Ford Confirms Shutdown of Mercury Brand; Final Production This Year
By Bill Visnic June 2, 2010Ford Motor Co. confirmed today it will eliminate its Mercury sales division. The decision came after an extensive business and product review Ford conducts every spring and was approved by Ford's board of directors at its regularly scheduled June meeting today.
The decision comes as the Ford brand has strengthened and the automaker instead looks to accelerate the Lincoln brand. Ford will take Mercury personnel and resources and focus them entirely on Lincoln, which will get new products -- seven all new or significantly freshened vehicles in the next four years.
The shutdown of Mercury apparently will happen quickly, as Ford officials say the last Mercury vehicles will be produced in the fourth quarter this year.
Mark Fields, Ford's President of the Americas, noted that Mercury captures only .8 percent of the U.S. market, and its share has been in decline. In contrast, the Ford brand has gained 2.2 percentage points of U.S. market share so far this year.
"The gains that Ford has made just this year amounts to twice Mercury's market share," Fields noted.
Ford has 1,712 dealers with the Mercury franchise. Of those, 925 are Ford-Lincoln-Mercury; 276 are Lincoln-Mercury and 511 are Ford-Mercury. There are no standalone Mercury dealerships.
Ford said will contact all of the 1,712 Mercury dealers over the next 24 to 36 hours. The FLM dealers are likely happy about the decision. The LM dealers likely are not - only some will be able to maintain as standalone Lincoln dealers. Fields acknowledged Ford will compensate those dealers or help them find a Ford franchise to add to Lincoln.
Lincoln, meanwhile, will present select new technologies and will see an expansion of the EcoBoost engine family, as Derrick Kuzak, group vice president of global product development, said the brand also will have exclusive access to a new V-6, giving no further details other than to tell reporters to consider available technologies and displacement.
Lincoln's expansion will include its first-ever C-segment vehicle, which could be similar to the unique but rather hazily-defined C Concept Lincoln unveiled at the 2009 Detroit auto show. The C Concept was based on the Ford Focus platform and fronted an advanced suite of connectivity and communication features.
Fields said Lincoln's focus will be on North America, primarily the U.S., as it expands and accelerates. However, he didn't rule out global expansion in the future. - Michelle Krebs, senior analyst and editor at large
Photos by Ford
1. Mercury Milan Hybrid likely to be one of the segment's shortest-lived models.
2. Lincoln C Concept
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I am curious about that "new" Lincoln V6. Maybe something on the order of 3.0L to compete with GM's downsized V6?
Lincoln-Mercury has less than 300 Dealers that are not part of a Ford franchise already. There are no solo Mercury dealers anymore.
In my opinion,Mercury's demise started when FoMoCo moved it down-market closer to Ford and farther from Lincoln in the late 70's. After that they became more or less trim packages of Fords, with a few exceptions like the Australian built Capri 2-seater and the Contour/Mystique-based Cougar.
I see the logic in dropping Mercury, though. In my small sampling of one case I bought a 2009 Mariner off our local Ford/Lincoln-Mercury lot because we liked the color better than the Escapes they had on hand. I imagine that many Merc sales are similarly "inbred".
Lincoln used to be its own deal just as Cadillac was at GM, and to only slightly a lesser extent, the Imperial at Mopar. The timelessly styled 1961-1966 Continental was virtually hand built and cost well over thee times as much as a Ford Galaxy; Would FoMoCo dare build an $80,000 Lincoln today?
Maybe a carbon fiber monocoque base 4-seater, sub-three liter V12 Ecoboost motor, and, of course, suicide doors.
The Reality? A Four cylinder Focus with a split wing grille and a $7000 bump in MSRP for Bridge of Weir Leather.
With websites like Edmunds.com and http://www.ford.com/ it's simple for a consumer to "Build & Price" a Taurus Limited or SHO-vs-Lincoln MKS and see that all of the important options are available on the Taurus for about $7000 less than the MKS. Same base car, no exclusivity. It could be tough sleddin' for a dealer with 6,000 mi Town Car rental returns on the same lot with twice the motor and half the price of the 2012 'C' Concept (MKC?).
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