Amid all the boom in Formula 1's popularity from the thrilling 2024 title fight, there was one element that fell short of expectations from a revenue perspective: the Las Vegas Grand Prix.
Lower than anticipated ticket sales and corporate hospitality take up were picked out by Liberty Media recently as a drag on overall race revenue - primarily because Vegas is promoted by F1 itself, so its profits are directly related to how many spectators it can get through the door.
But while new grands prix tend to suffer from a second-year drop in interest after the novelty factor of an inaugural event wears off, so 2024 was always going to be a challenge, F1 has not taken what happened lightly and is shaking up how it markets and sells the event.
Promotion and ticket sales have now become more integrated into F1's London offices, fan zones and hospitality experiences are being tweaked, grandstands expanded and F1 Academy is on the support bill.
But perhaps most significant for fans is that there has been a rethink about how ticket sales will be handled.
Where once the target seemed to be at the high-end of the pricing structure, now there is a much bigger push to provide better-value offerings.
The cheapest single day tickets will be on offer for $50, with a three-day general admission pass available for $400.
F1's chief commercial officer Emily Prazer, who is also president of the Las Vegas GP, says the approach now is almost the opposite to before.
That is because, in the past, prices initially started out high and discounts were made late on. Now, the cheapest tickets are going to be for the early birds.
"We've taken quite a hard look at the product mix and decided to make the race a little bit more accessible to a wider audience," explained Prazer.
"We've lowered the prices and created flexible payment plans, which will be interest-free, quite normal in US sports.
"And we are going to be guaranteeing our on-sale prices as the lowest possible price.
"I think everybody's seen that we've kind of flipped the model somewhat, where we've been lowering the prices closer to the race. This year, we're saying this is the absolute bottom entry price."
This is not to say that F1 is abandoning all the big-ticket offerings though. The most expensive package available is the Gordon Ramsay at F1 Garage experience that is on sale for $25,0000 plus taxes and fees.
Prazer admitted that there were some elements of the Las Vegas experience that F1 perhaps underestimated - such as that if people did not want to pay high prices for official hospitality there are plenty of other options to find a similar experience elsewhere.
"The challenge we're always going to have in Vegas is there are so many options outside of just our race track for people to enjoy the grand prix," she said.
"I know that Singapore and Monaco and others have the same issue, that you can have a very, very VIP experience by staying in a hotel room. So adjusting the product and the pricing is more lessons learned than it is supply and demand."
This is why there will be more focus on making sure official hospitality has better views of the track - with the Las Vegas F1 team now having two years of experience in understanding what customers will and will not pay for.
"Starting this we had zero data, zero database," added Prazer. "So everything we've done, we've had to acquire. We thought that that would be easier.
"So understanding what the demographic is for this grand prix is something that we now completely get, hence why there's a shift in product mix. But it's not necessarily less hospitality, it's probably more like what goes into the package.
"We all understand the European sentiment is food and drink first. I think the Vegas race and the audience want entertainment-led propositions versus food and drink-led propositions. So just shifting the mindset somewhat to understand the market we're in."
An earlier race
One of the other significant changes for 2025 is the timetable shifting forwards.
In a bid to minimise disruption to the Las Vegas Strip, as well as run at a more suitable time for European audiences, the race had previously started at 10pm local time, with practice and qualifying even later.
But that was not something that made teams and drivers happy, as it meant crazy long hours and night shifts at a time of the year when tiredness has already crept in.
For this year, F1 has brought the race forward by two hours.
Prazer said that the decision was triggered by F1 feedback, but is one that actually works well for Vegas too.
"We wanted to put the Formula 1 community first as it relates to the driver feedback and how taxing it is on the teams," she said. "That being said, we've had full support from each of the different stakeholders in Vegas.
"Obviously, we couldn't make the decision in isolation, we had to take the idea to them, and all of them approved it. The challenge is, if everything shifts two hours earlier, it just means that the roads are closed two hours earlier every day.
"That being said, it means they open two hours earlier every night, which means that, from their perspective as it relates to shift changes and restocking and everything else, it will be easier for the casinos as well."
A test bed for F1
While F1 has faced some challenges with the Las Vegas GP, it remains fully committed to the event.
It sees the pitfalls as a good learning experience, but also the positives that have come from it have given it bolder and better ideas for other events.
As Prazer said: "I think a great example of that was the confidence to produce F1 75 Live.
"If you think about it, based on the complexity of the production in Vegas, and how we pulled that off in year one with the opening ceremony, it meant that we felt that we were ready to take on such a mammoth task."
F1 feels too that even the value that Vegas brings to the championship cannot be viewed in simple isolation of the number of tickets it sells for that weekend.
"We feel that it has served as the halo effect for the sport," said Prazer. "I mentioned the test bed but also the global revenue that has been driven out of the Las Vegas Grand Prix is also significant.
"So with the integration [with the London offices], it means that we can also stop looking at it as just like this independent P&L [profit and loss], and look at it as it's serving to grow other commercial revenue streams for Formula 1.
"Ticket sales were softer, we've said that, but most year two events are. So that's where I think the ability to be really nimble and react to that, by creating products and pricing that actually resonates in the market, is probably something that we'll know more this year if we've got the data right."
