FORUMula1.com

[LRW]

I JUST WANT AN ORANGE CAR!!!!! WHAT IS AND ORANGE SPONSOR!!!!! APART FROM EASY JET!!!

T-mobile..?

[bud]

I JUST WANT AN ORANGE CAR!!!!! WHAT IS AND ORANGE SPONSOR!!!!! APART FROM EASY JET!!!

T-mobile..?

The Netherlands?

The Protestant Kirk?

[What's Burning?]

“We were interested in being with McLaren still because we have a bank in England, but it was a small sponsorship.
“When [Lewis] Hamilton was there it was justified. [Jenson] Button is a great driver, but it’s another matter,” -Santander

I'm starting to feel like cookin' here about my insistence that Hamilton brought additional interest to McLaren's sponsors and it's a factor in why they didn't get a title sponsor for this season. It's easy to argue with me, it's a little harder to argue with the reasoning of an F1 sponsor.

[Hammer278]

A thought occurred to me while having a discussion elsewhere. We know McLaren had a very difficult season last year. Different people, different perspectives as to the reason/s why. I'm of the personal belief that having Hamilton last year would have netted them markedly better overall results.

My point of discussion is this; There's the obvious difficulty in bagging a title sponsor that will pay the dollar amount McLaren is looking for. You can look at it from a purely business sense and say that the worst season in 33 years is a factor, but here's where I think the loss of Hamilton was a double whammy, as his marketability has to be a contributing factor in perceived value of a title sponsorship deal.

Your theory can now said to be factually correct

“There is only one Ferrari team, period,” he said. “We were interested in being with McLaren still because we have a bank in England, but it was a small sponsorship.
“When [Lewis] Hamilton was there it was justified. [Jenson] Button is a great driver, but it’s another matter,” Botin explained.

BURN

[What's Burning?]

A thought occurred to me while having a discussion elsewhere. We know McLaren had a very difficult season last year. Different people, different perspectives as to the reason/s why. I'm of the personal belief that having Hamilton last year would have netted them markedly better overall results.

My point of discussion is this; There's the obvious difficulty in bagging a title sponsor that will pay the dollar amount McLaren is looking for. You can look at it from a purely business sense and say that the worst season in 33 years is a factor, but here's where I think the loss of Hamilton was a double whammy, as his marketability has to be a contributing factor in perceived value of a title sponsorship deal.

Your theory can now said to be factually correct

“There is only one Ferrari team, period,” he said. “We were interested in being with McLaren still because we have a bank in England, but it was a small sponsorship.
“When [Lewis] Hamilton was there it was justified. [Jenson] Button is a great driver, but it’s another matter,” Botin explained.

BURN

I think you've got your sponsors confused.... that's Lotus.

[Hammer278]

It's so sad, they have a cool sponsor like BURN on the little front wing....and on the overhead air intake they have.....CLEAR. Makes me think of Button promoting anti-dandruff shampoo commercial.

Content edited to comply with forum guidelines

[CookinFlat6]

Yup, the path of causation is right there;

McLaren completely f'ed up by backing the wrong driver on track and even worse by making the mistake of thinking that off track with sponsors was not ultimately linked to on track performance. They chose the disturbing option and focused on sponsors, and in the process near destroyed 30 years of achievement and rep in 4 years, and then compounded it by losing the driver with performance, leaving the team fronted by a lame duck.

Luckily Ron noticed that there were no sponsors left and stepped in. Button is history at the end of this season, never to be mentioned in the team. He will not feature anywhere at all in McLarens hall of fame or in the image and heritage they sell to sponsors going forward. He was never a McLaren driver and in fact is an anti- Mclaren driver, a stain on a noble face.
He could even be gone before the end of the season if he doesnt improve by a factor of at least 3

[bud]

McLarens had since 1974 only 3 title sponsors. Neither of which had any driver association. I don't think Lewis leaving was as big a factor as say Mercedes no longer being the works parter/owner. After the Marlboro man decided to go hang in marranello( funnily enough is still there despite European law) West came along, a German death stick make.
Mercedes luxury and brand presence world wide makes it easy to attract a title sponsor so once they decided to buy Brawn, McLaren lost that attraction.

With Honda they will find a new sponsor regardless of driver, for that I am sure.

[CookinFlat6]

Of course they will find a new sponsor regardless of driver or grid position, the question is how much will they put down. McLarens strength over the years was the cracking commercial deals Ron could pull off on the back of the dynamism of the team and its drivers. It was that rep that allowed the Porsche Tag deal (one of the most one sided deals in history) and it was that rep that bagged the Merc works deal ( one of the best engine deals in F1 history) and its that rep that a bagged Vodaphone, West etc etc. In fact Rons savvy was the difference between McLaren and Williams who at one point were a serious and dangerous competitor. That was why McLaren could stand at the front with Ferrari where Williams ultimately rolled over

If McLaren now start taking sponsors at reduced rates some of that image of invincibility and a position right at the top will be tarnished. Indeed Ron has said he will hold out until sponsors start offering real money and not Williams/Sauber/FI/Renault type mickey mouse deals. Honda could be part of the answer but there is free money from elsewhere if Ron can erase the associations of the last few years when the team looked less a pure racing team with clinical ruthless ambition and more like a PR stunt with slicked back disturbingly looking phonies with no on track fire in the tradition of Ayrton, Mika, Lewis etc

