Ford vows to lead in fuel economy

[davidlane]

Ford Motor Co.'s president of the Americas, Mark Fields, on Tuesday said Ford would be dedicated to making its future vehicles "meet or beat the competition in fuel economy" in the face of $4-a-gallon gasoline, weak consumer confidence and plunging auto sales.

http://www.freep.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a...807230350/1014

[eurohazard]

Ford could help see it's goal by ditching the F-150! Seriously. Make everyone buy a Ranger (which does pretty well at the pump)..........or step up to a F-250/F-350 which are exempt from EPA fuel economy standards.

I understand the absurdity of my statement seeing how it's Ford's #1 product. But hey if you want to make lofty goals....

[EldoFan]

If they want to lead, they better resist the temptation to bet the farm on 'EcoBoost'.......

[Ming]

Well, at least for now Ford is pushing the same guzzling vehicles when it comes to incentives and marketing. I just got this in my inbox today:



Note the lack of small, 4-cylinder powered cars.

So if I currently own a Focus, you can get me into an F150 Super Crew or a Lincoln Town Car! My local Chevron station's gonna love me!

Let's hope they can wean themselves off of these "buy our SUVz!!!1!" type of desperate mailings (GM sends them to me as well) - because they are just going to reinforce the notion that what Ford really wants to sell you is not a new Fiesta, but still an SUV or large gas-slurping car.

[gregorypeter]

Originally Posted by Ming

Well, at least for now Ford is pushing the same guzzling vehicles when it comes to incentives and marketing. I just got this in my inbox today:



Note the lack of small, 4-cylinder powered cars.

So if I currently own a Focus, you can get me into an F150 Super Crew or a Lincoln Town Car! My local Chevron station's gonna love me!

Let's hope they can wean themselves off of these "buy our SUVz!!!1!" type of desperate mailings (GM sends them to me as well) - because they are just going to reinforce the notion that what Ford really wants to sell you is not a new Fiesta, but still an SUV or large gas-slurping car.

Incentives are used to boost sales of slow moving vehicles, yet you are surprised they sent you a letter highlighting the incentives on slumping vehicles. The Focus, Fusion and Escape are fuel efficient and have been selling well, so why would you expect them to have thousands off also?

[Saturn69]

Originally Posted by eurohazard

Ford could help see it's goal by ditching the F-150! Seriously. Make everyone buy a Ranger (which does pretty well at the pump)..........or step up to a F-250/F-350 which are exempt from EPA fuel economy standards.

I understand the absurdity of my statement seeing how it's Ford's #1 product. But hey if you want to make lofty goals....

I thought they were doing a smaller, more efficient F100?



GM needs an S-10/Sonoma sized truck again. Not everyone needs something the size of a Colorado or Silverado.

[Sinner]

Originally Posted by Saturn69

I thought they were doing a smaller, more efficient F100?

It's supposed to be 9/10ths the size of an F150, hardly a smaller truck, more like early 90's fullsize.

[wescoent]

Originally Posted by Sinner

It's supposed to be 9/10ths the size of an F150, hardly a smaller truck, more like early 90's fullsize.

More like 7/8ths.

You're right... think a 1998 F-150, and you have the idea. No V8 engines available though... just V6 and diesel.

[ericmvest]

Originally Posted by Ming

Well, at least for now Ford is pushing the same guzzling vehicles when it comes to incentives and marketing. I just got this in my inbox today:



Note the lack of small, 4-cylinder powered cars.

So if I currently own a Focus, you can get me into an F150 Super Crew or a Lincoln Town Car! My local Chevron station's gonna love me!

Let's hope they can wean themselves off of these "buy our SUVz!!!1!" type of desperate mailings (GM sends them to me as well) - because they are just going to reinforce the notion that what Ford really wants to sell you is not a new Fiesta, but still an SUV or large gas-slurping car.

A neighbor owns a current generation Toyota Camry and a Ford 500. He told me that he likes the 500 much better than the Camry and that the 500 got 30 mpg on a recent trip. The Taurus/500 gets good mileage considering its size.

[Ming]

Originally Posted by gregorypeter

Incentives are used to boost sales of slow moving vehicles, yet you are surprised they sent you a letter highlighting the incentives on slumping vehicles. The Focus, Fusion and Escape are fuel efficient and have been selling well, so why would you expect them to have thousands off also?

Where this gets a little tricky is with vehicles they obviously want to sell, vs. ones that they never promote, advertise or incentivize.

Take these three examples:

Ford Focus Wagon
Chevy Malibu Maxx
Chevy Colorado/GMC Canyon

I expressed interest in all of these at one point on the respective web sites. None of them sell or sold in particularly high numbers, and I never got a mailer on any of them. Ford salesman claimed that every time they ordered a Wagon, it would disappear quickly, but they were "hard to get" and he wanted to upsell me (and others, he admitted) into a more profitable Escape or Explorer anyway (so why would his purchasing guy buy them?)

So rather than "slow moving" you mean "heavily stocked and slow moving".

To the point where sometimes you wonder if they just kept churning them out of the factories (and dealers kept buying them), knowing full well that Ford/GM would need to heavily incentivize them, but still confident that they (both GM/Ford and the dealers) could turn the profits they wanted on these larger vehicles. As opposed to a smaller truck like the GMC Canyon, that they have made little attempt to market, advertise or "over" manufacture.

