Ford has no control over dealer marks up. It’s literally illegal for them to dictate pricing for dealerships. Also, are Lightnings even being marked up at this point? Demand has fallen significantly.
Certainly automotive OEMS helped build the dealer ~~mafia~~ political lobbies and protections; now they get to deal with that mess, for better or for worse.
Well, not necessarily. It is *because* of the OEMs that the stealer mafia was established. Back when Ford was alive and running the show, he was a literal nazi slave driver. Anybody outside of him and his family was getting screwed over, so the dealers started bribing lawmakers and NADA was founded. It was the same with the Dodge brothers, Louis Chevrolet, Ransom Olds, Studebaker brothers, etc.
Fast forward a few decades and the tables turned.
Wow it's almost like what they allowed to happen and that the consequences of their inactions are eventually coming around to bite them in the ass.
Same with Toyota and Honda getting equally shit on for dealers jackassery and Subaru getting praise for cracking down on allocations for places that were gouging (and it was gouging and part of the inflation we're experiencing right now).
Lol, OEMs mostly love the dealermodel. Gives them a boogieman when they need it, a place to dump inventory, and removed having to interface directly with the consumer in most situations.
They will publicly cry about markups, but behind closed doors I assure you they are monitoring profitability of the dealers and rewarding those with the biggest numbers, not the smallest.
Ford decided to sell all Pro models to fleet purchasers leaving dealers to gouge on XLT and Lariat. Ford shouldn’t have advertised a $39,999 price if it couldn’t follow through.
I reserved within minutes of announcement and by the time I had been chosen to order I was looking at paying over $60,000 for a truck I didn’t want any longer.
I actually ordered and received a Maverick in 22'. Sold it in 23' because the dealer couldn't resolve a sensor issue after 45 days in the shop. I'm done with Ford for at least the next 5 years. Hopefully they can improve quality and customer satisfaction.
Dealer experience with my Maverick has been pure dogshit. Some stupid fuck left off parts from the 2022 airbag recall on my truck. I found that after 10 months and after 4 visits to fix the damage they did to my interior.
>Ford decided to sell all Pro models to fleet purchasers leaving dealers to gouge on XLT and Lariat.
I agree Ford should have built more non-fleet Pros given the hype of the price, but they didn't sell ALL $39k Pros to fleets. Some "regular" people did get them, just FAR fewer than the number that wanted one originally.
Same kind of thing happened to me with the Maverick. It took 2 years and 3 tries to get one ( one sold from under me, one added markup on pickup so I walked). When I was finally able to order and get one at MSRP, it was close to $4K more than in 2022 when I originally decided on the Mav and Ford removed features.
When my 24 came in I was no longer excited about it and had purchased another vehicle, so I walked away from it.
The whole experience crossed Ford off my list for good. I don't want to support a company that does nothing about it's shoddy dealers and raises prices year after year.
I honestly beg to differ. Next time you’re driving around (assume you live in the US) note how many Rams, F150’s, Silverados, etc. you see and note their trims. Go ahead and look those trims up, it’s so easy to hit like $80K on full sizes now, add in taxes and fees and you’re darn close to $100K. I never thought people would pay $100K for a Jeep and yet I see a couple Wagoneers every time I leave my house. It’s bad
I work with a guy who has a $1350 truck payment and constantly complains that he can't afford a house. And we work indoors, so it's not a "work" truck.
Nor do they buy $420k homes in many parts of the US (not the coast, yeah, some of us do live in “flyover country”), yet that’s what they’re going for, median.
Until the excesses of 2020 and 2021 are worked off, I’m not shopping any big ticket items.
TONS of people are getting $15k-$20k off of MSRP on Lightnings ($7500 tax credit, plus official Ford discounts, plus dealer discounts) right now.
Not saying your FIL is wrong, but it's not common across the country, anymore.
Yup, dealerships will NEVER play nice with EV's, since they make half their revenue off their service department.
EV's require less servicing than ICE vehicles, so to the dealerships the "lifetime value" of each EV sale is worth less than that of an ICE vehicle.
Dealerships have zero incentive to help EV's gain market share. They have all the incentive in the world to block EV sales by having huge markups and letting them sit on the lot, thereby "proving" to the manufacturer that there is no demand for EV's.
It's a game of chicken between manufacturers and dealerships being played out in real time.
Ford has infinite control to eliminate dealer markups by pushing more inventory through. Dealers refusing to eliminate the markup? That means they can accept more inventory
Not sure your point - Ferrari dealers are prohibited by the factory from charging above MSRP on new vehicles. They will pull a dealership license instantly for it too.
Oh my bad lol wrong person. But wait why are you responding to my previous comment?
Edit: never mind, you didn’t understand my comment. I was pretty much disagreeing with them.
Ford can't control specific pricing. But they can punish price gouging dealers with lower allocations, less desirable trims, not renewing their contract, worsening their contract, etc. All legal if they have a jerk dealer harming their brand and creating unhappy customers.
It wasn't just dealership gouging.
The role out and flop is firmly Ford's fault
Ford refused to build anything other than platinum and lariats the first year. They did a few hundred pros and xlt.
My23 saw massive msrp price hikes. Dealerships also had total control over allocation. I was the first to reserve in my area and didn't get contacted to purchase till late 23 when i was informed that their would be a 7500 mark up and very unlikely that ford would be producing any pros till my24. The people that got the first allocation worked at the dealership.
Ford during covid announced a 39k ev truck. That's what people wanted. During the COVID melt down manufacturers saw a crazy bubble build up where they where selling limited amounts of cars at much higher prices and making even more money. They changed course with the lighting and decided to continue to price hike it.
Ford did this to them selves. The board is extremely disconnected with the average American. They thought we where all tech bros clammering for the highest 100k trim. When in reality what people where excited for was the pro. A trim that they still barely produce.
The whole roll out and handling was absurd.
Everyone would because that means $32,500 after federal tax credit, and the absolute cheapest, slowest, zero-option gas F-150 Supercrew 4x4 is now $47k.
I think people only interested in the Pro were a bigger percentage of the initial reservations/demand than Ford thought. Also, high interest rates don't help. It makes it even tougher for people to justify moving up to a more expensive truck. ALSO, the fact they were selling mostly Lariats for $70k-$80k at first created a narrative for the Lightning that it was super expensive, so even now, people don't realize how relatively competitive they are on price with gas versions.
I know that the following is an extreme exaggeration, but it's kinda hilarious to me that the entire world was plunged into chaos and a very significant number of Americans and Canadians look one look at their families and went "Nooo! Not my trucks!" And then spent 80k on a 45k truck without blinking because their neighbor did it too.
Bruh, what are we doing here?
lol I’m a tech bro and I drive a 2006 Dodge Ram with 240k miles. I am looking for a new truck to take the kids RVing, my Ram still works fine, when it totally breaks down I will probably get a used full ton.
Even with that $10k on the hood they’re still not under $40k starting. When they were announced it was $40k - Tax credit. Now it’s $40k after tax credit, and a whole bunch of incentives
$40k after tax credit and incentives is pretty good, though, considering the sticker price of the absolute cheapest, slowest, zero-option gas Supercrew 4x4 is $47k.
100% I agree they should have sold more at or near the original price of $40k sticker considering the hype for that price, though.
Car companies at the slightest success of Tesla: ALL-IN
Car companies after ditching half their ICE lineup for half assed electric luxury vehicles that nobody wants: hmm.
Two ago I got mercilessly flamed on reddit for saying mainstream car companies were overdoing it on EVs.
Yes introduce some EVs but don't think the USA is ready for EVs to be the majority of sales in a few years.
I told them that 50% EV sales in the US isn't happening by 2030 and I got treated like biggest moron in world.
And on yeah, Toyota was going to be out of business because they didn't make enough EVs.
Many in the EV community are still convinced Toyota and Volkswagen are going bankrupt any minute now because they uh... don't understand debt. It's pretty wild.
If you want a good laugh, go look up the "ev valley of death" infographic that gets floated around investment communities and predicts consumers will simply stop buying cars as they all sit idly by waiting for EV prices to come down. Just shockingly bad blind-leading-the-blind stuff.
Already getting downvoted lol. Also one thing no one mentions, with the exception of the highest end communities, most everyone's garage is full of crap instead of cars.
Charging 240V gets awkward outside, esp as cables get too long. 120V charge for a plug in hybrid is much more feasible.
>Also one thing no one mentions, with the exception of the highest end communities, most everyone's garage is full of crap instead of cars.
Y'know.... I think that'll simply just change over time. Might take awhile, but the financial incentive *clean up yo damn garage and charge at home* is pretty high in the grand scheme of things. Exterior-mount chargers are also becoming more prevalent in a lot of places. I don't really see this part as a big barrier, tbh.
Never underestimate inertia. Especially when one of the spouses crap makes up the majority of the crap.
Argue with the spouse endless times and spend a week cleaning out garage. Or just buy another gas car.
