When JEGS transitioned from a family-owned firm to an funding group controlling the reins in 2021, the aftermarket high-performance auto components firm’s involvement within the NHRA Professional Inventory Class grew to become much less prevalent, however that’s altering in 2026 on account of a brand new advertising strategy.
“The brand new group at JEGS is studying one thing new just about each quarter,” mentioned Troy Coughlin Jr., who writes net content material and assists with JEGS digital advertising group. “They’re seeing the way it (drag racing) impacts our firm and our buyer. ’26 goes to be a very, actually enjoyable yr and it’s going to open the eyes of our new group, educate them a few market that they’re aggressively studying.”
Coughlin mentioned that when the present JEGS CEO attended his first race final yr he was baffled as a result of he noticed JEGS stickers on a number of vehicles. It was defined to him that they had been JEGS clients.
“They simply didn’t know (how every part labored). It was a really new firm to them.” Coughlin mentioned.
Coughlin admitted that when the brand new house owners took over the corporate that his grandfather based in 1960 he was initially shy and reluctant to offer a lot suggestions. That’s not the case now.
“I normally sit with them as soon as 1 / 4, our CEO and their head of selling and ask them, ‘Hey, right here’s our sponsorship, right here’s what number of viewers on Fox, and their social accounts from NHRA decks and issues,” Coughlin mentioned.
This yr, Coughlin drives a black, trimmed in yellow JEGS-sponsored Professional Inventory automobile for Elite Motorsports within the Mission Meals NHRA Drag Racing Collection. His uncle, Jeg Coughlin Jr. returned to full-time Professional Inventory competitors in 2024, driving Elite Motorsports’ entry sponsored by SCAG Energy Tools.
Troy informed the corporate leaders that in the event that they needed to extend gross sales, they wanted to place his uncle Jeg Coughlin Jr. again in a Professional Inventory automobile with JEGS on the aspect of it. They listened and subsequent yr Jeg returns to the acquainted yellow and black trimmed Professional Inventory automobile.
The truth is, JEGS would be the main sponsor for Professional Inventory vehicles fielded by Elite Motorsports for Jeg and Troy.
Troy says the return of the yellow JEGS automobile trimmed in black means “normalcy.”
“I grew up round two JEGS Professional Inventory Automobiles majority of my life earlier than my dad stepped away from Professional Inventory,” Troy mentioned.
Jeg walked away from full-time competitors within the sport as a result of he had raced Professional Inventory for greater than 20 years and he needed a special kind of normalcy, particularly along with his household. Nevertheless, in the summertime of 2023 his 8-year-old daughter informed him she missed him racing Professional Inventory. His spouse additionally inspired him to return if he had the chance. That chance got here when Elite Motorsports proprietor Richard Freeman known as Jeg and requested him to check Erica Enders’ automobile within the season’s remaining two occasions with SCAG sponsorship.
When Jeg returned to full-time competitors in 2024 within the SCAG colours, he really walked to Troy’s automobile as an alternative and tried to get into it as a result of it had JEGS on it. He mentioned the transition to the automobile with the SCAGS paint scheme “was an enormous transition for me mentally.” He mentioned quite a few followers have even informed him it appears unusual to not see him within the yellow and black JEGS Professional Inventory automobile.
Jeg agreed along with his nephew that returning to a JEGS-sponsored automobile in 2026 is a return to “normalcy.”
“We grew up with the race monitor, so we had been organically doing a lot of this work ourselves week-in and week-out,” Jeg mentioned. “So, there was in all probability a small void that introduced itself after the transition. I feel our alliance coming along with a two-car punch … will carry some normalcy again to … the corporate aspect.”
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