Bernie Ecclestone by Terry Lovell

Author:Terry Lovell [Terry Lovell]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
ISBN: 9781782192626
Publisher: John Blake
Published: 2012-09-17T04:00:00+00:00

The purchase of Brands Hatch Leisure by the InterPublic Group of Companies (IPG) was to soundly prove the wisdom of the well-grounded business principle: stick to what you know. Its decision in 1997 to approve a proposal by Manchester-born Frank Lowe to set up Octagon Motorsport, of which he would be chairman, and move into motorsport would reveal itself to be an ill-conceived venture that would cost IPG dearly. It was a text-book example of a corporate giant, whose wholly owned companies included Foote, Cone & Belding and McCann-Erickson and which was enjoying a boom period, believing it could take into its stride, with audacious confidence, the management and marketing of an industry about which it knew little.

The first British Grand Prix at Silverstone under Octagon’s management as promoter, in 2001, was back to its usual July slot, the previous year’s rain-lashed event, switched by Ecclestone and Mosley – ‘It was commercial suicide for us,’ said the then BRDC president Sir Jackie Stewart – to the climatically fickle month of April now no more than a nightmare memory of a car-park bog causing an 18-mile static tailback on the narrow A43 access road. It was a grand prix noted for its monsoon weather conditions rather than the impressive win of McLaren’s David Courthauld, who, in appalling conditions, beat team-mate Mika Hakinnen and championship leader Michael Schumacher into second and third place respectively to win his second consecutive home grand prix victory. It portended the man-made disaster that, for Octagon, was to come.

Rob Bain, Nicola Foulston’s former finance director and now chief executive of Octagon, authorised the expenditure of £1 million to implement short-term traffic-flow improvements, including the laying of 660,000 sq ft of reinforced meshing for the car park, widening of gateway entrances and improvements to road approach angles. In the summer of 2001, work also began on a long-awaited dual-carriageway linking the M1 and M40 by passing through Silverstone’s northern car park, and which was completed in 2002. The 2001 grand prix at Silverstone went relatively smoothly, but Octagon came under renewed pressure in December that year, when the FIA confirmed Silverstone’s place on the following season’s calendar only after receiving ‘a binding commitment’ from Octagon – and a letter of support from prime minister Tony Blair – that further road and access improvements would be in place to prevent an occurrence of ‘the chaos experienced by motor sports fans’. Failure to honour its pledge would incur a $5-million (£3.6-million) penalty, warned Max Mosley.

To meet its commitment for the 2002 grand prix, Octagon ensured smooth traffic flow by decreasing ticket sales from 90,000 to 60,000 and, at the same time, introducing some hefty price hikes in addition to a £45 car-parking charge to encourage use of a free park-and-ride service. The flaw with this tactic was that while it was effective enough in slashing traffic volume at a stroke, it also guaranteed a stomping ticket revenue loss, Silverstone’s sole income. But, worse for Bain, he had the misfortune of

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.