The Art of Wrapping Your Car

On occasion Skirts and Scuffs allows guests to write posts that will be published to the site. Today we share a post from Kristina Zelisko about car wraps.

NASCAR drivers are among the biggest and the best when it comes to the world of advertising. Take top driver Kyle Busch as a perfect example. There is absolutely no mistaking who the sponsors behind number 18 car are. That advertising is key in letting the drivers support and recognize their backers as well as giving the sponsors the ability to have their name and their brand right out front and center in the public eye.

Not too far back in the past those cars were actually painted with sponsor advertising and given the nature of the sport of racing, they had to be re-painted and touched up on a pretty regular basis. Needless to say, it was a labor intensive practice. The advent of new technology and a high quality vinyl product by 3M changed that practice in a relatively short time. Motorsports Designs had one driver signed up for the new car decal program in 1982, and, by 1984, they had all but one of the cup drivers signed on as clients. It’s been a booming business ever since. In just one racing season a team can require several hundred RaceWraps.

The advertising in the race world will always be extremely prominent and the invention of the RaceWraps means that the down time required to change a car’s color scheme or sponsorship has been slashed. A good application team can have a car wrapped and ready to roll in just a few hours in comparison to the days needed to cut out and paint the cars by hand.

Essentially, the car wraps are like the “skins” bought to decorate cell phones or laptops. They can be changed, applied or removed all together with little effort which makes them very user friendly. In fact, they’re so easy and accessible that they’ve expanded from the race world and moved on to the vehicles of everyday drivers. Decals have always been very popular with car owners- professional or otherwise- and the creation of products like decal packages ensure that this popularity will continue far into the future.

Check out some of Kyle Busch’s different RaceWraps: