10 brands you didn’t know sponsored F1 teams
Sponsorship has been an integral part of Formula 1 ever since Colin Chapman switched his Lotus 49s from their classic green and yellow to a gold-over-red scheme in exchange for some cash from Gold Leaf.
As we build up to our incredible celebration of 75 years of Formula 1 at the Festival of Speed presented by Mastercard, we thought it was time to go through a few F1 funders that you may not remember.
Budweiser
And we start with an advertising giant, one which at first thought you might assume has been plastered all over F1 cars for decades. Budweiser has lent its famous white writing on a red background to numerous cars in IndyCar, NASCAR and even IMSA. But it’s actually only ever been seen on two teams in F1, and only once was it the main deal.
The first time Bud appeared in F1 was on an Ensign, and for just one race. At the forgettable 1981 Ceaser’s Palace Grand Prix, and only on Elisio Salazar’s N180B. It would be another 22 years before we saw Budweiser back on an F1 car, and even then it was only as a minor sponsor. A three-year stint adorning Williams cars was a deal some thought might herald the entrance of some of the big US brands, but it wasn’t. That Bud was not for F1.
Oracle
Ah yes, here’s a trick shot. Yes, data-giant Oracle is quite well-known for its current headline sponsorship of the Red Bull F1 team. But did you know its 2021 appearance on the F1 grid was predated to the tune of 27 years? And that its 1994 F1 exploration also won it a world championship nearly three decades before Max Verstappen?
In 1994, for several races, the word Oracle bedecked the side of a Benetton B194. Significantly of course driven to the F1 title by Micheal Schumacher, but perhaps prophetically, also piloted by... Jos Verstappen.
Chelsea
If you thought that Superleague Formula was a weird concept (football teams owning a racing team and going head to head with Spurs of all teams actually winning a few races) how about Chelsea just plain sticking its logo on an F1 car?
The deal was going to “focus on ways to enhance sporting and business performance”, although what the at-the-time uber-rich Chelsea could have learned from the on-the-verge-of-bankruptcy Sauber, we do not know. But the partnership lasted four years, so it must have benefitted someone. We can all just be thankful there was no Fabrizio Romano to announce the deal then.
Iso
Iso made some of the most beautiful road cars the world has ever seen. From the A3C to the Grifo…z and the Isetta. But it also created a slightly less beautiful sponsorship partnership with the first Formula 1 team that Sir Frank Williams would run.
Years before the current Williams team came about, Frank Williams Racing Cars spent the 1973 and ‘74 seasons fielding a scattergun series of drivers that included at various times Howden Ganley, Jacky Ickx, Jacques Lafitte and Henri Pescarolo. Its cars were decked out in red with ISO-Marlboro written down the side. The Iso in that strangely contrived mix was the maker of fine road cars.
Kronenbourg
Larrousse is not a name well remembered for its F1 antics (127 entries, one lucky podium, zero wins, zero poles, zero fastest laps). But we feel Gerard Larrousse’s lot should take a better place in the history of motorsport than it does, purely for the absolutely excellent red-and-white chequerboard livery it used for some of the 1994 season.
That astonishing look came to adorn the LH94 because of Kronenbourg’s only foray into Formula 1. If you go to any motorsport event in France it’s hard to avoid the red and white colours of Kronenbourg, but its Formula 1 journey was short lived. We wouldn’t dream of speculating why, but it might have something to do with Larrousse’s 18 retirements in a 16-race season.
Jägermeister
A bit like fellow alcohol-seller Budweiser, Jägermeister is a brand synonymous with many forms of motorsport. But if you dig into your brain, you’ll be hard pushed to find any memories of it being associated with F1.
That’s because it’s only happened three times. Twice with March (and only on HJ Stuck’s cars) and our favourite time: with EuroBrun in 1989. Yes, a partnership where you’re not only hard pushed to remember the sponsor being involved with the sport, but also the team at all. Not too surprising. EuroBrun failed to pre-qualify for 15 of the 16 races in 1989, and when it did, it didn’t qualify. Jägermeister branding disappeared when driver Gregor Foitek left the team late in the season and the booze brand has never been back. Funny that.
Benihana
This one even caught us out. The purveyors of overly-elaborate Japanese food flicked themselves into the F1 world for just one Grand Prix. Its appearance was, we think, in one of the strangest possible places – Shadow.
Shadow is, perhaps, the creator of some of the finest liveries in motorsport history. Mostly pure black, with some blue and red creeping in. In fact, even when Graham Hill stuck Embassey logos on a Shadow it still looked awesome. But the one-race partnership with Benihana is instantly forgettable. In Benihana’s home territory, Tom Pryce raced with the name just next to his crash helmet. He retired from the race, but for some reason all eyes during that particular Grand Prix were elsewhere...
MTV
MTV was everywhere in the 1990s. In fact it’s hard to think of a brand that set the cultural tone across the Western world more than the pioneers of music television. So it’s slightly baffling to wonder why it chose, of all teams, Simtek, for its first foray into Formula 1.
What ensued was a tragic season, the details of which are well enough told elsewhere. And that is an even bigger shame because of just how good the SN41 and SN51 looked with their vivid MTV branding in 1994 and 1995.
Goofy and Mickey Mouse
Another team on this list that’s history is not exactly well-remembered. Spirit had managed a good showing in F2, taking future Grand Prix winner (and now second most-famous Thierry from Belgium) Thierry Boutsen to third in the championship in 1982. Its step up to the big league for the following few seasons was not such a success.
But we will remember it for the fact that, for the 1984 season, it was sponsored not by Disney, but by Mickey Mouse and Goofy themselves. For the majority of the year the face of Topolino – as Mickey is called in Italy – adorned the side of Spirit’s 101 and for a few races his friend Goofy joined alongside (so poor was the performance the only images we can legally use are of this model). It’s the kind of crossover we’d like to see again. Imagine Peppa Pig on the side of a McLaren, or Bluey on a Williams...
Binladen
Must be unrelated right? Wrong. One of the world’s most reviled terrorists came from one of the richest families in his home country of Saudi Arabia. His father founded a construction company that garnered enough government contracts to make him the richest non-royal in the country.
Long before his son decided to make a name for himself in awful ways (an act which we must point out is very unrelated to his family’s company), the Binladen group did what every self-respecting business did in the 1980s and sponsored an F1 team. So for one year Williams raced with Binladen written down the sides of its cars. It was part of a much larger group of Saudi-related companies that sponsored Williams in its early years, but that one name on the side will always catch the eye first.
Honourable mentions
Just to finish off, we wanted to acknowledge a few brands that are no doubt being screamed into the comments section on various platforms. Yes, it would surprise a few that the purveyors of top-shelf grot mags Penthouse sponsored a few F1 cars (naughty, naughty Arrows and Hesketh) and that Rizla and Durex have also had their names plastered on cars. But if you know motorsport, you probably know about those brands. So we decided to leave them out.
Images courtesy of Motorsport Images.
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