Commercials, mailers, e-mails --- they all try to tempt me into Yukons, Sierras, Lucernes, or in the case of Ford, Explorers and F-150s.

Meanwhile, I go to a GM lot and see 2 Canyons out of 100 Sierras. And it's not because the Canyons are selling like hotcakes. It's because the dealers are only ordering 2 at a time. Not GM's fault exclusively, but the Dealers know that the incentives on the small trucks stink, and as a result, what customers will want to buy them when put up against the mega-incentives on bigger trucks?

So by "slumping" you mean, once strong selling, heavily stocked and churned out whether people wanted them or not. Because Colorado/Canyon sales are still "slumping" along, and the Focus Wagon and Malibu Maxx were cancelled due to "slow sales", but GM and Ford did not churn them out like crazy and slap insane rebates on them.

I wonder how slow the sales would be on the Canyon/Colorado/Focus Wagon/Malibu Maxx had they seen the same sort of near constant fire sale status that we see on the big vehicles------and have been seeing for some years now, regardless of gasoline prices?

Just something to consider. We all know about the "built in rebates" and profits. But what do they really want to sell us?

[blank disk]

Originally Posted by Ming

Where this gets a little tricky is with vehicles they obviously want to sell, vs. ones that they never promote, advertise or incentivize.

Take these three examples:

Ford Focus Wagon
Chevy Malibu Maxx
Chevy Colorado/GMC Canyon

I expressed interest in all of these at one point on the respective web sites. None of them sell or sold in particularly high numbers, and I never got a mailer on any of them. Ford salesman claimed that every time they ordered a Wagon, it would disappear quickly, but they were "hard to get" and he wanted to upsell me (and others, he admitted) into a more profitable Escape or Explorer anyway (so why would his purchasing guy buy them?)

So rather than "slow moving" you mean "heavily stocked and slow moving".

To the point where sometimes you wonder if they just kept churning them out of the factories (and dealers kept buying them), knowing full well that Ford/GM would need to heavily incentivize them, but still confident that they (both GM/Ford and the dealers) could turn the profits they wanted on these larger vehicles. As opposed to a smaller truck like the GMC Canyon, that they have made little attempt to market, advertise or "over" manufacture.

Commercials, mailers, e-mails --- they all try to tempt me into Yukons, Sierras, Lucernes, or in the case of Ford, Explorers and F-150s.

Meanwhile, I go to a GM lot and see 2 Canyons out of 100 Sierras. And it's not because the Canyons are selling like hotcakes. It's because the dealers are only ordering 2 at a time. Not GM's fault exclusively, but the Dealers know that the incentives on the small trucks stink, and as a result, what customers will want to buy them when put up against the mega-incentives on bigger trucks?

So by "slumping" you mean, once strong selling, heavily stocked and churned out whether people wanted them or not. Because Colorado/Canyon sales are still "slumping" along, and the Focus Wagon and Malibu Maxx were cancelled due to "slow sales", but GM and Ford did not churn them out like crazy and slap insane rebates on them.

I wonder how slow the sales would be on the Canyon/Colorado/Focus Wagon/Malibu Maxx had they seen the same sort of near constant fire sale status that we see on the big vehicles------and have been seeing for some years now, regardless of gasoline prices?

Just something to consider. We all know about the "built in rebates" and profits. But what do they really want to sell us?

Those three vehicles qualify as ugliest in the last decade.

[uvaeeman]

Originally Posted by Ming

Well, at least for now Ford is pushing the same guzzling vehicles when it comes to incentives and marketing. I just got this in my inbox today:



Note the lack of small, 4-cylinder powered cars.

So if I currently own a Focus, you can get me into an F150 Super Crew or a Lincoln Town Car! My local Chevron station's gonna love me!

Let's hope they can wean themselves off of these "buy our SUVz!!!1!" type of desperate mailings (GM sends them to me as well) - because they are just going to reinforce the notion that what Ford really wants to sell you is not a new Fiesta, but still an SUV or large gas-slurping car.

I saw a commercial this morning from one of our Ford Dealers that said that customers can get F-150's starting at $11995 now. Jeez! I wonder how many miles you have to drive before exceeding the cost of a more expensive but more efficient car, like the Malibu or maybe even the corolla....

[ChevroletRevived]

Originally Posted by Ming

But what do they really want to sell us?

Trucks and SUV's! Because they make the most money.

[Chaz_23]

Lutz said the same thing a while back. So we'll see.
I sure hope that these great plans and the fantastic revolution at form that PDL mentions also includes a new Ranger. Remember that one? Remember when the big 3 had decent small trucks?

[gardnet1]

Originally Posted by wescoent

More like 7/8ths.

You're right... think a 1998 F-150, and you have the idea. No V8 engines available though... just V6 and diesel.

7/8ths may not sound like much but it is like going from an F-150 to a Tacoma, and with the lightweight materials and ecoboost the difference in mileage will be significant. Plus just like all trucks it will be able to hold sheets of plywood without a problem.

The F-100 and the revamped and hopefully smaller new Ranger (or F-50) will position Ford well with a line up that stretches from a Ranger all the way up to a hulking F-450. Also two new diesels are on the way...6.7l Scorpion and 4.4 liter.