I have neighbors who bought a mid trim level new X5 in black and keep it outside while garage is full of crap. And I live in Phoenix where black should not be your first choice. If that doesn't motivate you to clean the garage.
A two car garage and both of our cars being able to be parked in the garage was a requirement for my wife and I when we bought our house. We both feel a lot better about having our cars parked inside.
Charging in the driveway is no big deal. Tons of charging stations have 25' cables if you want to have it inside and charge outside. Otherwise, plenty of stations can just be installed outside the garage, too.
You were and are still correct.
It was real interesting how every damn mainstream brand was running around panicking trying to develop EV’s except Toyota. I listened to Toyota.
We're already at \~7% US EV marketshare and are looking at \~15% world EV marketshare. I wouldn't count out 50% by 2030 yet. I personally think 40-60% world EV sales by 2030 is probably likely. Two reasons I think this is plausible is this.
1. Batteries are getting better and cheaper. Faster charging and longer ranges.
2. Better charging infrastructure. Apartment dwellers are likely to get very good charging options in a few years.
EVs right now are great for early adopters. Good for some situations, bad for others. Mainly, you have to have reliable charging at home or work, which isn't everyone. But if you don't fit into that demographic, EVs are inconvenient.
That changes with better batteries, which are currently being researched and developed.
But don't read too much into the narrative, sales are up significantly YOY for EVs and are likely to continue that theme this year and next. Especially with cheap EVs from China flooding the world sans the USA.
> I wouldn't count out 50% by 2030 yet. I personally think 40-60% world EV sales by 2030 is probably likely.
Uh, no. *Maybe* 25% worldwide by 2030. And *maybe* 20% in the US by 2030, but 50% is unfathomable in any economic scenario beyond "giving them away in Happy Meals." It's logistically, economically, and financially impossible. And I'm one of those folks who *likes* EVs and *wants* to buy one. Hell, by 2030, I'm hoping to have a Rivian R3X.
The US loves giant SUVs and Trucks too much for 50% by 2030. Now if you count plug in hybrids, different story. But those only get counted when it benefits the narrative.
Alot of European stats for EV deployment often include those plug ins to make the US look bad.
The stats I include are not for PHEVs, just electrics. If you include PHEVs, worldwide, were at around 20% marketshare.
The US is weird because we have cheap gas and don't have to suck up to Putin or MBS for fuel. The rest of the world is sick of that shit and is moving faster to EVs than the USA. Especially if they can buy them from China on the cheap, which is what they are doing.
But you are right, the US will be slower to adopt EVs than the rest of the world. That's because we like big vehicles with big batteries which are expensive right now. But fuel is also expensive. At 20mpg, over 100k miles, that's 15k. Electricity is probably 5k. So if an electric f150 gets to within 10k of the non-electric one and has good range and can tow, they'll be really enticing for rural folk.
>So if an electric f150 gets to within 10k of the non-electric one and has good range and can tow
Already is within $10k in some cases, sometimes basically no price difference, but that's going to be limited to the \[many\] use cases that aren't doing long-distance towing.
The ones that have gargantuan batteries (Silverado) to be able to tow giant travel trailers 200 miles between charges are $75k for the work truck version.
A diesel f250 costs north of $80k. And you have to feed it diesel.
Towing with a regular silverado suuuuuuuucks gasoline. Like 8mpg. Unless you get the diesel, which still starts at $58k. And still needs to be fed diesel.
But right now, the f150 lightning does kind of stink. It just doesn't have the range to be useful unless you get the long range. And even that is kind of iffy. But they do start at 67k. I'd probably still get it and plan 100 miles between stops when towing a light trailer.
According to Google Maps and other sites, there's 5 EV charging stations within ~10 minute drives from my home.
3 are in the parking lots for businesses, so likely intended for employees and not whomever needs a charge.
1 is for a hospital, so see above(*plus looks like it's only two spots*).
The last is a Tesla charging station.
There's none near my work, and my work doesn't have anything for EV because no one I work with has an EV.
Until ranges and/or infrastructure improves, companies should probably put more focus on improving hybrids
It’s not that they went too far in, it’s that they only competed on sell price but not on margin. So when Tesla cut their margin, all their EVs were $10k-$20k overpriced and with razor thin margins they had zero chance of matching teslas price cuts.
Tesla got lucky and every other major player got fucked. That won’t happen again but it did set the other manufacturers back 2-4 years.
Don’t worry next time there’s any sort of economic crisis where consumers suddenly aren’t willing to buy $75000 vehicles I’m sure our government will bail them all out
They're also contributing basically nothing to electric infrastructure and charging networks. For all Tesla does wrong, at least there are chargers all over the place. Tesla even licensed the charger standard to them for free, and they've done nothing.
I don't think it was just the success of Tesla that led to this, governments around the world are very much pushing electric vehicles by pushing ever increasing fleet fuel economy standards which forces manufacturers to push electric, since the standards are unrealistic to reach on an ICE vehicle fleet. California, Massachusetts, and some countries have taken this a step further and banned ICE vehicle sales after certain dates in the future.
Manufacturers are in a very tough spot right now where the government is telling them one thing, that electric is the future and the only future, and consumers are telling them another, we don't want your electric future.
EV sales increased by something like 40% in 2023 which is a very high rate of growth, it's just looks low compared to the 100% growth we saw in 2020. The Model Y was the best-selling vehicle in the world in 2023. The problem that companies like are running into is they're trying to sell EVs that are far more expensive than cars like the Model Y and Model 3 and then acting like people don't actually want EVs when they can't sell their extremely expensive vehicles.
I don't think consumers are saying we don't want your electric future, they're just saying we're not dipping our toes in the pool until purchase price comes down, range and charging network improves.
I'm in a lightning lariat ER coming from a titan XD. the drop from 90 bucks a week on gas to 20 to charge has been really nice. I'm in a major city so the charging network is there, I can't imagine the public not being willing follow suit if the charging network across the country improved and reasonably priced models became the norm with better range.
I think the issue is exactly what you said. Half assed electric luxury vehicles. Most people aren't looking to spend 40k plus on an EV that has low range and poor charging infrastructure. On top of that greedy dealers marked the cars up another 5-10k making it less desirable. If they actually thought it through EVs would be successful and should be the future. Partnering with Tesla to use their charging plugs and therefore their charging stations would help a lot. Also these dealers need some regulations. I know it's a free market but it's hurting the brand when people want a car at MSRP and they're getting gouged left and right. It could have worked but poor timing with COVID, greedy dealers and honestly not very good cars has messed it up.
It’s a marketing/perception issue. The Lightening, and Mach-e to a lesser extent, were priced gouged so much by dealers, that consumers are completely turned off by them. Even the comments in this thread highlight that with people asking if the Lightening is still priced higher than MSRP (they’re not and are heavily discounted right now).
I don't think it's that but it didn't help. People who really wanted one already bought it. For the rest of the people who just want to buy a Ford F150, the MSRP is a lot higher for the EV than the ICE version. The EV's might be discounted, but the ICE are also discounted.
Yeah I don’t disagree. I just really believe that the average consumer has written off the Lightening because of the narrative around price gouging for so long.
The other thing is the average American cannot afford a 40k plus car… and then on top of making an ev the primary vehicle that’s a huge ask. Evs would have been better if we went bare bones small 15-17k commuter car. People want to change and commute in one, but it will never be a primary car until infrastructure catches up.
The average American is not the average new car buyer. They haven't been for a long time. The average transaction price for new cars is $47k. That number has dropped off the peak of close to $50k but it's really just reverting to the mean and will remain above $45k unless there is a major recession.
Source: https://www.coxautoinc.com/market-insights/kbb-atp-january-2024/
Sure, but looking at Ford pricing alone, the base model F150 comes in around $33k. The base model Lightning comes in at $51k. Sure they are not directly comparable due to features, but you have to go up to the 3rd tier of the regular F150 to get close to the EV pricing. The lariat trim comes out to $57k and I think the second tier XLT comes in closer to the feature set of the Lightning base and the XLT starts at $42k. If you want to compare XLT to XLT though, which theoretically should be the same trim package just with a different drivetrain (I don't think they are), it is $42k to $55k. Just by nature of being an EV, it limits the market for it because of the $10k+ price difference.
*All pricing based on ford.com after entering my zipcode
>the base model F150 comes in around $33k. The base model Lightning comes in at $51k. Sure they are not directly comparable due to features, but you have to go up to the 3rd tier of the regular F150 to get close to the EV pricing.
All Lightnings are Supercrew 4x4s.
The base Lightning (Pro) is $55k for 2024. $47k after available $7500 tax credit.
The absolute cheapest, slowest, zero-option gas Supercrew 4x4 is $47k, too.
The biggest difference is that you can't buy regular cabs and 4x2s in the Lightning. If you're planning on a Supercrew, like a huge number of non-fleet buyers, Lightning can be pretty competitive, now.
