Ecclestone interview
Discussion
Red Bull/Toro Rosso have no need to be in the sport. They don't have cars to sell. It is a marketing exercise to them, pure and simple. As they are an extraordinary efficient company in the way they present their product in the market place, I would imagine they analyse every facet of their expenditure, marketing and performance in the sport almost by the minute. If it is no longer viable, they will quit.
Having the 'boss' of F1 basically saying a fair proportion of the demographic they mostly market their product to is redundant as far as F1 is concerned, would probably not be the best thing for the long term viability of the sport at time when the grid is looking sparse to say the least and might well get much worse in the close season. It also seems a strange thing to do when Red Bull/Toro Rosso seem happy to tow the party line on most occasions and have already intimated that they will run three cars if needs be.
So to sum up:
The grid right now is 20 cars.
If Lotus, Force India and Sauber walk/fold its 14 cars.
If Toro Rosso/Red Bull build three cars its 16 cars. (if McLaren & Ferrari do too its 18 cars.)
If Toro Rosso/Red Bull get bored and drift off the grid is 10 cars. (12 cars.)
Is 10 (12) cars really the pinnacle of world motorsport? That's Red Bull/Toro Rosso are so important to the sport right now like it or not.
Going back from that, lets take as an example Rolex. As you can see Rolex (and IWC or Hugo Boss come to that.) don't actually build chassis. As far as I know Rolex are only a trackside sponsor and the money from the company that organises that goes straight in the pocket of one man. If it didn't maybe they might have enough funding to consider actually putting a sticker on a car. And how long have they been in sport after having replaced TAG-Heuer and the other one (Seiko? Tissot? TW Steel? forgotten them already such was the impact they had on the sport.) as official time-keeper? How long will they stay?
The sport is in very bad shape right now. It needs to keep as many sponsors and manufacturers on board as it possibly can because you need tocompare the size of the companies who sponsoring the actually car to what they were a few years ago.
Therefore an 84 year old man saying that the sport doesn't need any young fans and shouldn't use the tools to market to them, that is nonsense.
I've said it before and I will say it again. If you were the CEO of either a major motor manufacturer or a possible corporation that might sponsor a team would you be talking to an 84 year old man who is making statements that almost suggest he is losing the plot and is looking increasingly isolated about multi-million dollar deals?
Until he goes the sport is in massive difficulties and that's the bottom line.
Having the 'boss' of F1 basically saying a fair proportion of the demographic they mostly market their product to is redundant as far as F1 is concerned, would probably not be the best thing for the long term viability of the sport at time when the grid is looking sparse to say the least and might well get much worse in the close season. It also seems a strange thing to do when Red Bull/Toro Rosso seem happy to tow the party line on most occasions and have already intimated that they will run three cars if needs be.
So to sum up:
The grid right now is 20 cars.
If Lotus, Force India and Sauber walk/fold its 14 cars.
If Toro Rosso/Red Bull build three cars its 16 cars. (if McLaren & Ferrari do too its 18 cars.)
If Toro Rosso/Red Bull get bored and drift off the grid is 10 cars. (12 cars.)
Is 10 (12) cars really the pinnacle of world motorsport? That's Red Bull/Toro Rosso are so important to the sport right now like it or not.
Going back from that, lets take as an example Rolex. As you can see Rolex (and IWC or Hugo Boss come to that.) don't actually build chassis. As far as I know Rolex are only a trackside sponsor and the money from the company that organises that goes straight in the pocket of one man. If it didn't maybe they might have enough funding to consider actually putting a sticker on a car. And how long have they been in sport after having replaced TAG-Heuer and the other one (Seiko? Tissot? TW Steel? forgotten them already such was the impact they had on the sport.) as official time-keeper? How long will they stay?
The sport is in very bad shape right now. It needs to keep as many sponsors and manufacturers on board as it possibly can because you need tocompare the size of the companies who sponsoring the actually car to what they were a few years ago.
Therefore an 84 year old man saying that the sport doesn't need any young fans and shouldn't use the tools to market to them, that is nonsense.
I've said it before and I will say it again. If you were the CEO of either a major motor manufacturer or a possible corporation that might sponsor a team would you be talking to an 84 year old man who is making statements that almost suggest he is losing the plot and is looking increasingly isolated about multi-million dollar deals?
Until he goes the sport is in massive difficulties and that's the bottom line.
PW said:
F1 wasn't targeting that demographic when Red Bull started as a title sponsor for Sauber 19 years ago, yet it has massively increased its investment in the sport without any indication or promise that the sport would change its focus, so you would think it probably wasn't of great concern, but like I said, it is suddenly presumed to be an issue simply because it has now been brought up.
