Bobby reports that this may be the last year. I'm afraid this is going to be only the start of bad news for next year. Been thinking about teams who have corporate sponsorships that are going to be affected by continuing miserable economy for a while. . . beer, tobacco, energy drinks, very expensive professional tools - who knows. Any thoughts?

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"The Counterfeiter"

I don't know about the other things you mentioned but when it comes to professional tools , Snap-on seems to be getting more affordable . Was looking at getting another tool the other day and im sure it was cheaper then it used to be .

Ya know what bothers me? In my current job I travel a lot - upwards of 200 or more days out of every year, so I spend a lot of time at airports and on the roads of this great nation. I keep seeing on the news and reading in the paper about what a shambles our economy is in, and frankly, I don't disagree. That said, the airports are still filled to capacity - they're like zoos in most cases! The highways are just as bad. So my question is this, if the economy is so bad off, where are people getting all the money to fill their tanks and pay for airfare? If I go too much further, this thread will end up in the politics section, so I'll stop there.

Bottom line: Something will replace Skoal and the show will go on.

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Gordon 'Flaps' Carlon
Work the solution, not the problem.

Hopefully the "sin stocks" will maintain their support of the sport. If they decide to bail with their sponsorships, it appears it wont be be due a lagging economy.
They look to be one industry that is weathering the storm.
Alcohol, Tobacco Products Remain Popular in Tough Times

Great points Gordon.
Just go to a decent restaurant on the weekend, you have to wait 45 minutes to be seated
and the high end electronic stores check-out lines are as long as they were 10 years ago.

I'll agree even further. Last month I went on a 10 day road trip with my kids out east to New York, DC, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, and Niagara Falls. Within the first couple hours of driving, my son had seen a few cars with out of state license plates. He decided to write down all the different states seen during the road trip. We had 31 in the first day driving from Minneapolis to NE Indiana. By the end of the trip, we had seen plates from 45 states and 4 Canadian provinces. For the higher fuel prices we're seeing, it hasn't seemed to affect much the folks taking long drives, me included. Goin' to Indy next week, Dallas 3 weeks after that, and Vegas in October, I'm doing my part to stimulate the economy.

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"I never said most of the things I said."

Yea I dont know about that forecast. I think there are way too many 'addicted' people in this country that the alcohol and tobacco companys will be alright. Energy drinks and expensive tools maybe not so much.

From a personal point of view. I havent stopped buying beer or cigarettes with the economy the way it is. Nor do I really plan it. Those are the only two things I do that are "bad" and we all need our rebellion.

As for expensive tools. I have never gotten into the "expensive" tools. I will stick with my craftsman and harbor freight. Sure the expensive ones sound better and are a little tighter toleranced but unless your working on an aircraft, who cares. Plus if a cheap harbor freight tool breaks. Its cheap to replace. If a craftsman break, its free to replace.

Now my opinion on energy drinks. I used to buy a Monster or two or three every couple of days but I havent had one in about 3-4 months. I have had a stock pile of FREE Full Throttle from the Norwalk event. For those who werent there. It was possible to get a few cases worth of Full Throttle for free. They were giving it away at the gates at the end of the day each day. So after a few trips back and forth to the car, me and the fiancee ended up with about 6 flats worth. We started with carry as much as we could in our arms. Then filled up a grociery bag that I found in the car. Then said hell with it and took a few of the cardboard flats the drinks used to be in before they got dumped into the big coolers and filled them back up. You could take all the full throttle you wanted but dont dare try to take a bad of their ice haha

AWESOME...AWESOME...AWESOME... ....?

BUDWEISER...TECHNICOAT...(cool Kats!!!!!!!

You are wrong pal...NOBODY wants to join in...It Is Now Unfashionable to join -in..............With all respect....got it???????????????

Huh?

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Gordon 'Flaps' Carlon
Work the solution, not the problem.

I agree, Gordon.............I think.

Kevin............WTF??? What exactly are you getting at?

Sean D

Masterchief...

I too was W.T.F.O. on Kevin's post

But lets see, I'm Skoal... why the heck would I put up money for a specialty race for a class I don't even have a car running in? 100K, plus payouts each race?

Same thing with The Cowboys and the pipe rack deal... but all they got outta the deal was.... hummmmm....

I Know, The PRO NITRO Funny Car Shootout...

d'kid

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Comfortably Numb- Fly Navy, Build SEABEES
A friend helps you move, A Real Friend helps you Move Bodies
http://www.myspace.com/ocir_forever

I did a trip last week of flying into Florida, driving up to Washington D.C. and then flying back (through Chicago, where I got to meet Zappy!).

Navarre is a tourist town and usually packed to the gills on the weekends and it wasn't as bad this time around. We went to our favorite restaraunt and didn't have to wait, at all, which is unusual with all the tourists.

We went to Hard Rock Cafe in D.C. and usually at the Hard Rocks we have to wait but this time we got seated and served immediately.

I think things are a little shaky in some businesses but a lot of it is perception and our darling news media.

I went to the dump today and they have a recycling center so I dropped off a computer monitor and saw all these TVs, some big screens. I said to the guy how many TV's do you guys get per day? He said last weekend alone they got 145 TVs. I said how many still work? And he said about 50 percent.

So yeah, I don't see any soup lines yet although we are all inconvienienced by high prices at the pump.

Don't mean to be picky, but it's U.S. Smokeless.

Makes you think this little piece was just an advertisement!

NHRA News: Video: CNBC on NHRA: 'Attractive' and 'affordable' buy (7/10/2008)

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Shift for Brains!!!!