Biffle to Bring Ortho Back to NASCAR Full-Time in 2015

Roush Fenway Racing has announced that Ortho and its complete line of home, lawn and garden pest control products will serve as the anchor partner on the #16 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) entry driven by two-time NASCAR Champion Greg Biffle in a multi-year deal.

Biffle and Roush Fenway lost the primary sponsor, 3M, to Jeff Gordon earlier this summer.

“I can’t tell you how excited I am to have Ortho on the car for 2015 and these upcoming races," Biffle said. "It’s gonna be really exciting at Atlanta.  I got to go by the shop and see the car the other day and they wouldn’t let me take a picture of it, so they said I can’t unveil it yet, but that was a lot of fun to see what the car is gonna look like in Atlanta.  I’m just really excited to be aligned.  I’ve been very lucky throughout my career to be aligned with great companies and not a lot of them, and I’m really excited to be going forward with Ortho on the car and to see some of the fun things we’re gonna be doing together in promoting the brand and, obviously, promoting the fire ant in Atlanta is really exciting too.”

Ortho had been a long-time sponsor of Carl Edwards in another RFR car, and was on the car when Edwards won his first race at Atlanta in 2005.

“We have a great history and have had a lot of success with Roush Fenway Racing," said Mike Sutterer, Vice President, Ortho, Regional Marketing.  "We’ve been to victory lane a dozen times and had a championship and we’re really excited about our new partnership with the Ortho brand and Greg and the outstanding No. 16 team.  The Ortho brand and the Roush Fenway Racing brand is really a natural fit together.  There are a lot of synergies.  We both try to be number one every day in everything we do, whether it’s the No. 16 race team working hard at the track every weekend to win, or whether it’s the Ortho brand working hard in fans homes and yards to keep insects away every day.  So we know NASCAR fans are incredibly passionate and loyal to drivers and teams and their business partners and we’re just excited to be part of that.  We know the Ortho brand is already in millions of fans’ homes and we’re looking to keep those fans, but with our partnership with Greg and the No. 16 team, we’re looking to add some new Ortho fans as well in 2015.”

Steve Newmark, the president of RFR, said he was glad to have Ortho back in the fold.

“I do want to express our sincere appreciation to Mike and the entire Scotts Miracle Gro and Ortho organizations for putting their faith in us to come back into this sport in a very, very big way.  I think everyone in here is familiar with some of the iconic brands that are under their umbrella and we’re extremely excited about a lot of the fun and creative stuff that we can do with this partnership.  I think probably example one is how often do you get to carry and eight-foot ant around and not have people throw you out of places, and I think you’ll see more creativity when we go out and unveil the paint scheme."

Newmark said the announcement of Ortho was part of the strategic vision for the company.

"We’ve been talking over the last few months at Roush Fenway a lot about our strategic vision and about getting back to our roots and being true to our DNA, which is truly rooted in driver development and Greg is obviously a product of that and now really the leader and mentor of our driver stable.  We’ve reunited with Mark Martin and this is kind of the next in a litany of those actions that are helping fulfill that vision, which is getting back together with Scotts and Ortho.  They have been an integral part of our history and obviously have had a lot of success and I think everyone in here is familiar that NASCAR is a superstitious lot and I think we were looking at the stats and 12 percent of the time that Scotts/Ortho has been on the car we’ve been in victory lane, so we’re hoping to continue that trend and start it off well at Atlanta.  We do appreciate and we’re really excited about some of the fun stuff we’ll do with this marketing platform.”

Ortho/Scotts