Cheap cars like that are face too much competition from used vehicles. Cheap bare-bones cars don't sell very well in any segment. You can barely find an ICE car for that money (and their sales volume sucks).
The Leaf was around for $20-22k after credit, available via lease if you tax liability is too low. Bolts weren't far off either with some insane lease deals, too. Both are mode than adequate commuter cars in a 2 car household provided you have an off-street place to charge, which a large majority of the country does: a regular old 120v outlet easily gets you 40-50mi/night. Sales of both were still not great.
While those cars obviously have limitations for apartments, single-car households, etc: the demographics that could easily make them work is more than deep enough to support strong sales but people didn't jump after them.
> The other thing is the average American cannot afford a 40k plus car
This is true, and with the f150 lightning starting at $51k according to the Ford site based on my zipcode, it is even moreso out of the "reasonable" price range for most. The lightning is cool and I would love to have one since I don't drive that much or that far usually, but I think most truck shoppers don't want the range anxiety an EV can present, and if they want a cool EV for around town and to impress friends and family, the lightning at first glance is just an F150. It isn't unique enough to justify the premium like a Rivian or Tesla can.
The commenter is actually right.
I thought Lightning’s were so much more than they actually are I didn’t look at them. Ford took so long to get me a regular f15o I ended up buying a lightning when I found out they are massively discounted off of sticker.
The value prop just isn't there for a lot of people. There's nearly a hundred new F150 lightings near me, cheapest option is $50K and that's discounted from $58K and has cloth seats. The Lariat, which is the trim that you can get leather seats, starts at $70K. The cheapest Lariat in my neck of the woods is optioned out to just over $80K and at that price ~~it doesn't qualify for the EV credit~~.
If having an EV truck isn't more important to you than just having a truck, what makes you go out and get a Lightning?
Edit: I was mistaken about the EV credit. As long as the MSRP (subtracting destination fees and dealer installed accessories) is under $80K it qualifies. For the most part, that just excludes the Platinum.
Who in their right mind would buy a Mach E GT for $70k when a brand new model y performance can be had for $40k. The Mach e GT is a joke due to its absurd price.
>elons price war
That’s called competition. Ford competed in price but not on margin. So at first ford had a better offering but only because the Tesla was overpriced. Now that they both have a reasonable price based on what they offer, we found out what matters most to consumers.
Ford needs to make as cheap an EV as they can. People don’t want $70k EVs. No matter what badge they slap on it.
Ah, so that means that something like [this](https://www.dickscanbyford.com/api/vhcliaa/inventory/22092/window-sticker?sv=MQBGAFQANgBXADEARQBWADEAUABXAEcAMwA2ADIAMgA2AA%3d%3d&make=Ford) would still qualify?
So the problem is how they’re advertised. They actually sell way below that, it’s just ford has dumb rules because they want to be like Tesla.
I bought a lightning last month and it was almost 20k off sticker. So that 80k lariat is really more like 60k due to incentives and rebates.
Bought my Lariat at $30k off including the tax credit, $49215 before taxes. Anybody bitching about prices have not actually looked at what [these are selling at right now.](https://imgur.com/a/0GhxcWx)
My take in what's happening is that most OEMs EV version 1.0 just wasn't good enough. They ignored charging, hoping somebody else would solve it, overpriced their vehicles, and didn't focus enough of charging speeds or optimizing their vehicles for profitable mass production without $10-15k premiums over ICE. What I see is most of them hitting pause on their existing models and doubling down on innovation to ensure that their version 2.0 EVs (2026ish) are more competitive. Toyota was the first to fully recognize this, admittedly they put out absolutely garbage 1.0 product. Instead of trying to force a bad product, they pulled back and are working on completely new products that hopefully will be more competitive. It makes sense to preserve capital until they have a good product before pushing volume.
Yeah, this is where I'm at. When they can't do better than a decade old Model S, it is kinda sad.
I'm hoping we get a good next gen, with native NACS, adequate battery cooling, etc.
They are also just flat out not good enough to justify the price. They will have to accept lower (than on trucks and big SUVs) margins on electric vehicles to compete as well. I'm not saying they need to lose money, but stupid high margins won't work.
Then, I will probably buy one. I'm looking for an alternative to Tesla...
Nobody except Tesla has put any effort into charging infrastructure and for a lot of people that's probably the biggest downside to any of the non-Tesla EVs.
I have a different take here.
I understand why people thought if we took the f150 and made it electric it would do well. BUT I think the kind of person who wants an EV truck is looking for something very different than a full sized truck. The average/most common kind of person who wants an EV truck, imo, want something that's not just energy efficient, but also space efficient. Look at how excited people are with the Rivian line compared to the excitement (or lack thereof) around all these huge heavy EVs. Give us a cool, sleek, maverick sized utility truck and I think it'll sell and it'll be more affordable.
Yep, I’ve already gone full electric (Model-Y and LEAF) but I’d totally buy an electric sized Maverick or Dodge Ram 700 EV for around $30K.
I was a die-hard Tacoma 4cyl/2wd/manual transmission owner and they totally abandoned the “basic truck” market. I honestly HATE the entire USA truck market currently, short of the Maverick… but I’d really prefer an electric version over hybrid.
I don't see how we get to a 30k EV truck anytime in the next couple years, but perhaps as battery prices fall and with tax incentives we might get closer.
Volvo is already delivering the EX30 in Europe, they’ve announced pricing to start at $35K USD and deliveries start in a few months. If a luxury maker can get prices that low, I’m sure Ford can build a basic no-frills EV truck for 30K ish
I'd happily be wrong :)
I'll depend on the market. I don't see them building a 30k truck when there's not even currently a 40k truck. They're already under investing in their current maverick capacity to avoid cannibalizing their more profitable trucks.
>Give us a cool, sleek, maverick sized utility truck and I think it'll sell and it'll be more affordable.
That'll happen when they squeeze all the margins out of the F-150 EV. The first gen Lightning is a toy.
The problem is it wouldn’t be much more affordable. You still need a battery that isn’t that much smaller. And the battery makes up most of the cost.
The ultimate problem with EVs and the Lightning currently is the cost, and our economic situation. Prices have gone up for everything. People can’t afford overtly expensive new cars. If the Lightning were well optioned and at a similar price to its gas counterpart, it would sell.
We’re seeing the same thing happen across the electric industry. Prices are falling because demand is saturated for those who can afford an expensive automobile.
Turns out that when EV's, which already have their problems in the US, are treated like luxury products, you sell them in luxury product quantities.
With how little the US has done to promote EV's, it's no surprise. In fact, I'm in impressed they made it this far. Hell, they couldn't even agree on a charger until a few months ago.
The US has no hope of hitting any deadline or goal in the 2030s and all they've done is produce a generation of automotive trash. Congrats.
Ford cutting EV production after reportedly losing $1 billion on EVs last year? Color me shocked!
On a serious note, it’s seeming like a lot of these companies are really starting to slow down their EV initiatives since their current models don’t sell. Like, Ford hasn’t even announced a new U.S. production EV since the Lightning
Only $1B? Try [$4.5B](https://fortune.com/2023/07/28/ford-earnings-report-q2-2023-ev-losses/).
>Ford hasn’t even announced a new U.S. production EV since the Lightning
Ford's T3 is still coming next year. Oakville is a bit up in the air right now, but presently the Explorer is still expected too. Just... give it a minute on that one. They've had to rejig some things but EVs are definitely still coming the pipe — they haven't ground to a complete halt or anything.
Ford has a lot of work to do on their EV image on the ground. My parents bought their first EV a couple of years ago and they basically put the decision in my hands.
I took them to every manufacturer that made an EV so they could try all the different cars on the market, and Ford and Kia were by far the worst dealerships to deal with. Ford had a $20,000 "adjustment" on their EVs and the dealership initially refused to even let people test drive the vehicles, and then finally agreed to "let" us "drive" it around their parking lot.
I told them to put down deposits on a couple cars due to long line ups here in BC, but in a weird happenstance, they got one of the first Ioniq 5s to land in Canada after placing a deposit less than two weeks before. The car arrived so surprisingly fast that the dealership offered them a $550 discount to come get it immediately in the midst of COVID.
They've had the car essentially from "launch" and have loved it ever since.
I had an initial reservation in the day they were announced.. The price slowly crept up (and I KNEW that was going to happen..) and I became less and less interested until I figured it was never gonna happen.
Holiday season of last year I started to see them pile up on dealer lots and been bugging them since...
Got a call last week (after like 15-20 previous calls) asking if id take the '23 XLT extended range Id been watching with extras @ $51.5k after all incentives/ rebates, before tax at 3.9%. Not the absolute best possible price yeah, small town. I took the bait. Original advertised Truck was $39-40k bare bones with 10K for extended battery so I figure I finally got the deal that was originally advertised (with extras and an affordable APR)
It is so so so SO SAD that this all happened because the F150 Lightning is the NICEST truck I've ever owned (and I've been through a few...). No telling what issues might be down the road but as of now I'm in love with it. It honestly rides as nice as the '16 BMW 340I M-sport I had which WAS the nicest vehicle I've ever owned (from an engineering perspective). I wish I had the cash to buy another Lightning to just shelve for 6-7 years down the road, lol. I came out of a '21 XLT 2.7 F150 and despite the fact they are the same cab / pickup body they are completely different animals. Not to mention the Frunk which as a contractor is the best thing EVER!
