Can You Sell Formula 1 (F1) Merchandise on Etsy? Trademark & Licensing Rules for 2026

The Brad Pitt F1 movie crossed $634 million worldwide in 2025, becoming the highest-grossing racing film of all time and Apple's biggest box-office release ever. Predictably, Etsy filled up with grid-graphic tees, driver-number keychains, "box box box" mugs, and Grand Prix decals. Just as predictably, Formula 1's lawyers noticed.

If you sell — or are thinking about selling — anything Formula 1 themed on Etsy, this is the post to read before you list. Formula One ran one of the most aggressive merchandise-enforcement campaigns of 2025, and "handmade" gives you no special protection. Here's exactly what's protected, what the recent lawsuits mean for small sellers, and how to build a racing-inspired shop that doesn't get swept up in a takedown.

Short version: "F1," "FORMULA 1," the team names, the driver names, and the circuit logos are all owned by someone. Unless you have a written licence, selling merchandise that uses them is trademark infringement — even if you made it yourself, and even if you call it "fan art" or "inspired by."

Who actually owns "Formula 1"?

The Formula 1 brand isn't one trademark — it's a dense thicket of them, held by Formula One Licensing B.V. and Formula One World Championship Limited (the commercial-rights entities now under Liberty Media). Their registered and common-law marks include:

• The word marks "F1," "FORMULA 1," and "FORMULA ONE"
• The F1 logo (the stylised red "F1" device adopted in 2018)
• Grand Prix event branding — names and logos tied to specific races (Las Vegas Grand Prix, Miami Grand Prix, etc.)
• "Paddock Club," "Pirelli Hot Laps," and other sub-brands

On top of that, every team layers its own intellectual property: Scuderia Ferrari, Oracle Red Bull Racing, Mercedes-AMG Petronas, McLaren, and the rest each own their team names, logos, liveries, and colour trade dress. And every driver owns their name, image, and likeness — selling a "Max Verstappen" or "Lewis Hamilton" keychain implicates right-of-publicity law on top of any trademark issue. (We cover that overlap in our guide to selling athlete NIL merchandise.)

The practical takeaway: a single F1-themed product can infringe three or four different rights holders at once — the F1 commercial entity, a team, a driver, and sometimes a sponsor.

The 2025 enforcement wave: why small sellers should care

For years, F1 enforcement felt like a problem for trackside counterfeiters, not Etsy crafters. That changed in 2025, and the mechanics matter because they're designed to catch online sellers specifically.

The Schedule A lawsuits. In May 2025, Formula One Licensing B.V. and Formula One World Championship Limited filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida against roughly 200 "John/Jane Doe" sellers and 100 Doe companies producing and selling counterfeit F1 merchandise around the Miami Grand Prix. These "Schedule A" cases — named after the long list of anonymous online-store defendants attached to the complaint — are the same litigation weapon used by Nike, Disney, and the plush brands. They're built for e-commerce: the rights holder gets an early temporary restraining order, then asks platforms and payment processors to freeze the sellers' accounts and funds before most defendants even know they've been sued.

The Las Vegas suits. Formula One also went after physical and wholesale supply, suing E & B Wholesalers Inc. in May 2025 over 516 merchandise items — T-shirts and hoodies bearing F1 trademarks — produced ahead of the Las Vegas Grand Prix, and separately suing Las Vegas gift shops over alleged fake Grand Prix gear. (That gift-shop matter was dismissed with prejudice in November 2025, but only after months of legal pressure.)

Why this should worry an Etsy seller: Schedule A cases don't distinguish between a warehouse counterfeiter and a hobbyist selling twelve grid-poster prints. If your listing is named in the schedule, your Etsy Payments balance and PayPal can be frozen by court order while you scramble to find an IP litigator. The cost and stress dwarf whatever you earned on the listings.

"But it's fan art / inspired by / handmade" — the myths

These are the rationalisations that get F1 sellers suspended. None of them are a legal defence.

"It's fan art." Fan art is still a derivative use of someone else's protected marks and brand identity. Etsy's Intellectual Property Policy lets any rights holder report it, and "I'm a fan" is not a licence. We break this myth down further in our Disney sellers guide — the analysis is the same for F1.

