{"id":2278630,"date":"2026-02-12T09:05:05","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T09:05:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2278630"},"modified":"2026-02-12T09:05:05","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T09:05:05","slug":"how-cadillac-f1-is-using-fashion-and-entertainment-to-build-americas-new-home-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/how-cadillac-f1-is-using-fashion-and-entertainment-to-build-americas-new-home-team\/","title":{"rendered":"How Cadillac F1 Is Using Fashion and Entertainment to ‘Build America’s New Home Team’"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Hi everyone, welcome back to <\/span>SportsVerse<\/a>, <\/span><\/strong>my twice-weekly newsletter that tells stories you can\u2019t find anywhere else about the intersection of sports, fashion, business, and culture.<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

One of my favorite things to do is to hear from the people responsible for shaping sports teams of the future. One such person is <\/span>Ahmed Iqbal<\/a><\/strong>, the chief marketing officer of Cadillac F1, the American team that is set to debut on the grid in 2026. Cadillac has already made quite a stir, breaking from Formula 1 convention to use an ad at last weekend\u2019s Super Bowl, as well as a simultaneous countdown reveal in New York\u2019s Times Square to reveal the team\u2019s 2026 season livery (the cosmetic design of the outside of the car).<\/span><\/p>\n

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Yesterday, I sat down with Iqbal to talk through the marketing strategy fuelling the team\u2019s debut season on the grid, and to discuss the synergies between modern F1 and the worlds of fashion and entertainment. <\/p>\n

If you\u2019re reading this and you\u2019re wondering why the name Cadillac rings a bell, it\u2019s because you read my article a few weeks ago, <\/span>dissecting the aftermath of pre-season testing in Barcelona, when Cadillac\u2019s drivers and team staff were spotted wearing Nike footwear<\/a> \u2014 an interesting development given that there is no formal partnership between the two brands. In that article, I asserted that in the Formula 1 world, these things are <\/span>never<\/em> a coincidence and are always designed to send some kind of message. Naturally, I asked Iqbal what the thinking behind it was, and while he was coy, his answer very much confirmed my initial thesis:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI saw the blogs going crazy about it. Here\u2019s what I can say: everything we\u2019re doing is done with intention. So that wasn\u2019t a coincidence,\u201d he told me, with a smile. \u201cThat said, I have no comment right now regarding anything additional on that.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Is Nike Getting Back Into Formula 1?<\/h4>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Reading between the lines, Cadillac\u2019s decision to wear Nike footwear is in line with its strategy to create \u201cAmerica\u2019s new home team,\u201d to use Iqbal\u2019s own words. This has been a guiding principle and through line in all of the team\u2019s major cultural partnerships to date. <\/p>\n

Cadillac\u2019s inaugural fashion and apparel partner, for example, is Tommy Hilfiger, which just rolled out a co-branded fanwear collection. The team is also working in partnership with Apple, which is creating shot-on-iPhone content of the new livery out in Bahrain. Though there is no formal partnership with Nike as yet, opting to wear the brand\u2019s footwear was a pointed choice to pick yet another big-ticket American success story to tie Cadillac\u2019s appeal to. <\/p>\n

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\u201cOne of the big themes when we started looking at our original partners [Tommy Hilfiger and Jim Bean among them], was this idea of American originals. Working with classic American brands that have had heritage storytelling,\u201d Iqbal said. <\/p>\n

Doubling down on modern Americana may feel like a bold, even risky strategy given the current political climate and overall perceptions of the country at the moment. But America is a major growth market for Formula 1, especially for the waves of new \u201ccasual\u201d fans which continue to flood into the sport, enticed by shiny fun things like Drive to Survive, the F1 movie, WAG culture, paddock fits or general drooling over Lewis Hamilton. <\/p>\n

Taken the above into consideration, the strategy to position Cadillac as <\/span>the<\/em> team to house America\u2019s growing interest in F1, begins to make a lot of sense. Without a single American driver on the grid\u2014Logan Sargeant was dropped by Williams in 2024\u2014there so far has been no singular entity around which American fans could centre their fandom. That\u2019s where Cadillac wants to come in. <\/span><\/p>\n

(My friend and Formula 1-tech-politics-science guru Toni Cowan-Brown, wrote a <\/span>brilliant deep-dive on the strategy behind Cadillac\u2019s Super Bowl ad<\/a> and the team\u2019s all-American brand building ambitions driven by chief brand advisor Cassidy Towriss, which I strongly recommend you read.) <\/span><\/p>\n

Cadillac also has a unique advantage in its efforts to assert itself in the world of F1 in its first season. It will be the only team on the grid to have not one, not two, but <\/span>three<\/em> home races on American soil, around which it can host major activations, bring along VIP talent and friends of the brand, and focus its efforts on converting American F1 fans, new and old.<\/span><\/p>\n

Iqbal is all too aware, however, of the responsibilities that come with being the new kid on the block in Formula 1, a highly traditional and sometimes conservative world, where following the status quo is often the safest method.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think there\u2019s an importance in knowing you have to pay homage to the sport and follow certain rules and codes on the way to go about certain things, making sure we meet expectations of the F1 community,\u201d he said. And then there\u2019s of course going to be moments [like breaking from tradition with the Super Bowl livery reveal ad and the Times Square activation] where we\u2019re looking to change, innovate, do things differently, and evolve the sport to bring in new fans, making it more accessible to bigger and broader audiences.\u201d<\/p>\n

In this sense, the arrival of Cadillac appears to be a crucial piece of the broader evolution of Formula 1, which has been dramatically transformed from the Europe-centric closed shop it was (with just the one U.S Grand Prix on the calendar) before the Liberty Media acquisition. <\/p>\n

The opportunity to seize the moment is not lost on the team. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s our job to create experiences, to create content, to bring stories\u2014everything from merch to access to cool content from the track. It\u2019s not just for the core F1 fan and not just for the casual fan, but it\u2019s a blend of both. Everyone can find something for themselves here in the team and in the sport, for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like all things branding in sports, much of Cadillac\u2019s cultural success will be predicated on how well the team performs on the track itself. As fun as partnerships are, nothing brings allure and credibility to an organisation like genuine sporting success. <\/p>\n

But in the meantime, splashy marketing moments like Super Bowl ads and Times Square takeovers (which certainly don\u2019t come cheap), combined with internet-breaking guerrilla marketing stunts like the Nike sneaker moment, seem like a very good place to start. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s all for today, friends. Thanks for coming along for the ride, and thanks to Ahmed for joining us, and to Meredith for making it happen.<\/p>\n

See you next week,<\/p>\n

DYM<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source sportsverse.substack.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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