The idea seemed so simple. Ford could satisfy North Americans’ increasing appetite for sporty European cars by importing one already in production. A popular Euro sports coupe could siphon off customers defecting to the likes of BMW and Audi, helping Ford compete in this hot market by taking advantage of the company’s global reach. It didn’t work out that way. Ford’s new car brand sputtered immediately, and within a few years was withdrawn from the US and Canadian markets.
Merkur survives mostly as a footnote in Ford’s long history, so it was quite a surprise to come across one at a local car show. This rare survivor is from Merkur’s last year of production, and as an added bonus is a daily driver with a remarkable 280,000 miles. Before we take a look at this car and the XR4Ti’s qualities, we’ll examine the Merkur brand’s origins.
Merkur was born out of one of the major themes in North America’s early-’80s auto market: the burgeoning popularity of premium European cars. Customers – especially younger, affluent ones – increasingly preferred taut handling, compact size and functional interiors to the larger, more traditional American offerings. A dose of snobbery that came with these cars didn’t hurt, either. From 1980 to 1985, for instance, BMW’s US sales doubled.
American manufacturers responded, but the resulting models were often “European” only in marketing terminology. Blacked-out trim and ads featuring driving gloves weren’t enough to dent the imports’ growing popularity.
Ford, however, had a plan. The company sold a different range of vehicles in Europe than in North America, so why not import some of its European cars? Just such a plan was hatched when Ford of Europe replaced its aging Cortina with the Sierra in late 1982. This compact car (offered in three body styles) charted a new course from a design standpoint, debuting a rounded, aero look that couldn’t have differed more from the stodgy Cortina.
Sierra’s appearance had been foreshadowed by the Probe III concept vehicle a year earlier. While the futuristic design may not have pleased everyone, that hardly hurt sales. Sierra became one of Europe’s best-selling cars for 1983; Ford hoped its European sophistication could transfer across the Atlantic.
Though most Sierras served as basic, family transportation, the XR4i performance variant received the most press adulations. With a fuel-injected 2.8-liter V-6, sport suspension, higher-end interior appointments, and the Probe III’s biplane spoiler, this model’s performance matched its slithery looks. Shortly after the XR4i was released in Europe, Ford announced it would sell a version in North America.
Surprisingly, Ford elected to create not just a new model, but a new brand… Ford’s first since Edsel. The Sierra XR4i would be sold in the US and Canada as the Merkur XR4Ti (“T” because it would be turbocharged), and Ford announced that other European Fords would follow. The cars would be sold at select Lincoln-Mercury dealerships.
Lincoln-Mercury Division General Manager Robert Rewey said about potential Merkur customers, that “We’re looking for people who are just on their way to European cars rather than people who are already in them.” In other words, domestic or Japanese car owners who are contemplating buying something like a BMW. Not a bad target market, though many of the XR4Ti’s characteristics, and Ford’s early marketing strategy, worked against this effort.
First, Lincoln-Mercury was an odd conduit through which to sell premium European cars. Lincoln-Mercury’s average customers were in their 50s, and valued traditional domestic cars. Meanwhile, Ford targeted Merkur to customers in their 30s, with college educations and incomes over $40,000 per year. While we’d all like to think that disparate groups can get along, in the 1980s, these two demographics often eyed each other suspiciously. A 35-year-old Yuppie wouldn’t be caught dead standing next to a Grand Marquis on the showroom floor.
The car’s name didn’t help, either. Merkur means “Mercury” in German, so from that perspective it was clever. But any product that needs a phonetic spelling faces an uphill battle in the US (it’s mare-koor, as shown above). This alone wasn’t a deal-killer; after all, Acura and Hyundai debuted in the US at about the same time, and they’re still around. However, Merkur sounded clunky, and did the car few favors. Combined with an alphanumeric model name that looked like an algebra equation, “Merkur XR4Ti” didn’t exactly make a great first impression.
Another factor limiting Merkur’s success was that the cars Ford chose to sell didn’t match the configurations customers sought. The XR4Ti came only in hatchback form, and the first shipments included mostly manual-transmission cars in silver or gray tones. A sedan version, and a warmer color palette, would have broadened the car’s appeal.
