The curious case of modern F1 'cigarette' branding

At the 2018 Japanese Grand Prix, Ferrari's cars were fitted with the logos of a new campaign from title sponsor Philip Morris. Then McLaren began promoting British American Tobacco. It was just the start of a continuing saga

Jonathan Noble Oct 10, 2019, 12:42 PM

Upd: Oct 10, 2019, 1:08 PM

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Twelve months ago, Ferrari title sponsor Philip Morris caused a stir when it launched Mission Minnow and the livery of the team's cars at Suzuka was tweaked as a result.

Initial confusion about the initiative's purpose was followed by criticism from some quarters that it was simply a back door way of bringing the Marlboro logo back into Formula 1 in a bid to sell more cigarettes.

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Author Jonathan Noble

Jonathan Noble is Motorsport.com’s Formula 1 editor. Having graduated from University of Sussex Jonathan worked for sports news agency Collings Sports reporting on F1, F3, touring cars and other sports, with articles appearing in The Daily Telegraph, The Independent, Reuters, Autosport and other publications. In 1999 he moved to Haymarket Publishing to become a senior editor at Autosport Special Projects, and one year later he became Autosport’s grand prix editor. In 2015 he moved to Motorsport Network, becoming the F1 editor for Motorsport.com. He is also a member of the Guild of Motoring Writers, and sits on the FIA Media Council.

Jonathan has won multiple awards for journalism - in 1991 he was the winner of the Guild of Motoring Writers’ Sir William Lyons’ Award for young journalists, in 2010 he was awarded the Outstanding Individual accolade for consumer journalism in the Haymarket wards, in 2011 he won Haymarket’s Scoop of the Year, and in 2018 he was awarded a prestigious Medaglia d’Oro at the Lorenzo Bandini Awards for his contribution to F1 journalism.