It's clear from looking at the paddock each team has its own "personality", its own set of sponsors; they don't have to mirror what F1/FOM does as a business, appealing to the same markets and people etc, so why should F1/FOM have to mirror the teams?
How could they anyway? There are 9 teams each with dozens of sponsors all targeting different audiences and demographics - why pick one at random that F1 MUST focus on now? What about the others?
F1 targets youth because of Red Bull, Monster, Burn and Rexona - then they're saying to Mercedes, IWC, Hugo Boss they don't matter to F1. Yet one of the teams that is relying on to carry the sport forward, especially if they have to go to three cars, only exists because of those brands which is particularly popular with which demographic of consumer?
Nonsense.
I completely agree. BCE could have been more diplomatic and said the stakeholders in the sport have just as much responsibility but instead as ambassador to the sport he rubbished 'young people' (whatever age group you wish to define). It's clear from looking at the paddock each team has its own "personality", its own set of sponsors; they don't have to mirror what F1/FOM does as a business, appealing to the same markets and people etc, so why should F1/FOM have to mirror the teams?
How could they anyway? There are 9 teams each with dozens of sponsors all targeting different audiences and demographics - why pick one at random that F1 MUST focus on now? What about the others?
F1 targets youth because of Red Bull, Monster, Burn and Rexona - then they're saying to Mercedes, IWC, Hugo Boss they don't matter to F1. Yet one of the teams that is relying on to carry the sport forward, especially if they have to go to three cars, only exists because of those brands which is particularly popular with which demographic of consumer?
Nonsense.
If Bernie is wanting the 70 years old people shall we be getting stannah stairlift and adult nappies on the advertising boards!
I must admit I watched most of last race at x4 speed as I found out the result before I could watch it on monday, even though I tried the hardest not to watch any news website! I actual stopped watching with 30 mins left on the race!
I must admit I watched most of last race at x4 speed as I found out the result before I could watch it on monday, even though I tried the hardest not to watch any news website! I actual stopped watching with 30 mins left on the race!
Red Bull has two target demographics based on their own published marketing information. One is the 18-34 year old generation Y active male population which they have pretty sown up. Their other target group, which they have concentrated more on since 2011 is the 35-65 year old. Bernie's vision of that demographic ties in with what Red Bull Marketing department are looking to expand sales within.
Some of you may have seen the piece put out on channel 4 news last week, where they compared the youth generation with the retired generations. It pretty much backed up what Bernie is saying, where the youth have bugger all disposable money and look unlikely to have any for a very long time, whereas the retired generations are having the time of their lives, with plenty of disposable money and are spending significant sums on leisure pursuits.
My dad was featured in that piece, a man now in his mid 70's who goes skydiving every week and is having a great time, spending my inheritance in the process
That market is a massive target for sales these days, its one of the few mass markets with disposable income growing significantly.
Bernie says a lot of things in a way that gets debate raging, the people in the loop know that's the way he works. Just look at this thread for evidence of this. He is correct in that the youth market isn't much use to the sponsors that are of high enough worth to be able to afford to sponsor F1. Red Bull don't care either. F1 is the perfect marketing platform for their target audience, a world wide sport with very high exposure in the media.
Some of you may have seen the piece put out on channel 4 news last week, where they compared the youth generation with the retired generations. It pretty much backed up what Bernie is saying, where the youth have bugger all disposable money and look unlikely to have any for a very long time, whereas the retired generations are having the time of their lives, with plenty of disposable money and are spending significant sums on leisure pursuits.
My dad was featured in that piece, a man now in his mid 70's who goes skydiving every week and is having a great time, spending my inheritance in the process
That market is a massive target for sales these days, its one of the few mass markets with disposable income growing significantly.Bernie says a lot of things in a way that gets debate raging, the people in the loop know that's the way he works. Just look at this thread for evidence of this. He is correct in that the youth market isn't much use to the sponsors that are of high enough worth to be able to afford to sponsor F1. Red Bull don't care either. F1 is the perfect marketing platform for their target audience, a world wide sport with very high exposure in the media.
fw said:
Why does F1 need to completely refocus it's business model to suit two specific sponsors? The argument doesn't make any sense.
