The Rich Energy saga
Sometimes reality is more interesting than anything you can find on TV. Rich Energy and their sponsorship of the Haas F1 team has become a soap opera on the biggest scale.
Back in 2018, when the Force India F1 team had gone into administration, a company that almost nobody had heard of submitted a bid to buy the F1 team. This bid was nearly successful but the group overseeing the administration ultimately decided not to take the Rich Energy buy out and instead sold the team to a consortium led by Canadian billionaire, and father of F1 driver Lance Stroll, Lawrence Stroll. Very quickly after that Rich Energy attempted to become the new title sponsor for the Williams F1 team. With the departure of long term sponsor Martini, Williams were keen to get a new title sponsor lined up. However after doing their due diligence it was decided by Claire Williams that they would partner with RoKit instead.
Rich Energy, not one to give up, then contacted the Haas F1 team who had been solely sponsored by Gene Haas himself up until that point. Ultimately Haas F1 decided to partner with Rich Energy, though to much outrage online. Next to nobody had ever heard of Rich Energy, let alone drank their drink and so many people speculated that the company didn’t actually exist and that the sponsorship would fall apart very quickly. Surprisingly the Rich Energy Haas F1 team showed up in Barcelona for winter testing with the Rich Energy logos on their cars.
Shortly after the F1 season began a UK company called Whyte Bikes filed a petition in the courts to have Rich Energy stop using the deer antler logo as it was nearly identical to its own logo. The courts sided with Whyte Bikes and gave Rich Energy until August 1 to either deliver all infringing products to Whyte Bikes, destroy the products or alter them so they are no longer infringing. In addition Rich Energy was ordered to stop using the stag logo in the UK and to pay £35,000 to Whyte Bikes within 14 days.
On July 10, seemingly out of nowhere just days before the British Grand Prix, a tweet was made by Rich Energy that they were terminating the Haas F1 sponsorship contract due to poor performance. The seemed to have also surprised the Haas F1 team as well as the team later released a statement indicating that the sponsorship agreement was still in place. It is very unusual for these types of sponsorship issues to be done in the public forum rather than behind closed doors.
Days after the tweet had gone out, it became apparent that Haas F1 had taken this seriously. For unknown reasons Mr. Storey shared legal documents from the Haas F1 solicitors indicating that they have accepted the contract break, although not because of any performance clauses as Mr. Storey had indicated. Haas also indicated that they will now be seeking the remaining £35M from the contract to be paid out within 14 days.
Seeing as how Rich Energy has not yet paid out the £35,000 fine to Whyte Bikes, it’s probably safe to assume that they won’t be paying out the sum that is 100x more.
Interestingly enough Rich Energy founder and (former?) CEO William Storey admitted in court that Rich Energy had purchased 90 million cans, although had not yet filled or sold them.
In another strange twist Rich Energy has made a statement indicating that the rights to the distribution of Rich Energy drinks has been transferred to another company that is allegedly controlled by William Storey. No additional information has been shared about this other company.
At the same time UK filings indicate that William Storey has been removed from Rich Energy as a Person with significant interest as replaced by someone named Matthew Kell as well as the Rich Energy company being renamed to Lightning Volt. The really odd part is that Rich Energy appears to have changed their trading address to the same address as a company in London called the BDG Group, a company that allegedly helps companies with their financial problems. However, looking at the website of the BDG Group it seems like a somewhat questionable organization.
Red Bull seems to now want to take Rich Energy to court. It’s very odd that Rich Energy’s Twitter account released the court filing. This is just the latest of new legal trouble for Rich Energy and William Storey as just a few days prior to this it had emerged that Mr. Storey had not transferred shares in Rich Energy to another company as had been promised in exchange for services.
The Rich Energy saga is a long ways from being over, but in the meantime I’ll be sitting over here with my popcorn waiting.
