From grid to global stage. What the F1 Movie teaches us about brand relevance.

Stuart Lang
Jul 8
4 min read

Not so long ago, Formula 1 was flirting with irrelevance. A high-octane sport with dwindling cultural currency - elite, inaccessible, and trapped in its own carbon-fibre bubble. Fast forward to today, and F1 is a pop-culture powerhouse. TikTok viral. Netflix dominant. Hollywood box-office gold. The transformation? Not just marketing. Not just media. This is brand strategy at full throttle.

When Liberty Media acquired F1 in 2017, they didn’t just buy a sport - they inherited a sleeping giant. What followed was a radical act of redefinition. Not just a new logo, or a refreshed tone of voice. F1’s new custodians reshaped the narrative architecture of the brand. They repositioned the entire platform - from a sport for purists to a cultural phenomenon for everyone.

First came the big rebrand. Then Drive to Survive. Now comes the Brad Pitt movie - a $300M Hollywood spectacle, Apple’s biggest ever theatrical debut and the highest-grossing opening weekend of Pitt's career, that doesn’t just feature F1… it is F1.

This is more than marketing. It’s brand strategy, at cinematic scale.

The movie as platform, not product

Directed by Joseph Kosinski and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, the F1 movie isn’t just a one-off feature. It’s a new chapter in the brand’s transformation - blending real race weekends with scripted drama, filmed alongside actual teams, on actual tracks, with Pitt driving a custom-built car for the fictional APXGP team.

As Forbes recently noted, this film isn’t just entertainment - it’s a “$40 million ad.” But it’s much smarter than that. It’s a Trojan horse: star power on the outside, long-term brand value on the inside. It’s building F1 into a platform, not just a sport. And crucially, it’s doing what the best brand strategies do - creating permission to play in new arenas.

“Female fans now account for 40 per cent of F1’s total fanbase. Not only are they getting involved in F1 as fans, but they are building powerful communities within it. That’s what is now driving interest from a whole spectrum of new brands, including those in the fashion and beauty space.” Susie Wolff, F1 Academy Managing Director

What makes this moment even more fascinating is what’s happening around the movie. Brands aren’t just passive sponsors - they’ve become narrative collaborators and platform builders. And it’s the range of this brands that is also interesting.

As recently noted in Harper’s Bazaar, “Historically, the target market for these sponsors was affluent, male and legacy-focused. But as motorsport’s audience changes in favour of women, so too does the commercial landscape.”

The brands behind the spectacle - and what they’re really buying

Several real-world F1 sponsors have smartly embedded themselves in the film - including IWC Schaffhausen, Tommy Hilfiger, Expensify, Shark Ninja and Puma. But this isn’t just about logo placement. The savviest brands have used the opportunity to create layered, multi-touchpoint activations that extend well beyond the cinema screen.

Take IWC Schaffhausen, for example - the luxury watchmaker and long-time Mercedes-AMG Petronas partner. They didn’t just stick their logo on the fictional APXGP car. They used the movie as a springboard for immersive brand storytelling: launching a behind-the-scenes campaign that positioned their engineering heritage alongside the drama of the film. Watches, pilots, speed - all seamlessly tied to the F1 mythos.

Or look at Tommy Hilfiger. They designed custom racewear for the APXGP team - which not only appears in the movie, but was leveraged as part of a wider limited-edition product drop. The result? Fashion that lives in both the fictional universe and the fan's wardrobe.

Puma, meanwhile, leaned into performance. As the film’s official supplier of racing gear, they activated across social and retail with teaser content, athlete partnerships, and product showcases that bridged the film’s world and their own.

These brands didn’t just ride the hype - they amplified it. They recognised that in 2025, brand storytelling is not about sponsoring culture. It’s about participating in it. F1’s evolution gave them the platform. Hollywood gave them the reach.

What smart brands will take away

F1’s shift from sport to story to spectacle is a playbook more brands should study. A few strategic lessons:

Brand partnerships work best when they’re narrative-first. The most effective activations aren’t bolt-ons - they’re baked into the story. F1 gave its brand partners room to co-create, not just co-brand.
Cultural relevance requires courage. Embedding a brand inside a fictional team in a high-stakes Hollywood film takes guts - and vision. But the reward is emotional resonance and cultural cachet that traditional media can’t match.
Entertainment is the new media plan. These brands didn’t just pay for eyeballs - they earned fandom. Because in a world of skip buttons and short attention spans, narrative is what holds attention.
You need the right platform to stretch. None of this would’ve worked if F1 hadn’t redefined itself first. The movie is an extension of a decade-long repositioning effort. You can’t just launch a Hollywood partnership if your brand narrative isn’t already primed for stretch.

This is the long game

At Propellant, we work with founders, CMOs and boards to build brands that aren’t just seen - they’re sought after. Brands that have a soul. That means designing platforms that transcend category, unlock cultural relevance, and create new permission for growth.

F1 is a perfect example. It didn’t just change its image. It changed its role in people’s lives. The sport that once kept fans behind the paddock fence, now invites them onto the track, into the garage, and onto the big screen. And the brands that ride alongside? They’re not just sponsoring a sport. They’re part of the story.