2009 Season the last for Renault?

+1

Simple as that.

Advertising tobacco in F1 raises brand awareness which causes smokers to change brands. But it does not get people started on smoking.

 

I remember when I was first learning about marketing. There is all sorts of different kinds of marketing that you can do, and at a certain level, everyone knows about the product, what it does, and the marketing is no longer about selling the product, but rather just keeping the brand out there.

For example... when is the last time you heard an ad for Rayvac batteries? We all know what they are and what they do. But we all know the Duracell (ding... dong...ding) and Energizer bunny commercials. It's not because Energizer or Duracell want to tell us what batteries are, it's that they know we buy batteries, and they want us to buy theirs when we go to the store, or they want us to buy theirs instead of their competitors.

Andreas was right when he said this the first time, a while back... it's not about getting people to start smoking. Everyone knows what cigarettes are. It's also not about glamorizing them... it's about brand awareness. How many here would know RBS is a bank if it didn't advertise in F1? Did anyone take money from the mattress and stick it in an RBS account based on F1 sponsorship? Anyone sign up for cell service after the Vodafone sponsorship? Or start drinking after seeing Johnny Walker on the McLaren? The mere suggestion is silly.

As is the suggestion that tobacco advertising on F1 cars makes or even entices folks to smoke. It just doesn't.

 

I beg to differ, Mike! My father (smoker, tennis player, scratch golfer, dead at 54, heart attack) was great friends with Bob Norris - the original iconic Marlboro man (dead at I believe 61, lung cancer). I'm old enough to remember when tobacco advertising was ubiquitous & I know damn well that those ads, while certainly promoting the subject brands "advantages", glamorized the concept of smoking as a central theme. As a former smoker & (now) asthmatic, I not naive enough to claim that the advertisements caused my adoption of the habit, but can certainly assert that the romantic images dominating the campaigns did little to dissuade me. Were it not for the tremendous amounts of tax revenue generated by tobacco sales the stuff would certainly be illegal & the idea that "brand awareness" is the sole point of tobacco ads is an incredibly pernicious lie promulgated by the death merchants running the industry. You probably believe in trickle-down economics as well.

As to my assertion that Governmental regulation has advanced the state of the automotive art - let's revisit a little history. At what point did Ferrari (& everybody else) decide to explore fuel injection on its road cars? At the point when they could no longer pass increasingly stringent emission requirements with fix-it patches on carburetors. I vividly remember the outcry from ALL the manufacturers - save perhaps Benz - that the cost in money & performance to meet said regs would be ruinous. Ferrari punished us with 308 i's that I would call dog-like except I like canines. After the first miserable attempts to get FI right, a light came on somewhere in the engineering departments of what had been an almost purely marketing driven industry & they realized that applying this new technology could result in massive EFFICIENCY gains. Note - I'm NOT speaking FUEL efficiency, but OVERALL efficiency. In 1968 or so, Ferrari trumpeted the incredible achievement of 100 BHP/liter in their F1 engines. Seems a little paltry in light of 800 BHP 2.4's eh? I maintain that absent Governmental "interference" fuel injection & overall electronic technology would not have progressed at the pace it did. Is a 430's 483BHP with essentially no noxious emissions not in fact a triumph of efficiency? Do you also decry the safety regulations that have enabled us to drive roughly 5 times the vehicle miles we did in the pre-reg days while killing +- 25% less of our citizens in absolute terms?
By the way - my daily driver is a Mini - I'm also a long time motorcycle rider, & if Benz would put a manual trans in Smarts I would have used my reservation. Uh, SRT Mike - does that thing have a HEMI??? Or do you just dream about it like the doofusses in the ads for your dream car? And I do THINK before I post instead of merely parroting a convenient company line that happens to fit my own narrow self interest! Yr fthfl svt, Jim

 

Established fact? Established by whom? Whenever I hear someone proclaiming something as preposterous as that I have to wonder who's on who's payroll! Big position in Altria??? Jim

 

I have to say, I completely disagree with you. I'd also like to say, in order to have a decent conversation with someone one should avoid name calling.

 

Hey thirteen - read my post again! The only name calling I've engaged in is 1) the doofusses in the "Hemi" ads & 2) the "death merchants" from the tobacco companies. I MIGHT consider apologizing to the Dodge guys - they're only PLAYING doofusses on TV, after all - but NOT the tobacco guys! LOL, Jim

 

Jim, you simply do not know what you are talking about. To state that your father knew the marlboro man and therefore you "know damn well" that the ads encourage smoking is just proof of that. You are speaking about subjects and saying that you know this or that to be true, because it seems to make sense to you. I am speaking about these subjects because I know what the facts are. It is a fact that tobacco advertising on F1 cars does not significantly contribute to people smoking. I already gave examples in my previous post in terms of other products that highlight what I am saying is true. To compare marlboro man ads to F1 livery advertising shows you do not understand this subject, because they are completely different. An argument position of "I don't care, I know it's true" is irrelevant. Also, political discussion is not allowed - so if you want to insert economics and George Bush as you did in the last 2 posts, you're going to have to pay up and become a subscriber and do it in the politics forum.