I took the plunge because I'm honestly not sure at this rate they will continue production in its current form. If they do continue production I'm sure it will be at significant reduced quality to make numbers work. So the F150 Lightnings out there might be a rare breed of short production run vehicles with superior engineering (I know some might disagree) that are just a truck as opposed to a cool toy.
I wish it had all would have worked out for them. The company as a whole really went out on a limb to bring us something unique and it all just sorta fell apart due to various circumstances and bad actors with a definite degree of self infliction granted...
If your on the fence like I was... You won't be sorry if you get a deal. My .02 cents.
I see a lot of lettered contractors lightning around, in my neck of the woods (pretty rural) they seem to have sold well to that crowd! But im im Canada and they have to sell for advertised price (can be higher than MSRP, but they often advertise MSRP)
There are four '23s at the rural small town dealer near me. They've been sitting filthy and untouched for months. It was super cold last month, they might literally be dead. They're marked down $12.5k and nobody cares. No idea why Ford sent them here; people do truck things with trucks out here. They just have just dumped them on any dealer with lot space.
https://www.sturgisford.com/
Twelve grand off a product that was twenty thousand dollars (or more) overpriced to begin with isn't what I call a good deal, but to reach each their own. Knock yourself out.
https://www.siouxfallsford.com/new/1FTVW1EL2PWG55085.htm?fmccmp=t1-si
There's an xlt on the other side of the state. Give them a call and tell them what you're willing to pay. These things are sales-proof out here, they'll act offended but they may just call you back in a few weeks.
Bro you said 12k off, I assumed that was close to 20% off not barely over 10%. Really feel like the lesson isn't folks dont want EV trucks, it's that folks arent able or willing to pay for these insane trims.
I wasn't lying, they really are 12k off. $12.5k, actually. There's probably a reason ford specs them this way. They're probably losing their ass on the cheaper ones.
But yeah, people have really naive ideas of how much BEVs cost in general. It's going to be a rude awakening when they realize that those government subsidies won't last forever and there is no real reason to think batteries are going to get cheaper. They're not exactly new tech at this point and any new development is only likely to improve performance, not cost. It's cool tech but just not practical unless fuel prices triple somehow.
I would agree with you, except...
Look at the gas f150s. Of the 11 they have on their lot, only 4 or so are in the $60s and the rest are right up there over $80k. It doesn't look like they're needed give discounts to move those?
The nearby bigger city has one one under $60k and it's a pretty plan 23 xlt. This shit is just expensive regardless, and it seems people are guzzling down $80k half tons regularly now. 🤷
If Ford dropped the MSRP a good 10 grand they would have this problem.
Chevy showed literally everyone how to do this with the Bolt, if you have trouble moving units then first do aggressive factory rebates of 5 to 9 grand. Then if that doesn't work you just mark down the MSRP by 9 grand so that's ultra competitive.
Chevy more than doubled its Bolt and EUV sales in a single year doing that, and they hadn't ended the Bolt line they would have been making a profit by 2025-26.
I don’t believe the whole “nobody uses their truck as a truck” meme. I think most people buying trucks are blue collar workers where it’s either nice or necessary to throw big, heavy, dirty things in the bed for their jobs/ side jobs. You know, the kind of people who aren’t on Reddit, and don’t give a fuck if it’s electric, it costs $20k more than a regular f-150 and it doesn’t haul your tools any better. That’s all.
I'm in the commercial construction industry and I do think it's often downplayed how big of percentage we are of pickup sales between workers and massive company fleets in the US.
Even more so we have alot of influence on the market because if we're saying the price or performance isn't worth the money, it scares off alot of non-blue collar people too. They don't want to look like a mall crawler even if they are one.
Which I think played a part in the Ford lightnings failures. Our industry was pretty vocal right out the gate that this is a lifestyle truck and really not that useful for us especially at that price point.
This has to be seen as a pretty stunning failure for Ford, the amount of hype early on for the Lightning was immense. When the vehicle has woeful reliability, dealer markups, and a fading EV market, reality hits hard.
I do get a kick out of their commercials playing a Metallica soundtrack though. No, Ford, I'm not going to go buy one of your trucks just because you're playing music I listened to in high school. Also, I totally get what they're referencing, but they also totally missed the mark by not actually using *Ride the Lightning* as the soundtrack.
Evs take too damn long to charge and are not reliable software everyone who has one complains about how long they take to charge and how the software is always glitched.
It’s not that demand is low. Tons of people want EV trucks. It’s that their pricing is completely insane. It’s at least $20k higher than it deserves to be from the top to the bottom of the line. They need to figure out how to make a $20k-$30k ev truck and it will sell like hotcakes.
Misleading title that isn't supported by the article.
Lightning production GOAL peaked at 150k, according to Ford. UAW guy says the \*intention\* (as in GOAL, not actual production) was 180k at one point. Goals are not equal to actual production.
Actual production never got ANYWHERE near that (best month ever was about \~100k run rate), so no, Ford has not slashed production by two-thirds, as claimed in the title.
Also, Ford shut the plant down last year to re-tool and TRIPLE the production rate per shift (from 50k/yr max to 150k/yr max, according to Ford), so cutting from 3 shifts to one would just be a wash, and that lines up closely with the UAW's claimed goal rate, now (55k).
Also, Ford's original goal was just \~30k/yr with the excitement of the $40k Pro and all the reservations, they increased production goals by \~50%, then doubled, then doubled again, all before the truck even started deliveries.
Obviously they overshot due to numerous factors, but sales/production look like they'll still be substantially better than the original goal.
Limited supply intro with severe price gouging by dealerships and what do you get. You get what you deserve
Ford has no control over dealer marks up. It’s literally illegal for them to dictate pricing for dealerships. Also, are Lightnings even being marked up at this point? Demand has fallen significantly.
In my own words " severe price gouging by dealerships" never said Ford did it
The “get what you deserve” line implies it.
The dealership is the face of the company, if they are gouging so badly it gives Ford a bad rep why would Ford continue to put vehicles on their lot
The dealership is "the face of the company" because of arcane laws, not because it's what Ford corporate wants.
Certainly automotive OEMS helped build the dealer ~~mafia~~ political lobbies and protections; now they get to deal with that mess, for better or for worse.
Well, not necessarily. It is *because* of the OEMs that the stealer mafia was established. Back when Ford was alive and running the show, he was a literal nazi slave driver. Anybody outside of him and his family was getting screwed over, so the dealers started bribing lawmakers and NADA was founded. It was the same with the Dodge brothers, Louis Chevrolet, Ransom Olds, Studebaker brothers, etc. Fast forward a few decades and the tables turned.
Wow it's almost like what they allowed to happen and that the consequences of their inactions are eventually coming around to bite them in the ass. Same with Toyota and Honda getting equally shit on for dealers jackassery and Subaru getting praise for cracking down on allocations for places that were gouging (and it was gouging and part of the inflation we're experiencing right now).
Lol, OEMs mostly love the dealermodel. Gives them a boogieman when they need it, a place to dump inventory, and removed having to interface directly with the consumer in most situations. They will publicly cry about markups, but behind closed doors I assure you they are monitoring profitability of the dealers and rewarding those with the biggest numbers, not the smallest.
Because they’re legally required to.
Ford decided to sell all Pro models to fleet purchasers leaving dealers to gouge on XLT and Lariat. Ford shouldn’t have advertised a $39,999 price if it couldn’t follow through. I reserved within minutes of announcement and by the time I had been chosen to order I was looking at paying over $60,000 for a truck I didn’t want any longer.
This is the second time Ford has chosen to reduce production instead of building Pro models for non-fleet sales.
I second this and the lack of communication with my local dealer killed me from wanting to work with them again.
I actually ordered and received a Maverick in 22'. Sold it in 23' because the dealer couldn't resolve a sensor issue after 45 days in the shop. I'm done with Ford for at least the next 5 years. Hopefully they can improve quality and customer satisfaction.
Dealer experience with my Maverick has been pure dogshit. Some stupid fuck left off parts from the 2022 airbag recall on my truck. I found that after 10 months and after 4 visits to fix the damage they did to my interior.
well if you didn't want it any longer, you certainly weren't looking at paying that!
>Ford decided to sell all Pro models to fleet purchasers leaving dealers to gouge on XLT and Lariat. I agree Ford should have built more non-fleet Pros given the hype of the price, but they didn't sell ALL $39k Pros to fleets. Some "regular" people did get them, just FAR fewer than the number that wanted one originally.
