Ouch. The Summer of Detroit's Discontent (not to mention everyone else's) continues to hammer the worst laid plans of truck-heavy automakers. And while everyone gives FoMoCo CEO Alan Mulally credit for being the most "realistic" of The Big 2.8's helmsmen, he ought to have a word with his PR department. Do they really think headlining their all-caps press release "FORD FOCUS CONTINUES TO SURPRISE, OUTPACE SEGMENT" is going to distract anyone from the fact that Dearborn's darlings' overall sales are down by 14.7 percent versus last year? On second thought [via The Detroit News]… "Car sales were up 7.8% in July compared to a year ago. Meanwhile, sales were down 7.8% for crossovers, 54.4% for SUVs and 18.1% for pickups and vans." FYI, Focus sales (a horrible car by my snobby estimation), totaled 15,200 units. Toyota shifted 34,438 Corolla's in the same time period. Just sayin'.
Click here for Ford's sales press release
(Note: The numbers in the press release are adjusted for sales days, so they will vary from the unadjusted numbers reported here.)
I’ve never been in a Focus, but I like its exterior. I like the Fusion too; they’ve got a bit of uniqueness about them that makes them pop a bit more than the typical volume compact/mid-size.
I see them a lot more often than Corollas.
Selective perception perhaps?
Actually, for the market, not bad at all. If the current craptastic Focus sells so well, Ford might actually come out on top of this pile. They really need the Fiesta over here, though – it’ll give them a full yet well-segmented car lineup. Subcompact, compact, midsize, and full-size. Compared to GM’s overstuffed lineup, or Chrysler’s lack of thereof, Ford will be the most coherent, well-rounded domestic make.
F-series at 44,829 almost outsold all of Ford cars. After a quick scan of incoming sales charts, it appears that the pickup has its sales crown back.
I’ve never driven a Focus, but if it’s got even one iota of personality, then I’d take it over my wife’s Corolla. Admittedly, the Corolla is the best appliance on 4 wheels that we’ve owned, just boring as all get-out. The earlier Focuses looked better IMO. The latest one is strange.
Anyone, are Focuses fun to drive?
toxicroach, I think the Corolla is so bland and ubiquitous, most of us selectively ignore them.
It was just announced GM sales were down over 26%. GM has lost almost $70 billion dollars since 2004 and a big piece of the market. Just a staggeringly bad performance.
Richard Chen – Ford may have been able to move 44,829 F-series trucks but at what cost? The incentives on these are murderous and mainly designed to clear stock rather than generate income – just look at Ford and GMs quarterly reports.
It all comes down to profit. A sales increase means nothing if it comes at $0 profit or a loss per unit.
Ford needs to update and bring back the Escort ZX2 coupe. If they were still selling a hot little coupe like that, I would have definitely considered it. I liked that styling much more than any of their current offerings.
Richard Chen:
F-series at 44,829 almost outsold all of Ford cars. After a quick scan of incoming sales charts, it appears that the pickup has its sales crown back.
Rumours of its death is greatly exaggerated.
dastanley :
August 1st, 2008 at 2:15 pm
I’ve never driven a Focus, but if it’s got even one iota of personality, then I’d take it over my wife’s Corolla. Admittedly, the Corolla is the best appliance on 4 wheels that we’ve owned, just boring as all get-out. The earlier Focuses looked better IMO. The latest one is strange.
Anyone, are Focuses fun to drive?
The Focus isn’t a bad drive by econobox standards. The engine doesn’t have a lot of power, but it has enough, and though I wouldn’t call it sporty, it isn’t completely lifeless either. It is laid out very well ergonomically on the inside, and while the interior isn’t stylish, in black it is somewhat attractive. Interior trim bits do fall off from time to time if rubbed against the wrong way, but they always snap right back into place easily.
The Focus is not a drivers car like the Mazda3, but it isn’t a pure appliance like the Corolla either. It’s economical, easy, and a little fun.
To shed some light on those numbers:
Focus – Ford started the month with 16,000 and ended with even less as they started production of the 2009 Focus in July, and it disrupted supply a little. The 2009s just started shipping this week, I believe. They also noted that the Focus now has two lobes in its demographics – one young (25-40) and one typical and old (50-60). The old Focus had mostly the 50-60 lobe. However, the emergence of the new lobe has been driven by places like the NE by customer who are paying higher transaction prices, almost always getting SYNC and are younger than Focus’ overall demographics nationwide.
Escape – Ford rebalanced production of the 2009s to reflect higher demand for four-cylinder models. As a result, they are selling every 2009 that hits the lots and are stuck with a bunch of 2008 V6s. Read: Expect some fire sales this month on Escape V6s.
Fusion – ditto Escape. Fusion and Mustang strength was driven partly by fleet sales as Ford tends to release some into fleets right after Job1 for quality and marketing purposes. On fleet more generally, Pipas had said back in Jan or Feb that H2 would have flat fleet sales overall after falling like 35% in 2007. He mentioned again that there would be some months with higher fleet and some months with lower – July was up, he implied August would be lower versus last year and September would be higher again. The higher Q3 fleets were, again, due to Job1’s being earlier this year than last (Fusion, Mustang, Escape, Focus all had Job1 in the last two months – I think Taurus is this month – 2010 Taurus and MKS are supposedly Apr 27 next year, FYI).