Your point about government intervention in the efficiency and safety of road cars really has nothing to do with this thread, so I am not sure why you brought it up... but again your assertions are simply wrong.

Fuel injection was being used in the 20's and was widely used on gas engined cars in the 50's.... ever hear of the Corvette "fuelie"? The EPA didn't even come into existence until the 70's, so to suggest that FI was somehow driven by legislation is just ludicrous. Same for safety devices. ABS brakes, airbags, seatbelts, side airbags, crumple zones, traction control, stability control, and on and on - ALL of these things were developed solely by the automotive industry. They were all very widespread before they became required. The government has never taken some new and promising technology and mandated it... they have waited until most cars already have something, then said they should all have it (like ABS and airbags). As for fuel injection, you say that the electronic technology wouldn't have progressed at the rate it did.

Wrong.

Fuel injection was not driven by legislation - not at all. Neither were the advancements in fuel injection... the move from mechanical, to electronic TBI, to port injection, to direct injection. And on the spark side, the move from distributors, to HEI systems, to coil-on-plug. NONE of that was driven by legislation... they were all advancements made by the auto industry that were driven by the competing companies looking to get more power, better efficiency and overall better performance from the vehicles.

How many cars have throttle-by-wire systems now? A large number. How many have port injection? Many/most of them. How many have coil-on-plug? Many if not most. How many have variable valve timing? Quite a few. How many have stability control? Most new cars. How many have traction control? Almost all. How many have side airbags? Most. How many of those things are required by law? None. How many are slated to become mandatory? None, I think. So how were the advances in efficiency and safety driven by government? Simple - they weren't.

 

Mike - you're using fuellie 'vettes as the basis for your argument? The rarest of all the early Corvettes? Name me another car from that era (not counting the odd Bel Air with the same engine representing 1/2% of production #'s) that didn't have a 3 point star on the hood or represents an insignificant boutique manufacturer like Maser that sported FI before '67. Why did Ferrari adopt FI in '79 ('80 model year)? Certainly not for performance reasons. They changed over kicking & screaming just as the car companies have done every time safety & emissions regs are tightened - & they punished their customers by producing one of the most embarrassing "exotics" in history. They were comfortable building the same old same old as long as we would let them. How about the seatbelts in 348's? Another example of Ferrari punishing us for daring to demand some level of passive safety. They didn't embrace airbags until they became mandatory. Once they accepted that they couldn't continue along the old path, yes, they began to improve the technology - but the FACTS in this instance are undeniable.
Unlike your assertions regarding tobacco advertising. You're gonna tell me that Virginia Slims ads aren't aimed at convincing women (& young girls!) that smoking is an avenue to weight loss??? Brand awareness??? Established fact??? An argument based on that entirely presumptuous assumption can only be loved by a tobacco company spokesman or stockholder. Anyway - it doesn't matter because tobacco advertising isn't banned by F1 - only by the countries they race in! That greedy little scumsucker Ecclestone would welcome advertising $'s from ANY source no matter how repellent if it lined his pockets - why do you think they're moving the races away from traditional venues to motorsports hotbeds like Singapore & Malaysia? Because they allow tobacco advertising! Why is there no USGP? No tobacco money to pay Bernie's freight (among other purely monetary reasons). Exactly who performed the research supporting your position that tobacco ads aren't aimed at increasing the pool of smokers? Ever been handed a pack of 'Boro's or Camels at a Nascar race? Used to be standard practice to hand the stuff out for free! Now that even NASCAR has gone smoke-free, that egregious practice has died, but not due to the philanthropic nature of big tobacco. C'mon, get real. Jim

 

While I find tobacco and cigarettes disgusting and have no idea why anyone would use them, they are a legal product. That they are dangerous and lead to death is not up for debate, however so does alcohol and yet that's advertised on television freely so why not allow tobacco advertising on grand prix cars?

In this day and age when everyone from age 2 on up has access to a wealth of information, when everyone knows how dangerous tobacco use it there is no need to limit their advertising ability. That's akin to someone suing McDonald's because they spilled their coffee and <gasp> it was hot and I was burned! I never knew coffee was hot!