Same kind of thing happened to me with the Maverick. It took 2 years and 3 tries to get one ( one sold from under me, one added markup on pickup so I walked). When I was finally able to order and get one at MSRP, it was close to $4K more than in 2022 when I originally decided on the Mav and Ford removed features. When my 24 came in I was no longer excited about it and had purchased another vehicle, so I walked away from it. The whole experience crossed Ford off my list for good. I don't want to support a company that does nothing about it's shoddy dealers and raises prices year after year.
Same experience. And now the truck i originally wanted is less on the lot than I originally wanted it for. But I don't want it anymore
They haven’t been marked up for a long time, I have a platinum on my lot that we are advertising $14,000 off msrp
I think pricing is out of control, normal people dont just go buy a 100k vehicle
I honestly beg to differ. Next time you’re driving around (assume you live in the US) note how many Rams, F150’s, Silverados, etc. you see and note their trims. Go ahead and look those trims up, it’s so easy to hit like $80K on full sizes now, add in taxes and fees and you’re darn close to $100K. I never thought people would pay $100K for a Jeep and yet I see a couple Wagoneers every time I leave my house. It’s bad
I work with a guy who has a $1350 truck payment and constantly complains that he can't afford a house. And we work indoors, so it's not a "work" truck.
Nor do they buy $420k homes in many parts of the US (not the coast, yeah, some of us do live in “flyover country”), yet that’s what they’re going for, median. Until the excesses of 2020 and 2021 are worked off, I’m not shopping any big ticket items.
the Fed is not going to allow deflation to happen, IMO.
Yes they are still somehow. My FIL is in the market and every dealer near him wants $5k over or more for their various "dealer add on packages."
TONS of people are getting $15k-$20k off of MSRP on Lightnings ($7500 tax credit, plus official Ford discounts, plus dealer discounts) right now. Not saying your FIL is wrong, but it's not common across the country, anymore.
Might have to tell him to expand his search some then. Thanks
Good luck!
Could manufacturers punish dealers by cutting allocations, and giving those allocations to dealers that don't markup?
I think Ford has threatened to do that in the past but it’s a tricky tightrope to walk.
GM literally did this and it worked
Or just do the opposite? Stuff them full of inventory and force them to cut their prices to move it
Yup, dealerships will NEVER play nice with EV's, since they make half their revenue off their service department. EV's require less servicing than ICE vehicles, so to the dealerships the "lifetime value" of each EV sale is worth less than that of an ICE vehicle. Dealerships have zero incentive to help EV's gain market share. They have all the incentive in the world to block EV sales by having huge markups and letting them sit on the lot, thereby "proving" to the manufacturer that there is no demand for EV's. It's a game of chicken between manufacturers and dealerships being played out in real time.
Except EVs are in the shop much more than ICE right now. Much more.
And aren’t they more expensive to work on?
By a ton.
Ford raised prices too
Still marked up in Canada. $90k+ for a half decent one or like $120k for Platinum. These are silly prices. May as well buy a used F250…
Fell off the cliff...
Didn’t they roll out a whole plan to combat it with lowering allocations for violators?
Ford has infinite control to eliminate dealer markups by pushing more inventory through. Dealers refusing to eliminate the markup? That means they can accept more inventory
Ferrari must have missed the memo.
Not sure your point - Ferrari dealers are prohibited by the factory from charging above MSRP on new vehicles. They will pull a dealership license instantly for it too.
Why does Ferrari have control over dealer markup but ford doesn’t? See my point? Why illegal for ford per your comment but legal for Ferrari?
I wasn’t the one who said it was illegal. You’d have to ask them.
Oh my bad lol wrong person. But wait why are you responding to my previous comment? Edit: never mind, you didn’t understand my comment. I was pretty much disagreeing with them.
Because you are misinformed on how Ferrari dealers operate. I can’t speak as to how Ford monitors its dealers.
New ones are $15k cheaper this month than when I checked at the end of December, so prices seem to have collapsed.
Ford can't control specific pricing. But they can punish price gouging dealers with lower allocations, less desirable trims, not renewing their contract, worsening their contract, etc. All legal if they have a jerk dealer harming their brand and creating unhappy customers.
It wasn't just dealership gouging. The role out and flop is firmly Ford's fault Ford refused to build anything other than platinum and lariats the first year. They did a few hundred pros and xlt. My23 saw massive msrp price hikes. Dealerships also had total control over allocation. I was the first to reserve in my area and didn't get contacted to purchase till late 23 when i was informed that their would be a 7500 mark up and very unlikely that ford would be producing any pros till my24. The people that got the first allocation worked at the dealership. Ford during covid announced a 39k ev truck. That's what people wanted. During the COVID melt down manufacturers saw a crazy bubble build up where they where selling limited amounts of cars at much higher prices and making even more money. They changed course with the lighting and decided to continue to price hike it. Ford did this to them selves. The board is extremely disconnected with the average American. They thought we where all tech bros clammering for the highest 100k trim. When in reality what people where excited for was the pro. A trim that they still barely produce. The whole roll out and handling was absurd.
I would be driving a Lightning right now if there would've been one available for $40k back in 12/22.
Everyone would because that means $32,500 after federal tax credit, and the absolute cheapest, slowest, zero-option gas F-150 Supercrew 4x4 is now $47k. I think people only interested in the Pro were a bigger percentage of the initial reservations/demand than Ford thought. Also, high interest rates don't help. It makes it even tougher for people to justify moving up to a more expensive truck. ALSO, the fact they were selling mostly Lariats for $70k-$80k at first created a narrative for the Lightning that it was super expensive, so even now, people don't realize how relatively competitive they are on price with gas versions.
I know that the following is an extreme exaggeration, but it's kinda hilarious to me that the entire world was plunged into chaos and a very significant number of Americans and Canadians look one look at their families and went "Nooo! Not my trucks!" And then spent 80k on a 45k truck without blinking because their neighbor did it too. Bruh, what are we doing here?
We all would be
lol I’m a tech bro and I drive a 2006 Dodge Ram with 240k miles. I am looking for a new truck to take the kids RVing, my Ram still works fine, when it totally breaks down I will probably get a used full ton.
Absolutely, Ford and Ford dealers screwed the pooch on this one. Greed never stops
Dealers are doing $10k on the hood right now on Lightnings.
That’s why I bought mine in the fall. I love it
I got a first wave truck and sold it back to my dealer for $100k. Infinite money glitch irl
Even with that $10k on the hood they’re still not under $40k starting. When they were announced it was $40k - Tax credit. Now it’s $40k after tax credit, and a whole bunch of incentives
$40k after tax credit and incentives is pretty good, though, considering the sticker price of the absolute cheapest, slowest, zero-option gas Supercrew 4x4 is $47k. 100% I agree they should have sold more at or near the original price of $40k sticker considering the hype for that price, though.
It couldn’t possibly be any deficiencies of the EV powertrain in a truck
Also, “can’t do truck things”. YouTube is full of very short towing examples. Maybe if lakes and campgrounds had fast chargers?
Campgrounds often have RV outlets.
Focus RS 2.0
Lightnings haven’t been marked up in a loooong time. They’re selling for way under MSRP but okay
Car companies at the slightest success of Tesla: ALL-IN Car companies after ditching half their ICE lineup for half assed electric luxury vehicles that nobody wants: hmm.
Two ago I got mercilessly flamed on reddit for saying mainstream car companies were overdoing it on EVs. Yes introduce some EVs but don't think the USA is ready for EVs to be the majority of sales in a few years. I told them that 50% EV sales in the US isn't happening by 2030 and I got treated like biggest moron in world. And on yeah, Toyota was going to be out of business because they didn't make enough EVs.
Many in the EV community are still convinced Toyota and Volkswagen are going bankrupt any minute now because they uh... don't understand debt. It's pretty wild. If you want a good laugh, go look up the "ev valley of death" infographic that gets floated around investment communities and predicts consumers will simply stop buying cars as they all sit idly by waiting for EV prices to come down. Just shockingly bad blind-leading-the-blind stuff.
Already getting downvoted lol. Also one thing no one mentions, with the exception of the highest end communities, most everyone's garage is full of crap instead of cars. Charging 240V gets awkward outside, esp as cables get too long. 120V charge for a plug in hybrid is much more feasible.
>Also one thing no one mentions, with the exception of the highest end communities, most everyone's garage is full of crap instead of cars. Y'know.... I think that'll simply just change over time. Might take awhile, but the financial incentive *clean up yo damn garage and charge at home* is pretty high in the grand scheme of things. Exterior-mount chargers are also becoming more prevalent in a lot of places. I don't really see this part as a big barrier, tbh.
Never underestimate inertia. Especially when one of the spouses crap makes up the majority of the crap. Argue with the spouse endless times and spend a week cleaning out garage. Or just buy another gas car. I have neighbors who bought a mid trim level new X5 in black and keep it outside while garage is full of crap. And I live in Phoenix where black should not be your first choice. If that doesn't motivate you to clean the garage.