They supply four cars. The grid is rapidly running out of cars. In the foreseeable future, no one else is stepping forward to fill those grid slots. There are no major manufacturers even remotely interested in F1 at the current time unless you believe the Audi rumours, so who else is going to fill those four spots? Unless you haven't been reading this and other websites, you will know that three teams are tottering on the edge, so if you look back at the figures I posted up there you will see that the grid could be as low as 12 cars if they did pull the plug and how is that sustainable as the pinnacle of world motorsport? fw said:
Why are you and others speaking for those companies, putting words in their mouths?
I'm not. I'm stating my opinion based upon information received. You have stated yours on this thread too.fw said:
I'm guessing as head of the company, Ecclestone has actual figures and expert consultation that informs his opinion that they don't need to do it.
I'm sure he does. He has his opinion and the people who he pays vast amounts of money to fly round the world all year or sit in offices taking down youtube videos agree with him. Maybe you haven't cottoned on but people who don't agree with Bernie don't tend to stay in F1 for very long.fw said:
He said that as a 44 year old man and the sport grew continuously for 40 years.
Fascinating. Could I have a link to that article please or the interview that you've just quoted from? I've been following F1 since Hunt won the championship and can't ever recall him talking about this topic before. And as he was busy running Brabham in 1974 and had nothing to do with the overall running of the sport I shouldn't have thought he would have bothered to make a comment.Nobody is going to invest in the sport until the uncertainty about its long term future and therefore its business model seriously evolve. That will not happen until Bernie has gone. Again, as I have said before he is a remarkable man but he is 84. Do you know any 84 year olds who could run a billion dollar company because I sure as hell don't. Most of the 84 year olds I meet have difficulty knowing what day it is.
Lets talk about this again in 12 months time when Sauber & Lotus have gone, the viewing figures have dropped off a cliff and there is a Red Bull sponsored Formula E car lining up on their grid.
If Red Bull go they will leave the team behind them for someone else to take over. Or rather buy. This would be no problem as long as the business model of F1 ensure there is a good chance of a return.
That, I think, is the main problem with F1 as it is: sponsors might well feel they will not get and ROI.
That, I think, is the main problem with F1 as it is: sponsors might well feel they will not get and ROI.
Two points- Whatever the subject, young people are the future. And the smart business looks after the bread and butter customers. bernie has been, whatever you think of him, quite visionary in building and marketing f1, but these suggest that today he completely lacks that capacity; still in charge only because he can't let go and no-one has the balls to get rid.
It would appear there must better ways of spending money on advertising, becuase alot of the cars still lok fairly spartan.
And was it that long ago that cars were pre-qualifying to get into a race? I think while there was a need to remove some truely dire teams from the mix, it's gone too far the other way.
Touring cars is looking in fairly reude health for next year though Bernie, and as you continue to alienate a fairly broad audience it will continue to reap the benefits.
And was it that long ago that cars were pre-qualifying to get into a race? I think while there was a need to remove some truely dire teams from the mix, it's gone too far the other way.
Touring cars is looking in fairly reude health for next year though Bernie, and as you continue to alienate a fairly broad audience it will continue to reap the benefits.
PW said:
The Hypno-Toad said:
PW said:
The fypno-foad said:
But coming back to more serious matters, I still would be very interested to see the article/interview from 40 years ago that I asked you to post where Bernie states that F1 should not be chasing the young peoples market. This is not only because of my interest in F1 but outside of the sport I'm also very interested in experimental physics.
If Bernie had known in 1974 that he would be in total control of F1, let alone that he knew all about twitter, facebook, Satellite TV & their effects on future marketing scenarios, it would strongly suggest that he had access to time travel. If it is the case, clearly the authorities need to be informed.
Still it would explain where he got the finances to buy Brabham from. Travelling through time to use the old Back To The Future racing results trick sounds more convincing than planning The Great Train Robbery.
______________________________________________________________________________
Anyway, back to the topic in hand.
Todays letter to Bernie from the smaller teams clearly shows they feel they have nothing to lose. Although I wouldn't be at all surprised that EU might have been 'cc' on it, I think it would be too early to say if the commissioners will be investigating F1 as a cartel or even if that would result in anything but Bernie bunging them a
Bob Fernley. Team Boss of Force India said:
"Red Bull and Ferrari are receiving in the region of $160 million each"
So clearly someone who is involved in the running of F1 at the highest level feels that changing the business model is worth supporting at least one of the sponsors I mentioned, as I doubt Red Bull was receiving the same amount of money Ferrari was when it just had a sticker on a Sauber. F1 is scared to death of Red Bull leaving and so they should be as at the moment even if the price was bargain basement I can't see any major manufacturer or brand coming in to build four chassis to prop up the grid.Therefore Bernie slagging off the younger market and saying F1 doesn't need them without thinking about how his comments maybe construed isn't helping the long term future of a sport that thanks to his 'unusual' management techniques is heading towards the edge of a cliff.
