Few brands have boosted their profiles during the past two years more than Formula 1 and Miami. This weekend, the two are linking up in what’s expected to be a bacchanal of booze, gasoline, and probably not enough suntan lotion.

Formula 1 is hosting the Miami Grand Prix tomorrow, marking the first time an F1 race will be held in the city. And the timing is impeccable: Americans’ interest in the racing league, which has typically been most popular among Europeans and South Americans, has never been higher.

• US TV ratings for races jumped 54% in 2021 over the previous year.
• And viewership for the first two races of this year was 47% higher than in 2021.

Many credit the jump in American fandom to Netflix’s behind-the-scenes docuseries Drive to Survive, which has turned drivers like Max Verstappen into household names and given your friend the confidence to complain about Mercedes’s “porpoising” problems after watching just two episodes.

But another key factor was the 2017 acquisition of F1 by Liberty Media, a Colorado-based entertainment conglomerate that’s transformed the racing championship into a drama-soaked, made-for-TV spectacle Americans can’t turn away from.

Speaking of spectacle…

The race itself is going to be very Miami, which is to say—not everything you see will actually be real. The organizers created a marina inside the track, but the “water” is just a graphic that’s been slapped on the ground.

The hype, though, is real. More than 300,000 people are expected to arrive in Miami for the Grand Prix, and travel and spending levels are expected to top the Super Bowl in 2020 and the annual Art Basel festival. Some Miami hotels are charging more than $100,000 per night for a suite. The race’s sponsor—and you’re going to be totally shocked when you hear this—is Crypto.com.

• There is a bit of intrigue leading up to the race. Lewis Hamilton, the sport’s biggest star, said he may sit out the Grand Prix if the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA), the governing body of F1, enforces its ban on drivers wearing jewelry while in the car.

Looking ahead…if you think the Miami Grand Prix is going to be a party, wait until you hear where the newest F1 race will be held in 2023: Las Vegas, where a section of the track will be located on the Strip. With Vegas on the calendar, the US will host more F1 races than any other country in a given year.—NF

Used car prices are finally beginning to reflect used cars. Wholesale used-vehicle prices dropped for the third straight month in March, and are now down 6.4% from their peak. Used car prices symbolized soaring inflation when they went vertical last year; that they’re deflating now is potentially a sign that inflation has really peaked.

The Kentucky Derby is this evening. The 148th edition of the iconic horse race will begin at 6:57pm ET sharp on NBC. One notable absence: Bob Baffert, who was suspended for two years by Churchill Downs after the horse he was training, Medina Spirit, tested positive for a banned substance post-Derby win last year.

That is not sugar. Swiss police seized more than 500 kilograms ($51 million worth) of 80%-pure cocaine that had apparently been destined for the European market but ended up at a Nespresso plant. Rest assured, your morning brew will remain regular-strength because the coffee beans had not been contaminated by the drug, Nespresso said.

Starbucks is feeling very left out, and not just because everyone’s getting into kombucha. After Starbucks union organizers met with President Biden and other Washington A-listers on Thursday, the company sent an angry letter to the White House requesting its own meeting, saying, “We are deeply concerned that Workers United…was invited to the meeting while not inviting official Starbucks representatives.”

From the tone, you can tell that the president’s show of support for the unionization efforts has the coffee company more anxious than someone who chugged a red-eye at 8pm.

• More than 40 Starbucks locations have unionized since December, and new/old CEO Howard Schultz, who was brought on to repair the company’s relationship with its employees, hasn’t been effective thus far.
• This week, Schultz said Starbucks would invest $200+ million to improve working conditions, but warned unionized stores that they might not see any of that cash.

Starbucks isn’t the only Seattle-based giant trying to fend off organizing efforts. While Amazon defeated a unionization drive at a second Staten Island facility, it’s still making headlines at the first. The e-commerce company fired half a dozen senior managers from that location—many of whom worked to unionize the warehouse just a month earlier.—MM

Would you rather buy a Gucci belt for $495 or 2.5 million shiba inu coin? Soon, the choice will be yours. Gucci will start accepting $SHIB—as well as more than 10 other cryptocurrencies—at select stores later this month and nationwide this summer as part of the luxury sector’s wider push into crypto.

• How it’ll work: In-store shoppers who want to reinvest their bitcoin into a crossbody will be emailed a QR code that allows them to complete the transaction using their crypto wallets.

Big picture: Gucci was the first luxury brand to mint an NFT—a film that sold for $25k last June. But it’s playing catch-up to other luxury brands that have rushed to accept crypto for goods:

• Off-White announced in March that its flagship stores started taking crypto as payment.
• Philipp Plein is one-upping its peers by building a London store where customers can pay in crypto, browse an NFT gallery, and upgrade certain purchases with a corresponding NFT they can wear in the virtual world of Decentraland.

Bottom line: A collab between luxury brands and crypto may be the best match since jazz and rain, because both rely on hype and clout.—JW

Stat: For the fifth year in a row, Liam was the most popular name for boys in the US, and Olivia scored the No. 1 spot for girls for the third year running, per the Social Security Administration. Just for the heck of it, we scrolled back to 1922 and the top five names for girls were: Mary, Dorothy, Helen, Margaret, and Ruth.

Quote: “If I knew that working at TikTok would cost me this much, I would never have taken the job.”

Former US TikTok employees told the WSJ that the social media company’s work culture is about as intense as a six-part Shein haul from someone named @ieatworms420. Some ex-employees said they were in meetings for an average of 85 hours per week. China-owned TikTok employs about 1,500 people in the US, but after explosive growth over the last year it’s planning to hire 9,000+ more.

Read: An excellent piece from our colleague Ashwin on the surge in ransomware attacks. (Morning Brew)

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Vids that will make you smile: 1) Running around like you’re in a video game and 2) when colleges ask for an alumni donation

Weekend conversation starters:

• What dinner will look like in the next 100 years
• How many bananas would you need to power a house?
• How a mechanical watch works
• What can we deduce from a leaked PDF