Flex – Contrary to wild speculation, the Flex only had 500 units in stock at the beginning of the month and is only just now up to a couple thousand. Not all dealers even have one yet. Only 20% of CUV shoppers have heard of the Flex – much lower than is typical of models. Their national campaign starts in September, implying they’re not worried until then. Interestingly, Flex was the #7 search on Yahoo’s top searches this month – the highest auto, knocking out the Prius.
MKS – MKS had even lower inventory at the start of the month – 100 units or so – and is still not at a 30-day supply.
Inventories are flat with last year. The F-series inventory declined from 210,000 to 190,000. They didn’t break out F-150 data. George Pipas warned everyone that those numbers will start falling a lot in the months ahead as Ford’s truck supply gets realigned with truck demand (ie – the plants are idled).
As far as truck sales, the statement was that Ford is “taking care of their own” in this downturn – the implication being that they will offer what they need to to keep their loyal buyers happy and aren’t actively chasing conquests right now. That implies to me that we won’t be seeing the same 50% off MSRP sales that some Dodge dealers are hosting.
Ford’s take on the lease business is this: everyone is going to have to curtail leasing – from Ford to Honda. If not in stoppages like Chrysler, than through the worsening of terms like Ford, the luxury makes and even Toyota and Honda. Farley believes this will expose more underlying rebates among the auto companies as they try to keep sales and will make the landscape even more difficult as far as net pricing and residuals for everyone. Ford has no plans to stop offering leases to anyone – just adjustments to residuals. Which basically means that Explorer buyers can’t lease any more, but no one is buying any Explorers right now, really. Farley stressed that Lincoln is good to go.
Most disturbingly – they’re sticking to their full-year 14-14.5 million unit industry sale mark. That means that even if Ford’s high-end is true, the industry will shrink 10% in the second half. If Ford’s low-end is true, the industry will shrink nearly 17% in the second half. Yikes!
In this environment a sales decline less than Toyota’s is some kind of an accomplishment, especially when your sales mix is normally as truck heavy as Ford’s. Down is still bad, but down less than the strongest competitor in the business is at least a momentary consolation prize.
I think the biggest thing the Focus has going for it is the Microsoft Sync system. I can see a young person choosing between a Civic, Corolla or Focus going with the Focus simply because it allows her to control her ipod and cell phone via voice commands and it can even read her text messages to her while she drives.
I’d prefer a Civic Si, but everytime I’m stuck in traffic I’d wish I had that Sync system.
Funny how Ford…really verges on lying to make their press releases sound good.
Take the stupid Focus babble talked about in the TTAC article. Did Ford not realize that the Cobalt outsold it this month???
P71_CrownVic :
August 1st, 2008 at 4:58 pm
Did Ford not realize that the Cobalt outsold it this month???
At least down here, a lot of that is due (as RobertSD said) to production issues.
I know my dealership would have sold a higher number of Focusses (Focii?) if we had any inventory. As it is, we have swung from 50 – 60 units a couple months ago to only around 10 units now, and almost all of those are low line S models with crank windows and manual locks. We are actively working to get more SE and SES units, but as those are selling most other dealers aren’t willing to part with them.
I bet that the Ford’s decline for the month wouldn’t have been half as bad if it weren’t for Volvo sales falling off a cliff: They are down more than 50% this month according to your best friends at Autoblog. Only Hummer is down more. Lincoln did well though, as they were the second best Luxury brand of the month: They are down 8.8%, beaten only by Mercedes-Benz, whose sales are actually up 3%.
If I were Ford, I would be looking to sell Volvo to the first corporation dumb enough to make an offer.
“… Volvo sales falling off a cliff ….”
I really hope this isn’t the death-knell for a company which once had a distinctive niche/voice in the auto industry. Volvo, IMO, went off the rails when it started chasing fashion and stopped being the thinking person’s rational choice. That transformation started pre-Ford and has continued ever since. Today there really is no distinctive brand message to a Volvo. Safety features are found everywhere and Volvo’s durability is no better than a Lexus or Acura, perhaps worse.
If Volvo isn’t the safest and most durable “near luxury” priced car available, what is it?
John Horner: Racing Saab for the Swedish graveyard?
Geotpf: Volvo won’t even win that. Saab is already in the grave, they just need someone to close the casket.
Volvo still has a chance. I think that they need to do like Mercedes-Benz and release a new car that is of the same formula of that of yesteryear. M-B released the new C-class, which brings back M-B’s classic formula of making cars that are rugged and overengineered. Volvo needs to do the same, and make a car that is conservatively styled, somewhat luxurious, extremely safe, and on top of it all, completely bulletproof.
I would liken Volvo to Jaguar. They have declined in recent years, but it is nothing that a blockbuster new product can’t fix. Jaguar went from one foot in the grave to being back in game almost overnight with the release of the XF.
However, I think that Volvo needs either to find a new parent or go independant again before this happens.
They could advertise the fact that they are the only Swedish automaker, because Saab is beyond saving. GM fucked them up grandly.
Some time ago I was hoping for a patriotic Swedish industrialist to snatch up both Volvo and Saab in order to once again build unique vehicles with a distinctively Scandinavian point of view. But alas, no Brave Viking Warrior has ridden forth. Now I fear it is simply too late to save the day.
Runfromcheney (good advice, that): “I would liken Volvo to Jaguar. They have declined in recent years, but it is nothing that a blockbuster new product can’t fix.”
Are you sure they don’t have it? The new V70 is gorgeous.