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Lazy certainly seems a good choice of words.
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Facer and his commercial director came from a football/rugby background where (broad brush strokes here) very few people have ethical concerns about the source of sponsorship. What they failed to appreciate is that a lot of BC members do have ethical concerns, so it looks from the outside that they went for the easy money options rather than seeking funding from strategically aligned sponsors.
CargoJono
andyp
@Greenbank
The problem with all things like this is the false dichotomy they use to justify the bad decision. It's as if they are saying:
"Without Shell's grubby money British Cycling wouldn't be able to do anywhere near as much as it does now, therefore anyone who disagrees with Shell's sponsorship wants grass roots cycling to be punished."
The truth is that the same money from a more ethical sponsor would be just as good for cycling. It wasn't a choice of "Shell's grubby money or nothing".
It's just that getting that same sponsorship money elsewhere is almost certainly going to be harder work than getting it from Big Oil who are more than happy to splash the cash to help their greenwashing plans.
In other words, BC were just lazy and took the easy less ethical option.