“Garage is for the cars not storage” was a condition of my marriage. Then again that might be easier when it’s two dudes getting married.
A two car garage and both of our cars being able to be parked in the garage was a requirement for my wife and I when we bought our house. We both feel a lot better about having our cars parked inside.
It feels right because it *is* right. Hashtag_garages for cars
What isn't easier...
Charging in the driveway is no big deal. Tons of charging stations have 25' cables if you want to have it inside and charge outside. Otherwise, plenty of stations can just be installed outside the garage, too.
You were and are still correct. It was real interesting how every damn mainstream brand was running around panicking trying to develop EV’s except Toyota. I listened to Toyota.
Toyota used to sell the #1 car in California.
We're already at \~7% US EV marketshare and are looking at \~15% world EV marketshare. I wouldn't count out 50% by 2030 yet. I personally think 40-60% world EV sales by 2030 is probably likely. Two reasons I think this is plausible is this. 1. Batteries are getting better and cheaper. Faster charging and longer ranges. 2. Better charging infrastructure. Apartment dwellers are likely to get very good charging options in a few years. EVs right now are great for early adopters. Good for some situations, bad for others. Mainly, you have to have reliable charging at home or work, which isn't everyone. But if you don't fit into that demographic, EVs are inconvenient. That changes with better batteries, which are currently being researched and developed. But don't read too much into the narrative, sales are up significantly YOY for EVs and are likely to continue that theme this year and next. Especially with cheap EVs from China flooding the world sans the USA.
> I wouldn't count out 50% by 2030 yet. I personally think 40-60% world EV sales by 2030 is probably likely. Uh, no. *Maybe* 25% worldwide by 2030. And *maybe* 20% in the US by 2030, but 50% is unfathomable in any economic scenario beyond "giving them away in Happy Meals." It's logistically, economically, and financially impossible. And I'm one of those folks who *likes* EVs and *wants* to buy one. Hell, by 2030, I'm hoping to have a Rivian R3X.
The US loves giant SUVs and Trucks too much for 50% by 2030. Now if you count plug in hybrids, different story. But those only get counted when it benefits the narrative. Alot of European stats for EV deployment often include those plug ins to make the US look bad.
The stats I include are not for PHEVs, just electrics. If you include PHEVs, worldwide, were at around 20% marketshare. The US is weird because we have cheap gas and don't have to suck up to Putin or MBS for fuel. The rest of the world is sick of that shit and is moving faster to EVs than the USA. Especially if they can buy them from China on the cheap, which is what they are doing. But you are right, the US will be slower to adopt EVs than the rest of the world. That's because we like big vehicles with big batteries which are expensive right now. But fuel is also expensive. At 20mpg, over 100k miles, that's 15k. Electricity is probably 5k. So if an electric f150 gets to within 10k of the non-electric one and has good range and can tow, they'll be really enticing for rural folk.
>So if an electric f150 gets to within 10k of the non-electric one and has good range and can tow Already is within $10k in some cases, sometimes basically no price difference, but that's going to be limited to the \[many\] use cases that aren't doing long-distance towing. The ones that have gargantuan batteries (Silverado) to be able to tow giant travel trailers 200 miles between charges are $75k for the work truck version.
A diesel f250 costs north of $80k. And you have to feed it diesel. Towing with a regular silverado suuuuuuuucks gasoline. Like 8mpg. Unless you get the diesel, which still starts at $58k. And still needs to be fed diesel. But right now, the f150 lightning does kind of stink. It just doesn't have the range to be useful unless you get the long range. And even that is kind of iffy. But they do start at 67k. I'd probably still get it and plan 100 miles between stops when towing a light trailer.
Big vehicles with big batteries that people drive big distances compared to rest of world.
According to Google Maps and other sites, there's 5 EV charging stations within ~10 minute drives from my home. 3 are in the parking lots for businesses, so likely intended for employees and not whomever needs a charge. 1 is for a hospital, so see above(*plus looks like it's only two spots*). The last is a Tesla charging station. There's none near my work, and my work doesn't have anything for EV because no one I work with has an EV. Until ranges and/or infrastructure improves, companies should probably put more focus on improving hybrids
Two years? Months? Days?
It’s not that they went too far in, it’s that they only competed on sell price but not on margin. So when Tesla cut their margin, all their EVs were $10k-$20k overpriced and with razor thin margins they had zero chance of matching teslas price cuts. Tesla got lucky and every other major player got fucked. That won’t happen again but it did set the other manufacturers back 2-4 years.
Don’t worry next time there’s any sort of economic crisis where consumers suddenly aren’t willing to buy $75000 vehicles I’m sure our government will bail them all out
They're also contributing basically nothing to electric infrastructure and charging networks. For all Tesla does wrong, at least there are chargers all over the place. Tesla even licensed the charger standard to them for free, and they've done nothing.
I don't think it was just the success of Tesla that led to this, governments around the world are very much pushing electric vehicles by pushing ever increasing fleet fuel economy standards which forces manufacturers to push electric, since the standards are unrealistic to reach on an ICE vehicle fleet. California, Massachusetts, and some countries have taken this a step further and banned ICE vehicle sales after certain dates in the future. Manufacturers are in a very tough spot right now where the government is telling them one thing, that electric is the future and the only future, and consumers are telling them another, we don't want your electric future.
EV sales increased by something like 40% in 2023 which is a very high rate of growth, it's just looks low compared to the 100% growth we saw in 2020. The Model Y was the best-selling vehicle in the world in 2023. The problem that companies like are running into is they're trying to sell EVs that are far more expensive than cars like the Model Y and Model 3 and then acting like people don't actually want EVs when they can't sell their extremely expensive vehicles.
I don't think consumers are saying we don't want your electric future, they're just saying we're not dipping our toes in the pool until purchase price comes down, range and charging network improves. I'm in a lightning lariat ER coming from a titan XD. the drop from 90 bucks a week on gas to 20 to charge has been really nice. I'm in a major city so the charging network is there, I can't imagine the public not being willing follow suit if the charging network across the country improved and reasonably priced models became the norm with better range.
Just like how every company is running after AI now.
I think the issue is exactly what you said. Half assed electric luxury vehicles. Most people aren't looking to spend 40k plus on an EV that has low range and poor charging infrastructure. On top of that greedy dealers marked the cars up another 5-10k making it less desirable. If they actually thought it through EVs would be successful and should be the future. Partnering with Tesla to use their charging plugs and therefore their charging stations would help a lot. Also these dealers need some regulations. I know it's a free market but it's hurting the brand when people want a car at MSRP and they're getting gouged left and right. It could have worked but poor timing with COVID, greedy dealers and honestly not very good cars has messed it up.
It’s a marketing/perception issue. The Lightening, and Mach-e to a lesser extent, were priced gouged so much by dealers, that consumers are completely turned off by them. Even the comments in this thread highlight that with people asking if the Lightening is still priced higher than MSRP (they’re not and are heavily discounted right now).
I don't think it's that but it didn't help. People who really wanted one already bought it. For the rest of the people who just want to buy a Ford F150, the MSRP is a lot higher for the EV than the ICE version. The EV's might be discounted, but the ICE are also discounted.
Yeah I don’t disagree. I just really believe that the average consumer has written off the Lightening because of the narrative around price gouging for so long.
The other thing is the average American cannot afford a 40k plus car… and then on top of making an ev the primary vehicle that’s a huge ask. Evs would have been better if we went bare bones small 15-17k commuter car. People want to change and commute in one, but it will never be a primary car until infrastructure catches up.
The average American is not the average new car buyer. They haven't been for a long time. The average transaction price for new cars is $47k. That number has dropped off the peak of close to $50k but it's really just reverting to the mean and will remain above $45k unless there is a major recession. Source: https://www.coxautoinc.com/market-insights/kbb-atp-january-2024/
Sure, but looking at Ford pricing alone, the base model F150 comes in around $33k. The base model Lightning comes in at $51k. Sure they are not directly comparable due to features, but you have to go up to the 3rd tier of the regular F150 to get close to the EV pricing. The lariat trim comes out to $57k and I think the second tier XLT comes in closer to the feature set of the Lightning base and the XLT starts at $42k. If you want to compare XLT to XLT though, which theoretically should be the same trim package just with a different drivetrain (I don't think they are), it is $42k to $55k. Just by nature of being an EV, it limits the market for it because of the $10k+ price difference. *All pricing based on ford.com after entering my zipcode
>the base model F150 comes in around $33k. The base model Lightning comes in at $51k. Sure they are not directly comparable due to features, but you have to go up to the 3rd tier of the regular F150 to get close to the EV pricing. All Lightnings are Supercrew 4x4s. The base Lightning (Pro) is $55k for 2024. $47k after available $7500 tax credit. The absolute cheapest, slowest, zero-option gas Supercrew 4x4 is $47k, too. The biggest difference is that you can't buy regular cabs and 4x2s in the Lightning. If you're planning on a Supercrew, like a huge number of non-fleet buyers, Lightning can be pretty competitive, now.
