Only 1% of Fans Ever Make It to a Race
To reach the other 99%, the team holds free fan events and paints its cars the color fans demanded.
Norges Bank Investment Management · The McLaren Turnaround | Zak Brown | Podcast | In Good Company“Only 1% of our fans will ever go to a race,” said Zak Brown, the chief executive of McLaren Racing. The other 99% will never stand by a pit wall.
Brown said that fact shapes almost everything the team does off the track. Without fans, he said, there is no McLaren, because a race is entertainment in the same way as a movie, a fireworks show, or a football match.
So McLaren spends its own money, and its sponsors' money, to bring Formula 1 to people who will never buy a ticket. It held a free event in Trafalgar Square in London that drew 40,000 people over two days, and its drivers always stop to sign autographs and take photos.
The clearest example is the color of the car. McLaren had gone dark gray. Brown said the dark gray looked like Darth Vader, which was cool but exclusive. Fans kept demanding the return of its bright papaya orange, so the team brought it back.
Questions people ask
Why is papaya orange McLaren's color?
Founder Bruce McLaren first raced in orange in the late 1960s, partly because it stood out on track and on television. The team moved through other colors under later sponsors, including red and white and silver, before returning to the papaya orange shade in 2018 after fans asked for it.
How many people watch Formula 1 compared with attending?
A Grand Prix weekend often draws more than 100,000 fans on race day and several hundred thousand over three days, limited by seats, prices, and travel. The television audience is far larger, with tens of millions watching a typical race worldwide and hundreds of millions watching over a season.
Why does reaching at-home fans matter financially?
Sponsors pay teams largely for exposure to fans, through logos, hospitality, and social media. More fans, especially younger and more diverse fans who follow from home, make the team more valuable to those sponsors, which is why fan events and driver access matter as business, not just goodwill.