As I keep saying, he needs to go. NOW.
Edited by The Hypno-Toad on Monday 17th November 20:10
The Hypno-Toad said:
Todays letter to Bernie from the smaller teams clearly shows they feel they have nothing to lose. Although I wouldn't be at all surprised that EU might have been 'cc' on it, I think it would be too early to say if the commissioners will be investigating F1 as a cartel or even if that would result in anything but Bernie bunging them a massive bribe to make it go away just like the German case huge donation to research into road safety,
The EU has twice in the past been highly critical of the way F1 has been run. Nothing came of these apart from a few promises and one or two minor modifications. There was talk of some of the historic venues losing their right to host a round of the championship and the FIA moving from Europe to pastures east.The criticisms surrounded the relationship between the FIA and Ecclestone, the latter being 'deputy' to Mosely but in essence running the whole thing. The EU said these posts should be split so the commercial rights were sold to Ecclestone for 100 years.
There are arguments, at the time they were felt to be very well founded, that the FIA could not sell the commercial rights. But what are you going to do, eh?
woof said:
Bernie doesn't understand Social Media.
What he does understand that he doesn't want to give away his content and IP without someone paying. That's not just to protect his content - that protects all the deals he does for the whole grid.
I've run a web agency for 20years. I know what the internet can do.
It pretty much killed off the recording industry - first Napster and now youtube, spotify etc are giving artists content away for free or next to nothing. Copyright infringement is rife and if you can most people download something for free rather than paying.
( That's why live music has had such a resurgence - you can't pirate a live gig. And why some of these old bands are still touring!)
Bernie's right about some aspects of social media. Bebo, Myspace, ASW etc etc are all worthless now or gone.
Twitter still doesn't have a business model that can generate proper revenue. They all rely on someone else to give them content eg us and when we get bored - we move on.
Facebook is in decline. Kids are using Snapchat now for their social interactions
But - F1 has to start to embrace some areas.
All ages want to watch content on whatever device they have and at whatever time.
Somehow they need to look at how to deliver that content.
Currently the teams want to do more of it. But they cannot show any content at the circuits or cars on track from a race weekend.
FOM need to loosen their grip a little and allow the teams to have a bit more flexibility.
For instance - we look after a GP2 driver. I wanted to have a homepage video banner - 5 sec clip. We weren't permitted to use it.
That's crazy.
Interesting how you mention live gigs being so popular since recorded music has become so cheap/free.What he does understand that he doesn't want to give away his content and IP without someone paying. That's not just to protect his content - that protects all the deals he does for the whole grid.
I've run a web agency for 20years. I know what the internet can do.
It pretty much killed off the recording industry - first Napster and now youtube, spotify etc are giving artists content away for free or next to nothing. Copyright infringement is rife and if you can most people download something for free rather than paying.
( That's why live music has had such a resurgence - you can't pirate a live gig. And why some of these old bands are still touring!)
Bernie's right about some aspects of social media. Bebo, Myspace, ASW etc etc are all worthless now or gone.
Twitter still doesn't have a business model that can generate proper revenue. They all rely on someone else to give them content eg us and when we get bored - we move on.
Facebook is in decline. Kids are using Snapchat now for their social interactions
But - F1 has to start to embrace some areas.
All ages want to watch content on whatever device they have and at whatever time.
Somehow they need to look at how to deliver that content.
Currently the teams want to do more of it. But they cannot show any content at the circuits or cars on track from a race weekend.
FOM need to loosen their grip a little and allow the teams to have a bit more flexibility.
For instance - we look after a GP2 driver. I wanted to have a homepage video banner - 5 sec clip. We weren't permitted to use it.
That's crazy.
This is where Bernie and some of the race promoters are coming from when they complain the cars are too quiet. They want to create that spectacle for live attendees.
I'm normally sitting at home watching F1 on the telly. But back in September I was on a Ferry doing the Hook of Holland to Harwich night crossing. Could I see the race on a laptop, phone, tablet, anything? No.
I would have happily paid money to see it right there and then. And Bernie doesn't think there's money in new media. Fool.
I would have happily paid money to see it right there and then. And Bernie doesn't think there's money in new media. Fool.
And almost immediately I see a tweet from Craig Scarborough linking to this item, about a replacement for Bernie.
http://www.managementtoday.co.uk/news/1325672/
http://www.managementtoday.co.uk/news/1325672/
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