The End of AMR?
Discussion
With the radical AM F1 team logo having just been revealed, I'm wondering to myself if this (along with the works exit from WEC) spells the end of the AMR sub-brand?
With my CMO hat on, given the sole purpose for the move into F1 appears to be to grow global awareness / consideration for the Aston Martin brand, I think calling the team Aston Martin F1 makes a lot of sense. And even by keeping the 'logo' dominated by the 'master brand' Wings badge is also the right thing to do, as that is ultimately what adorns the road cars (along with the Aston Martin script on some models).
With my AMR owner hat on, I'm sad that it seems that the racing brand that has so much pedigree in sportscar racing, and had so much potential when AP proclaimed it to one day be AML's equivalent of Porsche's GT division, seems to have bitten the dust. The fact the AMR road cars ended up being little more than badging and spec exercises, I guess showed that strategy was flawed from the start.
Whilst I'm sure we'd all love to have seen a lighter, more track focused GT3-esque Vantage, with trickle-down tech / componentry from the WEC cars, the reality is (as ever) AML were never going to have pockets deep enough to develop such cars that would need to have been heavily distinguishable from the base cars.
I guess we'll see, but I simply can't see a meaningful role for an AMR-badged car in the line-up, now the focus is so much in F1.
The cynic in me fears it's only a matter of time before we see the DBX Vettel Editon though...
Edited by AdamV12AMR on Monday 4th January 18:15
Edited by AdamV12AMR on Monday 4th January 18:16
I cannot remenber the details Adam, but I think I recall one or two AMR models, which seemed to be almost standard cars with a few extra 'trimmings' and an AMR badge. Such a shame when that type of dilution begins.
Is the manual Vantage one example? Aston Martin Racing Vantage, £30,000 extra, but slower 0-60mph than the normal auto Vantage. The racing version is slower, have I got that wrong?
It will be a long time before we really know, whether Mr. Lawrence S. Strulovitch's priority, is his Formula One team, or his part ownership of the AML car manufacturer.
Some might say, that having the Aston Martin name on Racing Point UK Ltd cars, will make it much easier to obtain lucrative sponsorship from prestigious backers. After all, Formula One teams almost cannot breath, without huge amounts of money. Hundreds of employees needed, to enable two cars to run for two hours, about twenty times a year.
I do not understand why Aston Martin have been given options, to buy £200 million of shares in Racing Point, at a time when even paying interest on the £1billion debt might be a burden.
My potential enjoyment of supporting an Aston Martin F1 team in 2021, has coincided with Formula One TV coverage ending in Germany. The sought after worldwide TV audience shrinks a little bit more. The free German F1 live coverage via satellite suited me, because it is against my principles to pay for Sky, when I am not a football fan. Hopefully someone here will tell me when Sebastian Vettel wins.
Edited by Jon39 on Tuesday 5th January 13:44
Neil1300r said:
AdamV12AMR said:
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The cynic in me fears it's only a matter of time before we see the DBX Vettel Editon though...
Stick a smaller engine in it and it can be the DBX Stroll EditionThe cynic in me fears it's only a matter of time before we see the DBX Vettel Editon though...
The sooner they get away from these cynical marketing ideas the better as far as I'm concerned!
Jon39 said:
I do not understand why Aston Martin have been given options, to buy £200 million of shares in Racing Point, at a time when even paying interest on the £1billion debt might be a burden.
soofsayer said:
Jon39 said:
I do not understand why Aston Martin have been given options, to buy £200 million of shares in Racing Point, at a time when even paying interest on the £1billion debt might be a burden.
JohnG1 said:
soofsayer said:
Jon39 said:
I do not understand why Aston Martin have been given options, to buy £200 million of shares in Racing Point, at a time when even paying interest on the £1billion debt might be a burden.
Options are only options until you decide to exercise them. I don't know the details and have no inclination to look them up, but it could just be an option to make a quick paper profit should the circumstances become beneficial, more of a deal sweetener.I suddenly woke up shaking, following an awful dream.
In the dream, Mr Stroll has just made another group of Aston Martin employees redundant.
He then reached for the AML cheque book and signed a cheque for £200,000,000 payable to Racing Point,
Edited by Jon39 on Wednesday 6th January 12:18
AMR will not disappear. Luxury goods need promotion and brand labeling.
The question is: Which marketing and sales benefit is created by any spent money in which category.
It is quite obvious that this relation is extremely poor in WEC-LeMans-GTE-Pro-racing. You have huge expenses of shipping equipment and specialist personnel across the globe. You have huge development cost of prototype GTE cars (though they look like a street car) and you may build a one digit number of these only. And if you look at the GTE cars you can assume that the sponsor and third party marketing income is probably low. The majority of the expenses are born by the manufacturers. On the other hand the number of spectators and TV-coverage is very low compared to Formula 1 or other motor sport events.
The contrast could not be bigger if you compare this to F1: TV coverage is so big that the FOM can pay back amounts in the range around $100m per team – which is 2/3 of the budget. Sponsors and tech partners can contribute another $50m to $100m. With the agreed budget cap F1 teams become such a profitable business that shares are traded at high prices (McLaren-GP, Mercedes-GP).
There should not be the slightest doubt that the decision to go forward with F1 and to cut the spending for GTE-factory-sports is in the best interest of AML.
At the same time this does not limit the participation in GT3-racing which is more a private team based effort. Manufacturers sell between 50 and 100 GT3 cars to teams and provide limited cost support. That suits AML and is a perfect combination with their F1-startegy. Assuming that GT3 is going forward – it is easy to assume that AMR branded editions will also continue. Hopefully not only a pure labeling with special colours, but with real sports features somewhat like a 911 GT3 is separated from the 911 S.
The question is: Which marketing and sales benefit is created by any spent money in which category.
It is quite obvious that this relation is extremely poor in WEC-LeMans-GTE-Pro-racing. You have huge expenses of shipping equipment and specialist personnel across the globe. You have huge development cost of prototype GTE cars (though they look like a street car) and you may build a one digit number of these only. And if you look at the GTE cars you can assume that the sponsor and third party marketing income is probably low. The majority of the expenses are born by the manufacturers. On the other hand the number of spectators and TV-coverage is very low compared to Formula 1 or other motor sport events.
The contrast could not be bigger if you compare this to F1: TV coverage is so big that the FOM can pay back amounts in the range around $100m per team – which is 2/3 of the budget. Sponsors and tech partners can contribute another $50m to $100m. With the agreed budget cap F1 teams become such a profitable business that shares are traded at high prices (McLaren-GP, Mercedes-GP).
There should not be the slightest doubt that the decision to go forward with F1 and to cut the spending for GTE-factory-sports is in the best interest of AML.
At the same time this does not limit the participation in GT3-racing which is more a private team based effort. Manufacturers sell between 50 and 100 GT3 cars to teams and provide limited cost support. That suits AML and is a perfect combination with their F1-startegy. Assuming that GT3 is going forward – it is easy to assume that AMR branded editions will also continue. Hopefully not only a pure labeling with special colours, but with real sports features somewhat like a 911 GT3 is separated from the 911 S.
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