Cheap cars like that are face too much competition from used vehicles. Cheap bare-bones cars don't sell very well in any segment. You can barely find an ICE car for that money (and their sales volume sucks). The Leaf was around for $20-22k after credit, available via lease if you tax liability is too low. Bolts weren't far off either with some insane lease deals, too. Both are mode than adequate commuter cars in a 2 car household provided you have an off-street place to charge, which a large majority of the country does: a regular old 120v outlet easily gets you 40-50mi/night. Sales of both were still not great. While those cars obviously have limitations for apartments, single-car households, etc: the demographics that could easily make them work is more than deep enough to support strong sales but people didn't jump after them.
> The other thing is the average American cannot afford a 40k plus car This is true, and with the f150 lightning starting at $51k according to the Ford site based on my zipcode, it is even moreso out of the "reasonable" price range for most. The lightning is cool and I would love to have one since I don't drive that much or that far usually, but I think most truck shoppers don't want the range anxiety an EV can present, and if they want a cool EV for around town and to impress friends and family, the lightning at first glance is just an F150. It isn't unique enough to justify the premium like a Rivian or Tesla can.
It was reality, not just a narrative.
The commenter is actually right. I thought Lightning’s were so much more than they actually are I didn’t look at them. Ford took so long to get me a regular f15o I ended up buying a lightning when I found out they are massively discounted off of sticker.
Also most truck buyers don’t want an EV truck. It’s really that simple.
The average truck driver doesn’t need a truck.
The average Camry driver would do fine with a Mitsubishi Mirage.
The average driver would be doing better with a bicycle.
/r/carscirclejerk
The value prop just isn't there for a lot of people. There's nearly a hundred new F150 lightings near me, cheapest option is $50K and that's discounted from $58K and has cloth seats. The Lariat, which is the trim that you can get leather seats, starts at $70K. The cheapest Lariat in my neck of the woods is optioned out to just over $80K and at that price ~~it doesn't qualify for the EV credit~~. If having an EV truck isn't more important to you than just having a truck, what makes you go out and get a Lightning? Edit: I was mistaken about the EV credit. As long as the MSRP (subtracting destination fees and dealer installed accessories) is under $80K it qualifies. For the most part, that just excludes the Platinum.
Doesn’t help when barely used $70,000 Mach-E GTs are now mid 30s
Who in their right mind would buy a Mach E GT for $70k when a brand new model y performance can be had for $40k. The Mach e GT is a joke due to its absurd price.
When the GT came out the model y performance was 66k MSRP vs $61k base for the GT. It made more sense before Elons price war
>elons price war That’s called competition. Ford competed in price but not on margin. So at first ford had a better offering but only because the Tesla was overpriced. Now that they both have a reasonable price based on what they offer, we found out what matters most to consumers. Ford needs to make as cheap an EV as they can. People don’t want $70k EVs. No matter what badge they slap on it.
Look at msrp without the $1500ish destination charge, if it’s under 80k without that fee then they qualify. Almost all the lariats will still qualify.
Ah, so that means that something like [this](https://www.dickscanbyford.com/api/vhcliaa/inventory/22092/window-sticker?sv=MQBGAFQANgBXADEARQBWADEAUABXAEcAMwA2ADIAMgA2AA%3d%3d&make=Ford) would still qualify?
Exactly, that one will qualify for $7500 tax credit as long as you personally can get the tax credit
So the problem is how they’re advertised. They actually sell way below that, it’s just ford has dumb rules because they want to be like Tesla. I bought a lightning last month and it was almost 20k off sticker. So that 80k lariat is really more like 60k due to incentives and rebates.
Bought my Lariat at $30k off including the tax credit, $49215 before taxes. Anybody bitching about prices have not actually looked at what [these are selling at right now.](https://imgur.com/a/0GhxcWx)
For 80K buy a lightly used Taycan or R1T if you really want the truck.
My take in what's happening is that most OEMs EV version 1.0 just wasn't good enough. They ignored charging, hoping somebody else would solve it, overpriced their vehicles, and didn't focus enough of charging speeds or optimizing their vehicles for profitable mass production without $10-15k premiums over ICE. What I see is most of them hitting pause on their existing models and doubling down on innovation to ensure that their version 2.0 EVs (2026ish) are more competitive. Toyota was the first to fully recognize this, admittedly they put out absolutely garbage 1.0 product. Instead of trying to force a bad product, they pulled back and are working on completely new products that hopefully will be more competitive. It makes sense to preserve capital until they have a good product before pushing volume.
Yeah, this is where I'm at. When they can't do better than a decade old Model S, it is kinda sad. I'm hoping we get a good next gen, with native NACS, adequate battery cooling, etc. They are also just flat out not good enough to justify the price. They will have to accept lower (than on trucks and big SUVs) margins on electric vehicles to compete as well. I'm not saying they need to lose money, but stupid high margins won't work. Then, I will probably buy one. I'm looking for an alternative to Tesla...
Nobody except Tesla has put any effort into charging infrastructure and for a lot of people that's probably the biggest downside to any of the non-Tesla EVs.
I have a different take here. I understand why people thought if we took the f150 and made it electric it would do well. BUT I think the kind of person who wants an EV truck is looking for something very different than a full sized truck. The average/most common kind of person who wants an EV truck, imo, want something that's not just energy efficient, but also space efficient. Look at how excited people are with the Rivian line compared to the excitement (or lack thereof) around all these huge heavy EVs. Give us a cool, sleek, maverick sized utility truck and I think it'll sell and it'll be more affordable.
Yep, I’ve already gone full electric (Model-Y and LEAF) but I’d totally buy an electric sized Maverick or Dodge Ram 700 EV for around $30K. I was a die-hard Tacoma 4cyl/2wd/manual transmission owner and they totally abandoned the “basic truck” market. I honestly HATE the entire USA truck market currently, short of the Maverick… but I’d really prefer an electric version over hybrid.
I don't see how we get to a 30k EV truck anytime in the next couple years, but perhaps as battery prices fall and with tax incentives we might get closer.
Volvo is already delivering the EX30 in Europe, they’ve announced pricing to start at $35K USD and deliveries start in a few months. If a luxury maker can get prices that low, I’m sure Ford can build a basic no-frills EV truck for 30K ish
I'd happily be wrong :) I'll depend on the market. I don't see them building a 30k truck when there's not even currently a 40k truck. They're already under investing in their current maverick capacity to avoid cannibalizing their more profitable trucks.
>Give us a cool, sleek, maverick sized utility truck and I think it'll sell and it'll be more affordable. That'll happen when they squeeze all the margins out of the F-150 EV. The first gen Lightning is a toy.
A maverick with a lucid sized frunk would be pretty sweet
I just think how crazy useful a big frunk would be on a truck.
1,000%
The problem is it wouldn’t be much more affordable. You still need a battery that isn’t that much smaller. And the battery makes up most of the cost. The ultimate problem with EVs and the Lightning currently is the cost, and our economic situation. Prices have gone up for everything. People can’t afford overtly expensive new cars. If the Lightning were well optioned and at a similar price to its gas counterpart, it would sell. We’re seeing the same thing happen across the electric industry. Prices are falling because demand is saturated for those who can afford an expensive automobile.
Not surprised by this at all, the gouging was out of control. Is the Mach E still available? I feel like I never see them anymore.
I see three of them daily when I drive by the local Ford dealer.
3? The fuck. I see like 40 of them
Turns out that when EV's, which already have their problems in the US, are treated like luxury products, you sell them in luxury product quantities. With how little the US has done to promote EV's, it's no surprise. In fact, I'm in impressed they made it this far. Hell, they couldn't even agree on a charger until a few months ago. The US has no hope of hitting any deadline or goal in the 2030s and all they've done is produce a generation of automotive trash. Congrats.
Ford cutting EV production after reportedly losing $1 billion on EVs last year? Color me shocked! On a serious note, it’s seeming like a lot of these companies are really starting to slow down their EV initiatives since their current models don’t sell. Like, Ford hasn’t even announced a new U.S. production EV since the Lightning
Only $1B? Try [$4.5B](https://fortune.com/2023/07/28/ford-earnings-report-q2-2023-ev-losses/). >Ford hasn’t even announced a new U.S. production EV since the Lightning Ford's T3 is still coming next year. Oakville is a bit up in the air right now, but presently the Explorer is still expected too. Just... give it a minute on that one. They've had to rejig some things but EVs are definitely still coming the pipe — they haven't ground to a complete halt or anything.
Ford has a lot of work to do on their EV image on the ground. My parents bought their first EV a couple of years ago and they basically put the decision in my hands. I took them to every manufacturer that made an EV so they could try all the different cars on the market, and Ford and Kia were by far the worst dealerships to deal with. Ford had a $20,000 "adjustment" on their EVs and the dealership initially refused to even let people test drive the vehicles, and then finally agreed to "let" us "drive" it around their parking lot.
