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The Lincoln MKR may be a key ingredient to reviving Lincoln A night at the Ford theater: The Lincoln brand has been on a streak that 's been seldom duplicated over the last 10 years. Of course, we all know that the streak has been a bad one. Terrible, in fact. Sales have gone from well over 200k in the mid-90s to only 120k in 2006. The individual vehicles within the Lincoln brand have been left to rot in many cases, and the ones that have been updated are in the worst-possible market situation (see Navigator). In the rotting category, the livery special of the millennium, Town Car, rides on an ancient body-on-frame car platform. The Panther platform stems from the late 1970s LTD. Almost as ancient as the platform on which the Town Car rides is its powerplant. The 4.6L, two-valve V8 and four-speed transmission are shared with the F-150 of all things. There are still a slim minority that say the Town Car is classic American luxury, but with a chassis and powertrain that's older than many of Autoblog's readers, classic would be the operative word.
Many more products have been unceremoniously killed off without the benefit of a redesign. Since 2000, the Aviator and LS never saw a single design change and came to market severely disadvantaged. The Aviator has been a well-chronicled failure. It reportedly shared only 40% of its hardware with the Explorer off which it was based. Amazingly, just about the only area of the Aviator that is common with the Explorer is the exterior design. That's just crazy. What executive team approves new everything except the sheet metal? Sure it had a different grille and different front and rear lights, but the decision-making there was weak. Then you have the LS, which sold 50,000 copies in 2000. It sold 8,500 just six years later. When it came out, the LS had the BMW 5 Series within leaping distance. At the end, it had $10,000 rebate stickers on the windshield. Continue reading A Deeper Look Into the Lincoln Brand: Reviving or Dying? Continue reading A Deeper Look Into the Lincoln Brand: Reviving or Dying?
Interesting article. I am absolutely dumbfounded that they took such a nice car as the LS. Made no improvements and let it die. The only vehicle they promote is the Navigator.
I personally don't think the management is competent. Lincoln and Ford will probably die a slow death.
Toyota updates/changes its platforms every 6 yrs to keep up with technology.
Ford keeps their platforms for decades and watches market share disappear.
