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Max Verstappen will lose one of his longtime personal backers – the Jumbo supermarket chain – at the end of the current season.
Verstappen and Jumbo began their successful partnership during the Red Bull driver's Formula 3 days.
The company was rocked last year by allegations of money laundering by its former CEO Frits van Eerd, a close friend of the Verstappen family, who stepped down from his role last October.
New CEO Ton Van Veen now intends to steer the company in a different direction and away from sports sponsorship.
"Max is a folk hero, of course, but he acts on the absolute world stage," Van Veen
told Dutch newspaper Algemeen Dagblad.
"We are a very good food retailer, but only in the Netherlands and a bit in Belgium. We invest more than 20 million euros in sports sponsorship every year, but I can only spend every euro once.
"We cannot return the money that goes to Max to the customer, or put it into sustainability or health."
Unfortunately, Jumbo's change of direction also means that the company will no longer sponsor F1's Dutch Grand Prix at Zandvoort after this year's edition, as well as the Jumbo-Visma professional cycling team.
"We don't want anything to do with motorsport and suspicions," added Van Veen. "With Max Verstappen and Jumbo-Visma we stop for a completely different reason.
"That sponsorship has brought us a lot of brand awareness, but we have now won everything there is to be won."
Verstappen's manager Raymond Vermeulen paid tribute to the two-time world champion's long-standing sponsor.
"The Van Eerd and Jumbo family have supported Max from day one. That could certainly be called very unique at the time. We look back on a fantastic collaboration," he told De Telegraaf.
"After ten years, it's not at all strange to recalibate the matter. Above all, we are very grateful and look back on all these years with great pleasure.
"This year we can hopefully get a third world title together and close it with a bang."
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