Marketing Whiz enhances community engagement at Texas Motor Speedway

For Katie Douglas, sports have always been part of her professional life.

“My time at the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce was actually an outlier in my career,” she said. Douglas served as vice president of marketing for the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce for three and a half years.

Sports also played a big role in her work at the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce.

“Fort Worth has become a big sports town, or maybe I should say bigger,” she says.

Mr. Douglas, 45, a San Antonio native, started his own agency, Douglas SPLY, last year to provide marketing and support services to companies in need of outside counsel.

She recently acquired a major customer: Texas Motor Speedway.

The company has hired a consulting firm to enhance its overall marketing and community efforts in Fort Worth and the surrounding area.

Douglas will work with Mark Faber, vice president and general manager of Texas Motor Speedway, as the speedway motorsports facility celebrates its 28th anniversary.

“Katie is a long-time supporter of Texas Motor Speedway and was instrumental in developing a strategic plan with the TMS team during her recent role with the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce,” Faber said.

Faber, who took over as general manager in August 2022, has made community support a key focus for the speedway. He worked with Mr. Douglas and Visit Fort Worth, who were at the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce at the time, on some of the initial steps to integrate the community. One of his early steps was to remove “Texas, No Limits” signs around the truck that had made some city officials uncomfortable. The “Fort Worth, Texas” sign had been replaced with a sign on the course, making the city less visible during race coverage.

“It's an honor that Mark did it because it wasn't easy and it wasn't cheap,” Douglas said. “But it meant a lot.”

Now she's ready to do something more.

“The progress we have made since Mark joined has been incredible, but there is still so much work to do and so many opportunities,” she said.

Douglas knows it's also important to the economic development of Fort Worth and North Texas. According to a 2009 City of Fort Worth report, Texas Motor Speedway has an economic impact on the region comparable to hosting the Super Bowl every year.

“It is important to reintegrate the speedway into the community because it is a great asset and economic engine for Fort Worth and North Texas,” she said.

Douglas got off to a fast start by consulting with Texas Motor Speedway for his next big race, the 2024 AutoTrader Echo Park Automotive 400, which will be held April 12-14.

The race shows community involvement by having the Fort Worth-based Texas Boys Choir sing the national anthem just before waving the green flag and starting the race.

“That's a great message,” Douglas said.

Douglas also organized another new event to help support the community. Texas Motor Speedway will host the 2024 Supermotocross World Championship Playoff Round in September.

“This is a great addition and will bring a new fan base to the speedway,” Douglas said. “I think it’s going to really increase the excitement.”

She works with Speedway stakeholders to ensure that community support and involvement continues to grow.

“We're going to be asking, 'What is the audience for communities that the speedway hasn't really connected with or had touchpoints with historically?'” How do you include them? Do you have it? ” she said. “Because there's no substitute for that first-hand experience.”

Further events like the HWY30 Music Fest scheduled for October this year are also on her radar.

“We're going to look at ways to have more of these festivals and get the promoters excited and have more community events there,” she said.

It will change the community's thinking about what a speedway is, she said.

“There are so many events going on here that it’s actually open 365 days a year, but a lot of people don’t realize that,” she said. “It's a perception change that takes time.”

Mr. Douglas’ athletic experience includes serving as Executive Senior Associate Athletic Director of External Affairs for the University of Texas at San Antonio Athletics from 2018 to 2020. She was also a founding member of the NFL Players Association's The Trust Program. The program helps NFL veterans prepare for life after football and works with former players to help them navigate their struggles.

She also served as director of player engagement for the Kansas City Chiefs from 2003 to 2008 and event manager for the New England Patriots.

Douglas said he was with the Patriots for several Super Bowl years. Coach Bill Belichick will be assigning players the types of hotel rooms available to them and their families during the Super Bowl, which she said is about 800 people.

“He did that so that when someone complained, he could say, 'Talk to the coach,' and they never did that,” she said. Told. “It was a great way to manage the team, manage the expectations and manage what I have to do so that I can be successful, and ultimately eliminate as many distractions for the players as possible. It helped me do that.”

It taught Douglas a lot about management.

“He was willing to spend time on such small things, right? It was the player room assignments. It turns out that it doesn't matter,” she said.

Douglas is excited about the new business and working with interesting clients ranging from Navy SEALs to breweries.

“We can talk about everything from 50 hours of intense physical training and sleepless mental training to beer, community engagement and highways,” she said. . “I love being able to participate and contribute to all these different conversations and then realize that the goal is to drive and have an impact. I love it because it brings variety to the day. I am.”

Bob Francis is the Fort Worth Report's business editor. Please contact [email protected]. At The Fort Worth Report, news decisions are made independent of board members and financial supporters.Read more about our editorial independence policy here.

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