"I wrote 'inspired by' / 'not affiliated with F1.'" A disclaimer does not cure infringement. If consumers could believe the product is officially licensed — and a tee with the F1 logo absolutely creates that impression — the disclaimer is irrelevant under the Lanham Act's likelihood-of-confusion test. In some cases a disclaimer actually helps the rights holder prove you knew the mark wasn't yours.

"It's handmade, so the rules are different." They aren't. There is no handmade or small-business carve-out in trademark law. A hand-painted Ferrari-logo helmet ornament infringes exactly the way a mass-produced one does.

"I only used the team colours." Colours and livery can be protected as trade dress when they're distinctive enough to identify a team (think Ferrari red plus the prancing horse, or McLaren papaya). Pure colour alone is usually safe; colour combined with logos, sponsor layouts, or a recognisable car silhouette is where you cross the line.

What you can sell: the legal lane

Racing is a genuine aesthetic and a genuine hobby, and you can absolutely build a motorsport-adjacent Etsy shop without touching anyone's trademarks. The trick is to sell the vibe, the activity, and your own original art — never the brands.

Generic motorsport themes. Checkered-flag patterns, "race day" and "pit crew" slogans (as long as they're not registered marks), tire-track motifs, and original illustrations of unbranded cars are fair game. A "Sunday is for racing" tee with your own typography infringes nothing.

Descriptive location and event references — carefully. You can make a "Las Vegas race weekend" or "Miami race day" product that references the city and the activity without using the official Grand Prix logos or the F1 marks. Keep it descriptive, keep it generic, and never imply official affiliation.

Your own original characters and designs. Cartoon cars, an original racing mascot, hand-drawn helmet art that isn't a copy of a real driver's design — all yours to sell and even to register.

Properly licensed products. If you want to use real F1, team, or driver marks, you need a written licence from the relevant rights holder. F1 runs official licensing programmes, and licensed goods flow through the Official F1 Store and F1 Authentics (its memorabilia partner). Licensing is realistically out of reach for most individual Etsy sellers, which is exactly why the legal lane above matters.

Quick test before you list: Could a reasonable buyer think this came from F1, a team, a driver, or a sponsor? If yes — or if you had to use any official name, logo, number-plus-name combo, or livery to make the design "work" — don't list it.

A pre-listing compliance checklist

Before you publish any racing-themed product, run through this:

1. No protected word marks in the title, tags, or art — "F1," "Formula 1," "Formula One," "Grand Prix" used as a brand, team names, or driver names.
2. No logos or devices — the F1 logo, team badges, sponsor marks, or circuit logos.
3. No driver name/number/likeness combinations that identify a specific person (NIL/right-of-publicity exposure).
4. No team trade dress — distinctive livery-plus-logo combinations that point to one team.
5. Original art only — every graphic is something you created, not traced or AI-generated from official imagery.
6. Descriptive, not affiliative language — describe the activity or city, never imply you're official.
7. Search the USPTO for any slogan or phrase before you build a product line around it. Our trademark-search walkthrough shows you how.

If you've already been hit with a takedown

If Etsy has removed a listing or you've received an infringement notice tied to F1 content, don't panic and don't fire off an angry counter-notice. Read our guide to responding to an Etsy trademark violation notice first. The short version: a trademark complaint (unlike a DMCA copyright takedown) usually has no counter-notice process — your options are to comply, to negotiate with the rights holder, or to challenge it through Etsy if the complaint is genuinely baseless. Removing the infringing listings quickly and not re-listing them is what protects your shop from the strike pattern that leads to suspension.

If you receive anything that looks like a Schedule A federal complaint or a frozen Etsy/PayPal balance, treat it as urgent and get an IP attorney involved immediately — that is not a DIY situation.

The bottom line

Formula 1 is one of the fastest-growing sports brands in the United States, and 2025 proved its owners will spend real money to protect it — including with anonymous-defendant lawsuits and account freezes aimed squarely at online sellers. The opportunity for crafters is real, but it lives in original, generic, motorsport-inspired work, not in the official marks. Sell the checkered flag, the race-day energy, and your own art. Leave the logos to the licensees.

Want to know whether a specific listing is safe before it costs you your shop? ShieldMyShop scans your Etsy listings for trademark and IP risk and flags problems before a rights holder does. Start your free trial and list with confidence.