Josh Bilicki has been no stranger to the NASCAR Xfinity or Cup series throughout the years.
While his background is in road course racing, he had never had his moment to shine in the spotlight and show off his skills on those track types until this year with Joe Gibbs Racing.
Ahead of the race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL, Bilicki sat down with Frontstretch before taking to the track for JGR, an opportunity that meant so much and he worked hard to get. He details his process of also getting his own sponsors and the challenges that come with it.
Trenton Worsham, Frontstretch: How did the opportunity to race with JGR come about for Charlotte at the ROVAL?
Josh Bilicki: I ran with them [JGR] in Portland this season, but this one had talks starting last year. I had a sponsor that we were racing at Cup part time, and it was a relatively big sponsor. We had reached out to several different teams. Gibbs was kind of at the top of that list, and, to our surprise, they came back and said, ‘Yeah, we were interested in talking about numerous races for next year.’
Worsham: Do you feel getting an opportunity like this for a driver like yourself is a great way to showcase your skillset and what you can do as a driver?
Bilicki: Yeah, I do. I think a lot of the garage probably knows I favor the road courses though. I do quite well in them, you know.
Most of all my starts other than these two races have been with smaller teams, and we’ve had some decent success with some of the smaller teams but never been able to fight for the win. It can open more eyes and opportunities running well, even though it’s still an oval series. Doing well on one of those would probably open more doors and opportunities.
Worsham: Sponsorship is what I wanted to discuss with you. What is that process like going after these deals as a driver because many don’t do that or know what all of that may entail?
Bilicki: Some weekends, I’m on the sim more throughout the week or at the shop, focusing on being a driver. Other weekends I’m at my house in Wisconsin, away from the industry, 50-60 hours a week making calls and on my computer doing cold calls, sending out proposals and whatever I need to do to make sure the sponsors I have now are happy. Around 95% of sponsors in my 200 NASCAR starts I would say are from my own hard work.
Worsham: There are a ton of companies out there, some even regionally based to where you may be racing, such as in Portland, looking for an Oregon-based company, how do you find these partners with how many are out there?
Bilicki: Never be afraid to ask. Some are just luck. … [Insurance] King was just a random Facebook message, and I saw them, I saw their ads all over Facebook. In 2019, I was racing in Chicago, and we didn’t have a sponsor for the Xfinity race, and I saw their ads all over Facebook.
I knew they were local to that racetrack. I just shot them a Facebook message, and they came back and they were interested. Honestly, that was the start of something massive now.
They’ve done five to six years, 50-plus races, but they were on my car that weekend for the [Craftsman] Truck Series race, the Xfinity race and the Cup race. I did triple duty that weekend. That just started from a Facebook message, and I got my first NASCAR start with a Facebook message too in 2016.
Worsham: You said you can put 50-60 hours in a week making these calls. I know there is a good bit who give a rejection. This is your livelihood. How do you handle the mental aspect of getting potentially lots of rejections?
Bilicki: I’d say more than that, I’d say for every 100 pitches you make, you’re gonna get maybe one or two messages back and most of those are gonna be a no, unfortunately. There are times where I just feel defeated and I’ve worked all week, I’ve worked two weeks, three weeks and I haven’t gotten anything new. That’s tough.
You just have to keep working, and then you get that one yes. This year, for example, a new sponsor of mine, Rita’s Italian Ice. They’ve been on my car four times this year, and I found them at Pocono. You get that one yes and form a new partnership and the hard work is all worth it.