When last did McLaren not have an acknowledged top top talent? Maybe briefly with Coulthard till Kimi came on

Thats the difference, sponsors aint stupid, they know the difference between a legend and a lame duck - Mag is already more a Mclaren driver than the other guy

[Hammer278]

Of course they will find a new sponsor regardless of driver or grid position, the question is how much will they put down. McLarens strength over the years was the cracking commercial deals Ron could pull off on the back of the dynamism of the team and its drivers. It was that rep that allowed the Porsche Tag deal (one of the most one sided deals in history) and it was that rep that bagged the Merc works deal ( one of the best engine deals in F1 history) and its that rep that a bagged Vodaphone, West etc etc. In fact Rons savvy was the difference between McLaren and Williams who at one point were a serious and dangerous competitor. That was why McLaren could stand at the front with Ferrari where Williams ultimately rolled over

If McLaren now start taking sponsors at reduced rates some of that image of invincibility and a position right at the top will be tarnished. Indeed Ron has said he will hold out until sponsors start offering real money and not Williams/Sauber/FI/Renault type mickey mouse deals. Honda could be part of the answer but there is free money from elsewhere if Ron can erase the associations of the last few years when the team looked less a pure racing team with clinical ruthless ambition and more like a PR stunt with slicked back disturbingly looking phonies with no on track fire in the tradition of Ayrton, Mika, Lewis etc

When last did McLaren not have an acknowledged top top talent? Maybe briefly with Coulthard till Kimi came on

Thats the difference, sponsors aint stupid, they know the difference between a legend and a lame duck - Mag is already more a Mclaren driver than the other guy

Truth mate, well said.

[CookinFlat6]

Thats what was so frustrating and painful about the last few years, watching the team go through a mickey mouse period pretending to be the old team. Imagine having the best and most exciting driver, that cost Ron an arm and a leg and almost his whole business, because he did it the McLaren way - let the rookie take on the WDC etc etc etc

imagine after all that, after decades of Ayrton, Lauda, Mika, Montoya, Kimi, to see a guy who got lucky over half a season and never ever amounted to sh!t suddenly promoted and treated like a star, at the expense of Rons driver? The garage rearranged so the duck could steal the others data and use it against him? Where the best engineers and staff were reassigned to 'make a duck feel welcome?
And then the team slowly but surely turn into the medocrity brought by the duck, TP CRYING when the guy started 15th and came 6th? kissing between the cheeks? qualifying at the back? understeer limited guy unable to hustle round a corner? an abomination for true followers of the team,

Worst of all was wondering how in hell Ron had let this happen, and then finally finding out that the lame TP had tried to steal the firm and that ALL the conspiracy theories etc trying to expalin the above were not even conspiracies but just plain old LAMENESS and incompetence of a criminal order

Its almost enough to drive a chap over to a German team

[racechick]

Santander really said that?? That they don't want to stick around at McLaren with button now that Lewis is gone? it's all coming home to roost isn't it. Seems a far cry from the days when we were a few loan voices banging our heads against the wall
The good thing out of it is that now McLaren ( and Lewis) both have the opportunity to go on to great things without being hampered, just a shame about the wasted years.

[CookinFlat6]

Yes racechick, we actually got hear something from the sponsor horse mouth - They considered and are of the opinion (that they back with hard cash) that McLaren with Lewis was a justifiable venture, but with Button - a different story, a different proposition, a different value jedgement, a whole different ball game

Its what we real fans said all along - that the promotion of a less talented driver at the expense of the most talented driver of his generation was not justified by how friendly and disturbingly looking the less talented one was. WDC or not it was a bad trade as the result was collapse in performance AND flight of sponsors who looked through the facade and saw what we saw. Sporting talent must come first, above disturbing overtures to the TP, above steak dinners, above easy to get on with, above 'cheap for the price'

The job of the TP is to manage and get the best out of the talent however difficult or immature, or petulant, gangster rapping, pop star girlfriending. Taking the easy option and allowing a lame duck to manipulate and scam his way around with his 'happy bubble' and then building a car around his limited repertoire of slow driving combined with excuses and smiles, AND even employing another poor qualifier 'gentle on tyres' understeerer to complement a duck as you let your arch rival and nemesis team reap vengeance for all the years they got screwed on an engine deal, by taking your dejected star driver and engineer

Anyway rants over (I promise ) . We knew all this all along and guess what? Ron 100% agreed and has finally regained control and hopefully is getting medieval on the bottom of the lame TP in some basement somewhere

[darwin dali]

Anyway rants over (I promise ) . We knew all this all along and guess what? Ron 100% agreed and has finally regained control and hopefully is getting medieval on the bottom of the lame TP in some basement somewhere

Ron took some classes at my dungeon recently - and he insisted that he wanted to sometimes be the bottom as well to 'experience from a first person point of view the application of reasonable punitive power on a rear-facing dispensable body part'.

[racechick]

It's weird how he's just completely disappeared without trace.............he who must not be mentioned! Where is he?
I can't work the guy out. Why did he sacrifice Lewis.....and his career to promote button?? Time and time again even when everyone started noticing. I don't get it . If he did have a crush on Jenson, well he's not a teenage girl, why did he let it wreck his career. And if he didn't have a crush on him, well what was he playing at?