilusi onto the country’s motorsport scene, describing it as the kind of initiative needed to attract the involvement of more sponsors who represent the lifeblood of the sport.

“Team Dilusi’s innovative marketing approach is a real shot in the arm for motorsport in New Zealand,” said Mr Johnston. “It will get more top quality drivers involved across the racing disciplines and this in turn will whet the appetite of sponsors who need, more than ever, to show a good return on their investment in motorsport,” said Mr Johnston.

Director of Drifting New Zealand (D1NZ), Brendon White, described Team Dilusi as a ‘great concept that is sure to raise the professionalism of motorsport marketing in New Zealand’.

“We have long needed an affordable new way of bringing more people into all forms of motorsport, both as participants and sponsors,” he said. “Team Dilusi represents an imaginative and gutsy Kiwi approach and I have no doubt that it will help change the rules of the game to the benefit of all involved in New Zealand motorsport.”

The Team Dilusi drifting driver is Curt Whittaker, the current Australasian champion and the leader in this year’s D1NZ national championship.

An active participant in New Zealand motorsport for 25 years, Kingsley Thompson has enjoyed a successful history racing motocross, including winning the Junior National Championship at the age of 15. His return to competitive racing just four years ago, followed a successful career operating his own helicopter business, Bay of Islands based ‘Heliops’. “My plan always was for the helicopter business to fund my dream of racing in the New Zealand Rally Championships,” he said.

In 2009, he built and began driving New Zealand’s first Mitsubishi Evolution X rally car ‘Lucy’. In just three years he has shown remarkable development, placing third in the Production World Rally Championship in 2010 and last year gained consistent top five placings in the New Zealand Rally Championship.

Having achieved his rallying ambition, Mr Thompson’s experience as a business owner and racing driver led him to realise that there was an opportunity for something much bigger. And so Team Dilusi was born.

“I had always heard organisers and drivers at motorsport events speaking of the frustration of gaining sponsorship, and as a driver myself I could relate. However, being a businessman too, I could see why so many companies felt motorsport did not offer them the marketing solution they required.

“With Team Dilusi, we have created something different in that it is a fully managed marketing opportunity - mobile billboards in the form of cars and people competing at high attendance, televised events throughout the country each week - representing real tangible benefits and ROI to sponsors.”

Team Dilusi sponsors are promised exposure at up to 25 race events, as well as TV, radio, print, website and social media coverage for their brands. Sponsorship costs range from $250 per month for the Bronze package to $19,000 per month for full naming rights.

Mr Thompson chose the team name Dilusi as an acronym for the popular motorsport expression ‘Drive It Like U Stole It’. He says the term is a motivational one that keeps him and the other drivers inspired to always perform at their best.

“I believe Team Dilusi is a game changer in the industry. We are out to win and create an iconic brand that changes the face of New Zealand motorsport.”

As a means of giving back to the motorsport community, Team Dilusi is also offering a karting scholarship to a talented young driver aged between 15 and 20, to race in its new 125cc Rotax Max Light during the upcoming season.

“Most professional drivers cut their teeth on karting before moving on to the bigger racing disciplines and all the big name New Zealand racing drivers started in karts,” said Mr Thompson.