Good morning, everyone.

It's been mentioned in a few other threads, but I wanted to talk about price specifically. Looks like Ford has increased pricing $7,000 on the Pro, $6,500 on the XLT, and $8,500 on the long-range XLT. They're also increasing the price of the Mach-E by similar amounts. I know that inflation is a Big Deal right now, but these increases seem far outside of what the rest of the industry is doing.

But everyone isn't doing it! Chevy has dramatically cut the price of the Bolt and it's larger twin Bolt EUV for 2023. Volkswagen has lowered the starting price for their 2023 ID.4s that are now made in Tennessee, thus eligible for the new tax credit. No final word about the upcoming Ultium models from Chevy, but lots of us have reservations in for pricing that was announced when they were unveiled, which is a heckuva lot more value than the Lightning. I currently have a reservation on the $52K Blazer EV and a $64K AWD Lyriq, as well as a $40K Silverado EV. Of course, I'm not going to be purchasing all of them, but any one of them would tow my boat, which is my primary motivation to get a Lightning.

So as it sits now, the Lightning seems to have completely lost its value proposition to me. Unless GM and others dramatically reverse course on announced pricing, I can't see the Lightning making any kind of financial sense against the competition. I hope the competition holds the line on these prices and Ford has to make adjustments.

 

alert!!!

Tom, what is the weight of your boat, trailer and fun time accessories estimated to be?

The reason I ask is you have the Lyriq in your list of tow vehicles. Based on my very brief research of the AWD Lyriq, it has a maximum towing capacity of 3,500 lbs.

On topic... It is a shame that Ford has seemingly priced their available EV's out of most budgets. Perhaps this is their new business model along with letting all of the people go in order to make up the $3B (I think that was the dollar figure) they set their financial goals for.

 

Last time I weighed it was 3,280 lbs on the axle. Assuming 200 lbs on the tongue, it's right at 3,500 lbs. Over the 11 years I've had it, it's spent a lot of time behind minivans and even a Ford Escape that were rated for 3,500 lbs. So that's the magic number for me. My EV6 is rated for 2,200 lbs, but the same car is 3,500 lbs overseas, so I've thought hard about putting a hitch on. I'm always a bit neurotic about being towed into a dealer with a warranty failure with a boat attached, though.

Yup, and of course specs and pricing changes as these things get closer to release. The way things are set up, it's most advantageous to put deposits on anything you might be interested in, and get a refund if it won't work out.

Moving to EVs this fast is expensive, so I don't begrudge them for trying to leverage pricing power. The market will determine if they're right, and I absolutely hope they aren't. Right now, I don't see myself behind the wheel of a Ford in the coming years unless something changes.

 

I'm a little bitter sweet on this news, bitter because they just priced it beyond my budget and if it doesn't keep people away from buying then sweet for my portfolio which includes Ford stock.

Still have a reservation on the eSilverado which is the only ev truck left at this time still in my price range. Cars and suv's are not an option.

 

And Ford just recently announced lay off for thousands of employees in their ICE division and now they have to increase the cost by $6k -$8k per lightning along with quality problems on just about all their products.

Not sure Farley is the right man for the job at Ford.

 

They're laying off white collar jobs not workers. In the corporate world it's known as trimming the fat.

 

Farley and the team are trying to do one of the most difficult things a company can ever be forced to do. Every legacy automaker will be faced with this evolution in the coming years, and the stakes are high. There's extremely stiff competition from upstarts like Tesla and Rivian, and everyone knows they need to get it right to exist come 2040. Think about Toyota and their complete whiff of a bZ4x, or Nissan's Leaf. Neither are likely to sell in significant numbers, and billions were poured into their development. If you make too many of those, or your ICE division ceases to be competitive too quickly, you could find yourself in bankruptcy.

I think Farley & Co. are doing an amazing job trying to pivot the entire business while remaining competitive in all segments where the participate. They created an entire department and installed a new director-level position to address quality, so I'd expect that part to improve. It has to.

 

How many engineers where part of this layoff?

 

Read for your self. https://www.wsj.com/articles/ford-co...da-11661180161

It states white collar and contractors to the tune of about 3000 primarily in Canada, U.S. and India. Considering the new ev division Ford has split away from the ice division, it stands to reason. Why would they need an ice engineer in an ev division? Just spit balling on that last question.

 

The new quality director was a reactive move and was too late and why did Ford's management (Farley) realize one day they need to have such a significant increase in price for the Lightning trucks? When doing an amazing job you prevent these type of issues from happening in the first place.

 

In my humble opinion, it is better to let white collar go rather than blue collar, but each of those collars (regardless of color) is a human being with a family. Whether they have children of their own or are someone's child, they have a family. They are not just a line item on a spreadsheet, they are a person with a life and people that depend on them.

The military called this "force shaping" during a couple of periods of cutbacks while I was active duty and there were A LOT of people negatively impacted by the "shaping". Not only the people and their families that were let go, but the ones left behind that were now responsible for picking up the slack. Just because there are less people to accomplish the mission does not mean the mission can fail and the people get a do-over. Do more with less was something we lived by and it was utterly catastrophic on people, families and equipment many times over.

 

White collar jobs are Engineers as well

He has said profits from its lineup of gasoline and diesel-engine vehicles will help fund the transition

 

Blue collar jobs require the design, engineering, manufacturing engineers, Quality, product qualification, supply chain, etc. to be successful. Good management keeps these jobs functions at the correct balance. All of these functions will not be absorbed by the blue collar worker.

 

Key word "Transition". Transition from ice to ev. Their going to need all hands on deck on the assembly line. Not so much in the office.

 

One plausible explanation is that commodity prices have increased for some important metals after the introduction. Tesla has massively increased prices during that time. I came really close to a Model Y at $48K at the end of 2020. They sell that same car for $67K today.