Start Your Engines Ricky Dennis was born into the sport of auto racing, and now he's making money doing what he loves.
By Jake Kilroy
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
What: Indoor arena racing licensing
Who: Ricky Dennis of Arena Racing LLC
Where: Mechanicsville, Virginia
When: Started in 2002
Startup Costs: $500,000
Ricky Dennis was born into the sport of auto racing, and now he's making money doing what he loves. The son of a racer, Dennis went to his first hockey game in the early '90s, and he says all he could picture was "a race car running around a racetrack in the arena with all those people sitting there looking at it. Like a million other race fans, I was wishing we had something to watch in the winter, because there's almost no racing [then]."
In 1993, Dennis built a wooden indoor track and 52 cars with no suspension, but it wasn't until friends--including Washington Redskins head coach Joe Gibbs--invested in the idea that Dennis was able to officially start the company in 2002.
After a city purchases a license with Arena Racing, the company builds 56 cars and a high-bank indoor track. The city, meanwhile, sells slots to locals. Each slot includes a car and a spot on the track. So far, the company has opened arenas in Charlotte, North Carolina, and Hampton, Virginia--the first arenas to boast indoor stock car racing leagues. This fall, Grand Rapids, Michigan, is opening its indoor racing arena, selling slots for $12,500.
After building stock cars for 19 years, Dennis now prides himself on creating hometown heroes. "They all tell their friends, their family, their co-workers and their neighbors, 'Everybody, come watch me race,'" says Dennis, 48. "And with 56 teams and five crew members on each team, you've got 250 or 300 people [spreading the word]. That's a guerrilla marketing force."
Having earned 2007 sales of about $1.2 million, Dennis is looking to open arena racing in three to five new cities this year.
