Puma and Formula 1 Just Threw Their Partnership Into High Gear
Puma is no stranger to the fast-paced world of car racing. The German sportswear giant has "forty years in motorsport, twenty in F1," as CEO Arne Freundt explained trackside before the Miami Grand Prix this past weekend. In fact, the company has been producing everything from fireproof coveralls to driving shoes since the mid-'80s, and currently outfits teams like Ferrari and Alfa Romeo, among others. But the run-up to the most recent race on the Formula 1 circuit was the chance for Puma to announce that it's going even further: The company is now the official supplier at Formula 1 races, and will be the exclusive seller of fanwear for F1 all ten teams starting in 2024.
"I think it’s clear that this kind of authenticity and credibility is not built overnight. It takes decades," Freundt said of Puma's motorsport heritage. "We truly have that experience." Freundt delivered his remarks at a panel where he spoke alongside Nina Nix, CEO of Puma subsidiary Stichd, which which will exclusively handle trackside retail, and Formula 1 CEO Stefano Domenicali. "We work in two dimensions: rational and emotional," said Domenicali. The rational side of things, he explained, is stuff like getting the weight of coveralls down while getting their breathability up. "Emotional is having the right design, the right energy that we need to have in Formula 1," he continued. "That’s the energy that we want to share."
"F1 has changed tremendously and fanwear is no longer just fanwear," added Nix. "F1 is now lifestyle. And all those teams have now developed amazing stories that we want to share with the fans."
Later on, in a separate panel dedicated to Puma's "plan to disrupt the culture of F1 and the culture of motorsports more broadly," as moderator and Puma's global chief brand officer Adam Petrick put it, fashion and culture luminaries echoed Nix's sentiment.
"There are three universal languages in the world that’ll bring us all together regardless of where you’re from—white, black, young, old—and it’s music, sports, and fashion," said Emory Jones of Roc Nation, who's been working with Puma creatively for more than a decade. "I look at Formula 1 and put them on the board with the Tiffanies of the world, when you talk about legacy. So now, us disrupting it together is going to make that next twenty-five years open up even more as a brand, so they can see who they are even more in the future."
Naomi Schiff, a television presenter and racing driver herself, looked to the future. "For a long time, it’s been very sterile," she explained, noting that drivers have long used their helmets as the only available form of self-expression because you arrive on track in your racing kit. "You don’t get to see people’s characters, who they are, how they want to represent themselves. More recently, much like in basketball at the moment, we have this catwalk of racing drivers walking onto the track, really expressing themselves. I think it’s an incredible thing to do."
The trick is translating that sense of style enthusiasm and expression from the drivers to the sport's enormous audience—one and a half billion viewers tuned into Formula 1 last year—that idolizes them. Puma's F1 apparel will be available to the diehards at the track, of course, but also on the brand's website starting in February of 2024. If the brands involved play their proverbial cards right, they're hoping that there will be a genuine crossover moment. It wouldn't be too different from when Puma's Speedcat turned into a street-style must-have in the early aughts—and there are pretty portentous signs on that front.
"My son is 21, and he's been wearing the Speedcats since before this announcement was even made," said June Ambrose, creative director of women's hoops at Puma and a creative trailblazer with deep roots in '90s hip-hop. "What drove him to wanting the Speedcat? No pun intended." The answer, it seems, is a level of influence from motorsport that's not too dissimilar from the scene in Ambrose's earlier career.
"We were using it in music videos, taking inspiration from the culture," she said. Now, with the boom in Formula 1's popularity and Puma's product partnership, there's a chance to take that culture to the masses. "If you can create commercial product that makes the consumer feel like they’re part of it in a very authentic, organic way," she said, "then I think that we’ve cracked the puzzle."
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