Mercury - death by badge engineering.

It was all downhill after the pinto/bobcat.

All time worse badge engineering idea - Chevy Cavalier / Cadillac Cimarron

 

So they buy a BMW, Lexus or Cadillac.
The real problem is the autoworkers union became too powerful, putting a wages and extended benefits load plus workers who didn't care above sustainability.

 

I can agree with this statement. My intent for this thread, which I couldn't find the proper words for, was to demonstrate the need for Mercury even today. 52 Merc said it in a way. The niche filled by Mercury was evident back in the 50's, when all cars had style. You could buy the base Crestline Ford, park it in the drive-in, and then park a Mercury of the same year, and you'll see two different types of cars and two different types of owners. However, today's world, you park a Mercury next to a Ford of the same model, can you tell the difference among the people? Foreign cars have filled a niche, albeit successfully, which pushed the niche's filled by Mercury and Ford into a tighter circle. Plus, with people buying beyond their means, (the frugal still buying baseline Ford) the rest are going above their budget and jumping right into a Lincoln, or Cadillac, or BMW, etc... Lease programs helped that in a way, too. So the type of people who typically bought Mercury are no longer out there.

I suppose efforts by Ford to keep Mercury going lasted 10 years or so (read that as life support). It just came to a point where it no longer seemed worth it. Could have the designers and engineers tried harder? sure they could have. But investors want returns short term, and so Ford does what it has to, to keep creating returns. That is the price of business.

This area of FTE is on '48-60 Ford pickups and trucks....Mercury included. So we all have some sort of nostalgic factor built in, or we wouldn't bother having one. Modern drivelines installed?....sure, but the look is still old. So we all may be "old-car guys" and we all may have our reasons. Personally, for me, I prefer to "live" in a time of that era,. I hope to have the old gas pumps outside my garage, the old Ford truck, pickup, and Mercury "Sunday go to Church" car. However, I have to live in today's world, and losing Mercury means just one more thing lost that ties us to the past. So to me, Mercury has a lot of value.

You all may not see it now, but how many people do you talk to still talk about Plymouth? Mercury will be a forgotten term as well.

 

In terms of the majority, you are quite right. The average twenty something guy doesn't even remember or know of cars and trucks that have been phased out in the past ten years. There is just so much thrown at them nowadays from all the sources of types of products that it is just overwhelming to take it all in. If you don't have a particular interest in something of the past or if you didn't live in those times you just plain don't have a connection or even care. Unfortunately that particular demographic slice is now fast becoming the majority. However, the other side of this is the fact that there are a vast number of museums and individuals that are keeping the memories of all the old cars and trucks alive. The very existence of this forum is testament to that. In some ways, cars and trucks of the past are now better known that when they were phased out.