THE MORNING RANT: Blue Oval Blues – The Ford EV Debacle Keeps Worsening

Ford’s electric vehicle nightmare is unrelenting, and although it has allegedly backed off of its most aggressive EV timelines, the misfires of Ford’s “Model e” program continue to cause 10-figure losses, dealer resistance, and a multi-billion dollar construction project that is likely to never manufacture a single EV.

In 2021, the gullible Republican-controlled legislature in Tennessee, along with the gullible Republican governor, threw about one billion taxpayer dollars from its Rainy Day Fund at Ford to manufacture a massive new plant outside of Memphis. Known as Blue Oval City, the total cost of the project was estimated at close to $6 billion. The state also helped out by condemning land and building roads. The first electric pickup trucks were supposed to roll off the line in 2025, but just a few months ago Ford announced that production was being pushed back until 2026. The delay is not related to construction issues. It’s because consumers have emphatically rejected Ford’s flagship EV, the F150 Conflagration Lightning. There is no demand for an electric pickup, because it cannot do what consumers need pickups to do.

Not only does Ford not need the EV capacity that the massive new Tennessee plant was going to provide, it pretty much doesn’t need any EV capacity at all. Ford is also postponing EV production plans at other plants.

“Ford delays next-gen EV offerings as it pushes further into hybrids” [Yahoo – 4/04/2024]

Ford said today it is pushing back EV production at its massive Blue Oval City EV campus in Tennessee to 2026 from its initial 2025 start date.

Ford also revealed it is “retiming” the launch of upcoming EVs at its plant in Oakville, Ontario, where it plans to build next-generation three-row EVs, most likely a full-size SUV. The company is aiming to launch those vehicles in 2027, pushing back the original 2025 timeline.

I have been writing about the need for the elected Tennessee officials who voted for this boondoggle to be held accountable, including this piece at The Pipeline, “EV Accountability Is Coming.” With the writing on the wall regarding Blue Oval City, Tennessee officials are finally starting to prepare for the uncomfortable discussion about what happens if/when Ford finally pulls the plug on the West Tennessee plant.

“Dimming electric vehicle market may delay start of full production at Ford’s new West TN plant” [Tennessee Lookout – 6/13/2024]

The state senator in whose district the Ford plant is located is still hopeful…

State Sen. Page Walley, a Savannah Republican, told the Lookout his understanding is that full production of the truck at the BlueOval City campus in Stanton was pushed back earlier this year by nine months from its initially scheduled full production start date. Based on “what’s happening, with (Ford’s) read on the economy,” the company might need “a little bit longer runway” before full production takes off, Walley said.

But with the absence of a market for the unwanted electric pickup that Ford intended to build, the senator is also already hedging his language and test-driving his CYA language for the potential taxpayer backlash:

Walley said, however, he isn’t concerned about the state losing money amid Ford’s slowdown because of a “clawback” provision that would enable Tennessee to reclaim funds if the automaker fails to follow through on its investment and hiring promise. “That’s kind of our security in this,” Walley said.

What if Ford’s failure goes beyond failing to follow through on this investment? The ongoing $5 billion annual losses Ford is booking on its Model e-dsel misadventure, plus the inevitable write off for Blue Oval City, will take a huge toll on its Balance Sheet. Will there be anything left to “claw back”?

The chairman of Tennessee’s megasite authority had the following to say, which doesn’t sound too optimistic.

Clay Bright, chairman of the state’s megasite authority, said this week that Ford’s time frame “slid some,” but he didn’t think work was ever scheduled to start until the latter part of 2025, anyway. He added that the automaker is committed to finishing the plant, but “we really won’t know if they’re serious until they start hiring their staff that has to operate the facilities.”

Meanwhile, Ford had required dealers to pay approximately $500,000 to become a “Model e Certified” EV dealer, and $1.2 million to become a “Model e Certified Elite” dealer. A great many Ford dealers balked, because they actually know Ford’s customers and what those customers’ vehicle preferences and needs are. Electric vehicles are a terrible fit for most of Ford’s customer base. While it’s a shame that Ford’s executives are more obedient to the climate communists in the Biden administration than they are to Ford’s own customers, at least the dealers actually understand the market they serve.

With its EV program in a doom loop, and with a terrible glut of unsold EVs to unload, Ford just pulled the plug on the “Model e Certified” program so that it can start shipping its unwanted EVs to all of its dealerships. The dealers who chose not to invest in becoming e-certified chose wisely, even though they still might not want those awful products on their lots.

Beege Welborn at Hot Air has an excellent piece discussing this reversal. “Dealers Who Forked Out for Ford's 'Exclusive' EV 'Certification' Feel Like They Got ShEVved” [Hot Air – 6/17/2024]

Dealers who'd paid over half to a million plus dollars to be Ford EV "certified" to be able to sell the all-electric things in what was billed as an exclusive "or else not at all" arrangement were kind of blown away at a surprise announcement out of corporate HQ last week. Ford yanked the football.

It will be interesting to see if Ford tries to reimburse those dealers who shelled out big money for the privilege of selling Ford’s EVs. Why not? Ford is already hemorrhaging so much money on its EV debacle, what’s a couple hundred million more at this point?

Amidst all this, much of the media is still contorting itself to report booming sales and strong demand for Ford’s EVs.

“Ford EV and hybrid sales surge 65% in May” [CNBC – 6/04/2024]

Lumping in hybrids with EVs is rather dishonest, since one actually runs on gas and is not an EV, but otherwise, great headline, CNBC.

As it turns out, of Ford’s 190,014 vehicle sales in May, only 8,966 were electric, or less than 5%, and that is with an increase in year over year EV sales. Sure, the total is still low. But how did Ford increase its EV sales at all? As noted in this glowing Yahoo piece , “Though sales of Ford EVs are higher, Ford has increasingly had to use incentives to move the vehicles.”

Yes, there is a price for most everything, even Ford’s unpopular EVs, if the selling price gets close enough to $0. Liquidating a product at a huge loss can certainly move excess inventory. And Ford certainly had excess inventory. As I wrote in October 2023:

Ford has suddenly canceled all further deliveries to dealers of 2023 model year F150 Lightnings that are not already pre-sold.

Let me translate. What would have been year-model 2023 electric pickups are now going to be year-model 2024 electric pickups (after their “additional quality checks”) so as to ensure that there is not a glut of unsold prior-year model Lightnings in 2024. Don’t misunderstand, there will still be a glut of these unwanted pickups, but at least the dealers will be sitting on a glut of year-model 2024 Lightnings.

That glut of 2023-turned-2024 model Lightnings is now being sold at a huge loss, causing a percentage rise in year-over-year sales, but also causing a sea of red ink.

There is no way forward for Ford to resolve its EV nightmare, and Blue Oval City is a sunk cost that will likely have to be written off at some point. Ford’s traditional business units cannot continue to cover for its EV losses forever, no matter how passionate Bill Ford and CEO Jim Farley are about pleasing Klaus Schwab and Joe Biden.

Toyota has shown that there is a non-EV path to both prosperity and virtuosity with its lineup of ICE vehicles and hybrids. Ford would be wise to abandon EVs and follow that path.

[buck.throckmorton at protonmail dot com]

posted by Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM

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