Quote:

A bit more Baugur at Williams
Hamleys, the celebrated London toy emporium, has extended its sponsorship of the Williams F1 team. The Hamleys logos will now been seen on the sidepods of the cars. The company, which is owned by Icelandic investment group Baugur, has supported Williams since 2004 and says that the sponsorship has been a great success.

The company is in the process of trying to establish a global presence with the aim being to one day have Hamleys stores in all the major cities in the world. Hamleys has already opened five concessions in House of Fraser stores, three in Danish retailer Magasin - both chains which are also owned by Baugur, in addition to two factory outlet stores, and seven airport and train station shops. In the next few weeks Hamleys will open stores in Dubai, UAE and Jordan and is in discussion with potential partners in India, Singapore, Turkey and China. There is also talk of expanding to UK cities and there will be more airport and station stores and further concessions in other stores. The aim is to treble turnover in the next three to five years and F1 is obviously an important part in that process.

Hamleys is one of London's top 10 tourist attractions and is visited by four million people each year.

Williams is another British institution and has backing from several other Baugur companies.

[www.grandprix.com]