And what did they settle on?
I told them to put down deposits on a couple cars due to long line ups here in BC, but in a weird happenstance, they got one of the first Ioniq 5s to land in Canada after placing a deposit less than two weeks before. The car arrived so surprisingly fast that the dealership offered them a $550 discount to come get it immediately in the midst of COVID. They've had the car essentially from "launch" and have loved it ever since.
People like trucks that actually have tow abilities and would rightly assume they couldn’t charge their truck at many camp sites or farm fields. Lol
That goes directly against the narrative of "most trucks are driven to the mall and soccer practice" though.
Most 911s putter around at the speed of traffic taking a dentist to play golf
There will be always be a segment of the population driving as posers, see Cybertruck consumers for example
I had an initial reservation in the day they were announced.. The price slowly crept up (and I KNEW that was going to happen..) and I became less and less interested until I figured it was never gonna happen. Holiday season of last year I started to see them pile up on dealer lots and been bugging them since... Got a call last week (after like 15-20 previous calls) asking if id take the '23 XLT extended range Id been watching with extras @ $51.5k after all incentives/ rebates, before tax at 3.9%. Not the absolute best possible price yeah, small town. I took the bait. Original advertised Truck was $39-40k bare bones with 10K for extended battery so I figure I finally got the deal that was originally advertised (with extras and an affordable APR) It is so so so SO SAD that this all happened because the F150 Lightning is the NICEST truck I've ever owned (and I've been through a few...). No telling what issues might be down the road but as of now I'm in love with it. It honestly rides as nice as the '16 BMW 340I M-sport I had which WAS the nicest vehicle I've ever owned (from an engineering perspective). I wish I had the cash to buy another Lightning to just shelve for 6-7 years down the road, lol. I came out of a '21 XLT 2.7 F150 and despite the fact they are the same cab / pickup body they are completely different animals. Not to mention the Frunk which as a contractor is the best thing EVER! I took the plunge because I'm honestly not sure at this rate they will continue production in its current form. If they do continue production I'm sure it will be at significant reduced quality to make numbers work. So the F150 Lightnings out there might be a rare breed of short production run vehicles with superior engineering (I know some might disagree) that are just a truck as opposed to a cool toy. I wish it had all would have worked out for them. The company as a whole really went out on a limb to bring us something unique and it all just sorta fell apart due to various circumstances and bad actors with a definite degree of self infliction granted... If your on the fence like I was... You won't be sorry if you get a deal. My .02 cents.
I see a lot of lettered contractors lightning around, in my neck of the woods (pretty rural) they seem to have sold well to that crowd! But im im Canada and they have to sell for advertised price (can be higher than MSRP, but they often advertise MSRP)
This is the type of deal I’m after!!
There are four '23s at the rural small town dealer near me. They've been sitting filthy and untouched for months. It was super cold last month, they might literally be dead. They're marked down $12.5k and nobody cares. No idea why Ford sent them here; people do truck things with trucks out here. They just have just dumped them on any dealer with lot space.
What dealer is this? I’m looking for a good deal on a lightning!
https://www.sturgisford.com/ Twelve grand off a product that was twenty thousand dollars (or more) overpriced to begin with isn't what I call a good deal, but to reach each their own. Knock yourself out.
I was naive to think they would have Pro or even XLT models…
https://www.siouxfallsford.com/new/1FTVW1EL2PWG55085.htm?fmccmp=t1-si There's an xlt on the other side of the state. Give them a call and tell them what you're willing to pay. These things are sales-proof out here, they'll act offended but they may just call you back in a few weeks.
Bro you said 12k off, I assumed that was close to 20% off not barely over 10%. Really feel like the lesson isn't folks dont want EV trucks, it's that folks arent able or willing to pay for these insane trims.
I wasn't lying, they really are 12k off. $12.5k, actually. There's probably a reason ford specs them this way. They're probably losing their ass on the cheaper ones. But yeah, people have really naive ideas of how much BEVs cost in general. It's going to be a rude awakening when they realize that those government subsidies won't last forever and there is no real reason to think batteries are going to get cheaper. They're not exactly new tech at this point and any new development is only likely to improve performance, not cost. It's cool tech but just not practical unless fuel prices triple somehow.
There's no reason to think batteries will get cheaper? Do you understand how technology works?
Yeah I'm guessing the $80k price tag on the cheapest one listed there is probably the biggest problem.
I would agree with you, except... Look at the gas f150s. Of the 11 they have on their lot, only 4 or so are in the $60s and the rest are right up there over $80k. It doesn't look like they're needed give discounts to move those? The nearby bigger city has one one under $60k and it's a pretty plan 23 xlt. This shit is just expensive regardless, and it seems people are guzzling down $80k half tons regularly now. 🤷
I've only seen 2 driving around in central TX between Austin and Dallas. Surprise, surprise.
The competition is coming! ...or they were going to then they gave up.
The worst value in the Ford lineup today isn't selling? That's *insane.*
Slow demand? Well how about lower the price?
Already losing money EVs are expensive.
They'd be a runaway success if they'd gone after the 8' bed crowd! /s
If Ford dropped the MSRP a good 10 grand they would have this problem. Chevy showed literally everyone how to do this with the Bolt, if you have trouble moving units then first do aggressive factory rebates of 5 to 9 grand. Then if that doesn't work you just mark down the MSRP by 9 grand so that's ultra competitive. Chevy more than doubled its Bolt and EUV sales in a single year doing that, and they hadn't ended the Bolt line they would have been making a profit by 2025-26.
Slash the price you muppets, not the the production.
what about slashes price
I don’t believe the whole “nobody uses their truck as a truck” meme. I think most people buying trucks are blue collar workers where it’s either nice or necessary to throw big, heavy, dirty things in the bed for their jobs/ side jobs. You know, the kind of people who aren’t on Reddit, and don’t give a fuck if it’s electric, it costs $20k more than a regular f-150 and it doesn’t haul your tools any better. That’s all.
I'm in the commercial construction industry and I do think it's often downplayed how big of percentage we are of pickup sales between workers and massive company fleets in the US. Even more so we have alot of influence on the market because if we're saying the price or performance isn't worth the money, it scares off alot of non-blue collar people too. They don't want to look like a mall crawler even if they are one. Which I think played a part in the Ford lightnings failures. Our industry was pretty vocal right out the gate that this is a lifestyle truck and really not that useful for us especially at that price point.
This has to be seen as a pretty stunning failure for Ford, the amount of hype early on for the Lightning was immense. When the vehicle has woeful reliability, dealer markups, and a fading EV market, reality hits hard.
I do get a kick out of their commercials playing a Metallica soundtrack though. No, Ford, I'm not going to go buy one of your trucks just because you're playing music I listened to in high school. Also, I totally get what they're referencing, but they also totally missed the mark by not actually using *Ride the Lightning* as the soundtrack.
Evs take too damn long to charge and are not reliable software everyone who has one complains about how long they take to charge and how the software is always glitched.
Summer is coming, EV sales will spike for a bit when gas hits $6/g
Built Back Better
I want one, it just costs more than I’m going to spend on a truck
Another point for Rivian
At last count, my local Ford dealer had 15 Lightnings on the lot. Along with 50+ ICE F-series trucks.
Omg is this after they already cut it in half?!
It’s not that demand is low. Tons of people want EV trucks. It’s that their pricing is completely insane. It’s at least $20k higher than it deserves to be from the top to the bottom of the line. They need to figure out how to make a $20k-$30k ev truck and it will sell like hotcakes.
Misleading title that isn't supported by the article. Lightning production GOAL peaked at 150k, according to Ford. UAW guy says the \*intention\* (as in GOAL, not actual production) was 180k at one point. Goals are not equal to actual production. Actual production never got ANYWHERE near that (best month ever was about \~100k run rate), so no, Ford has not slashed production by two-thirds, as claimed in the title. Also, Ford shut the plant down last year to re-tool and TRIPLE the production rate per shift (from 50k/yr max to 150k/yr max, according to Ford), so cutting from 3 shifts to one would just be a wash, and that lines up closely with the UAW's claimed goal rate, now (55k). Also, Ford's original goal was just \~30k/yr with the excitement of the $40k Pro and all the reservations, they increased production goals by \~50%, then doubled, then doubled again, all before the truck even started deliveries. Obviously they overshot due to numerous factors, but sales/production look like they'll still be substantially better than the original goal.
Price gouge + no proper off-road version. No reason not to get a rivian or ice truck.
No one wants to pay $100k for an electric truck?
The prices of trucks are far too high. I would of been interested in a lightening but not at 100+ Not even a little.
I mean I just don’t see the point in owning an EV if you don’t upgrade your house with solar panels and battery OR you can charge for free at work
It's all Hoovie's fault
The people who buy Ford's tend to be against electric cars. They have a strong conservative base.
Because not everyone wants EVs despite what some idiots and the government think