Edsel

A make of automobile manufactured by the Ford Motor Company, the Edsel was introduced amidst a considerable amount of publicity on "E Day" -- September 4, 1957. The firm had recently earned its status as a publicly-traded corporation that was no longer entirely owned by members of the Ford family. It was able to sell cars without being hindered by Henry Ford's antiquated preferences following the sellers' market of the post-war years. The new management compared the roster of Ford makes with that of General Motors, and noted that Lincoln competed, not with Cadillac, but with Oldsmobile. The plan was developed to move Lincoln upmarket and put another make in beneath it, with yet another (Continental) at the very top. Research and development had begun in 1955 under the name "E-car" which stood for "Experimental car".

Edsel's failure

The Edsel is most famous for being a marketing disaster. Indeed, the name "Edsel" came to be synonymous with commercial failure, and similar ill-fated products, such as the Betamax tape format, have often been colloquially referred to as "Edsels." Since it was such a debacle, it provided a case study for marketers on how not to market a product. The main reason why the Edsel's failure is so famous was because it flopped after Ford put $400,000,000 into its development. Even though the Edsel was a flop, it still has a strong fan following.

Related Topics:
Marketing disaster - Betamax

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After an initial United States sales goal of 100,000 - 200,000 for the model year 1958, the Edsel went on to sell only 100,847 in the U.S. over the course of the three years it was in production, with an additional 7,431 sold in Canada, and a bare handful overseas.

Related Topics:
United States - 1958 - Canada

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Several reasons are given for its downfall. One is consumer letdown following the large publicity buildup prior to the model's release. The pre-release advertising campaign touted the car as having '...more YOU ideas' and the teaser advertisements in magazines only revealed glimpses of the car through a highly-blurred lens or wrapped in paper or under tarps. The cars were shipped to the dealerships undercover and remained wrapped on the dealer lots. After its introduction to the public, it didn't live up to its over-blown hype even though it did have many new features such as self-adjusting rear brakes and automatic lubrication.

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Another reason that the Edsel failed was that when Ford was developing it, they asked consumers what they wanted in a car while not asking how much they were willing to pay for it. Thus when it actually came out, the price tag was much higher than many customers were expecting despite all the model's features. When many potential buyers saw the base price tag, they simply left the dealership, and others were put off by the price for a fully loaded, top of the line model.

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The name of the car, Edsel, is also often cited as a further reason for its unpopularity. Ford ran internal studies to decide on a name. They reached no conclusions. Ford hired the advertising firm Foote, Cone and Belding to come up with a name. Ford also asked poet Marianne Moore for suggestions, and she submitted a list which included "The Intelligent Whale," "The Utopian Turtletop," "The Pastelogram," and "The Mongoose Civique." All these outside ideas were rejected, and at the behest of Ernest Breech, who was chairing a meeting in the absence of Henry Ford II, the car was finally called "Edsel" in honor of Edsel Ford, former company president and son of Henry Ford. Marketing surveys later found the name was thought to sound odd and therefore was unpopular with the public; additionally, some sources claim that the Ford family disapproved of the decision to name the car after Edsel Ford from the very beginning.

Related Topics:
Foote, Cone and Belding - Marianne Moore - Ernest Breech - Henry Ford II - Edsel Ford - Henry Ford

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Perhaps the most important factor in the Edsel's failure, however, was that when the car was introduced, the U.S. was entering a period of recession. Sales for all car manufacturers, even those not introducing new models, were down; consumers entered a period of preferring less-expensive, more fuel-efficient automobiles. The Edsel came in two engine sizes of 361 and 410 in³ (5.9 and 6.7 L). These were named the E-400 and the E-475, with the numbers corresponding to the torque ratings of 400 and 475 ft·lbf (540 and 640 Nm). Compression was 10.5 to 1. Edsels were fast, but required premium fuel and did not make the gas mileage desired during a recession. Mechanics said bad things about the bigger engine because of its unique design. The cylinder head had no combustion chamber and was perfectly flat, meaning that the combustion took place in the cylinder bore. This design reduced carbon buildup, but appeared strange to mechanics. Many drivers disliked having the automatic transmission as push-buttons mounted on the steering wheel hub: this was the traditional location of the horn, and drivers ended up shifting gears instead of honking the horn. While the Edsel was fast, the location of the transmission push buttons was not conducive to street racing. There were jokes about stoplight dragsters and the buttons: D for Drag, L for Leap, and R for Race (instead of Drive, Low and Reverse). The Edsel, moreover, was priced higher than comparable models offered by competing automotive firms at the time. In this respect, it was not a failure — while it did not hit its sales target based on 1955 sales numbers, it did achieve the projected percentage of sales for its class. The sales target of 100,000 cars was 3.3% of mid-size cars sold in 1955 when the design process began; the Edsel achieved 5% of mid-size car sales in 1958 when the car was first sold. Several other car makes did not survive this market downturn: Nash and Hudson were discontinued after the 1957 model year, Packard after 1958, and De Soto after the 1961 model year.

Related Topics:
Recession - Fuel-efficient - Nash - Hudson - Packard - De Soto

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Various other problems were cited, including the unpopularity of the Edsel's trademark "horsecollar" grille, which made it stand out from other cars of the period. A widely circulated wisecrack at the time was that "It looked like a Merc sucking on a lemon." There were also reports of mechanical flaws in the models originating in the factory, due to lack of quality control and confusion of parts with other Ford models. Edsels in their first (1958) model year were made in both Mercury and Ford factories; the longer wheelbase models, Citation and Corsair, were produced alongside the Mercury products and the shorter wheelbase models, Pacer and Ranger, were produced alongside the Ford products. There was never a stand-alone Edsel factory devoted solely to Edsel model production; therefore, the desired quality control of the different Edsel models was difficult to achieve for the new make of car.

Related Topics:
Quality control - Mercury

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The "horsecollar" grille was dropped for the 1960 model; 1960 Edsels had a body-type almost indistinguishable from the Ford cars released that year. The Edsel was discontinued after truncated production of the 1960 version in November 1959.

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The scheduled 1961 Edsel Comet compact car was relabeled the Mercury Comet and sold more cars in its first year than all models of Edsel ever produced. Styling touches seen in the Comets sold to the public that allude to being part of the Edsel family of models include the rear tailfins (though canted diagonally), the tail light shape (reminiscent of the 1960 Edsel) and the front grille (roughly similar to the 1960 Edsel's).

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Fewer than 6,000 Edsels currently survive and today they are considered collectors? items, convertibles sometimes selling for over $20,000 if in good condition. (As usual with classics, hardtop models are worth considerably less, station wagons less than that, and sedans least of all. It is possible to get a solid, running, inspected 1959 sedan for about $3000 to 3500, as of January 2004.)

Related Topics:
Hardtop - Station wagon - As of January 2004

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