Ford predicted first-year sales of 20,000-25,000 – and even more optimistically, that the Merkur brand (once other models were added) would sell 100,000 units by the decade’s end. To put that in perspective, no premium European brand sold 100,000 units in the US at the time. Ford was either bluffing or was outlandishly confident.
North American Merkurs weren’t quite identical to European Sierra XR4i’s. The main change was that Ford swapped the European V-6 for the 2.3-liter turbo four used in the Thunderbird Turbo Coupe and Mustang SVO (though the engine did feature many improvements, including better noise and vibration control). All told, the Merkur contained 800 different parts than the Sierra. With so many different parts, and relatively low production numbers, it didn’t make sense to build Merkurs alongside other Sierras. Instead, Ford contracted with Karmann to assemble these cars at its facility in Rheine.
The first Merkurs made their way across the Atlantic in early 1985, listing at about the same price as BMW’s 318i. First-year sales underwhelmed. Still, Ford put on a brave face. Merkur’s Marketing Plans Manager admitted sales were disappointing, but insisted that momentum was starting to build, pointing to struggles that Audi had when it was a new brand in North America. That was wishful thinking. Overall, Merkur seemed stuck in an in-between land: Not refined enough to pry performance enthusiasts from their BMWs, but too European to attract a typically domestic clientele.
Merkur’s tepid reception left a trail of disappointing numbers. By late 1985, Ford offered $1,000 cash rebates to Merkur buyers. One year later, dealers had a 5-month supply of XR4Ti’s on hand. During those first two years, Ford sold about 25,000 XR4Ti’s… within their initial target range for first-year sales alone.
At that point, Ford hoped Merkur would be saved by a car other than the XR4Ti, since Ford planned for that brand to include multiple models from the outset. In 1987, a second car – the larger, 5-door Scorpio joined the range as a 1988 model. But by this time the Merkur brand was in serious trouble. Scorpio helped a bit, but not nearly enough.
Source of data: Merkur Club of America
That early forecast of 25,000 sales building to 100,000 in a few years seemed like a fantasy. 1985’s XR4Ti sales topped off at 12,400, far below expectations. The next year was slightly better, but then the bottom fell out. Scorpio added 16,000 sales for ’88, but that didn’t help much. In the fall of 1988, Ford announced it would discontinue the XR4Ti the following year. That wound up being the end of the entire Merkur brand; in October 1989, Ford announced the Scorpio as well was being discontinued.
As for the XR4Ti, after an initial flurry of ads and promotions, the car was shifted to Ford’s back burner. And while the car remained largely the same for four years, a trickle of detailed changes made each year identifiable. 1986 models gained the required third brake light. For ’87 (shown above), 15” pie-spoke wheels replaced the original 14” telephone-dial design, lower body cladding was added, plus interior and mechanical upgrades.
1988 and ’89 XR4Ti’s are easily identified because Ford replaced the biplane spoiler with an understated conventional one. Additionally, bumpers were now body-colored and wheels were BBS-type alloys.
Seeking a quick way to identify 1989 models? A few minor changes mark these cars as different, but look for these black bumper inserts – they were red or chrome for all other years.
For folks who didn’t mind buying an unpopular car facing poor resale value and questionable product support, 1988 or ’89 Merkurs became great deals. Ford offered $4,000 rebates on 1989 XR4Ti’s. Considering these cars listed for about $20,000, that was an instant 20% discount… and that was just the beginning of negotiations for most buyers. Ads like this, offering $7,000 off MSRP, were common.
That brings us to our Radiant Red featured car. With Ford having announced the XR4Ti’s demise before the model year began, original owners knew these cars would be orphans. Accordingly, sales were very slow, with only 2,870 1989 models finding homes.
We can walk around this example, and look at some of the Merkur’s features that highlight both its upsides and downsides.
Appearance: Since first impressions are important, we’ll start with a brief discussion of the car’s looks. While the Sierra sold well in Europe, the XR4Ti’s styling never caught on in North America. It’s not that the aero design was too far out of the mainstream – Ford’s Taurus and Thunderbird caught on with this look. But the Merkur’s design appeared less integrated than those cars. The front and rear fascias looked a bit droopy, and the rear quarter windows split by a wide C-pillar – especially with the original biplane spoiler – put the car over the edge for most North Americans’ tastes. In some ways, this car must have looked like a love child of a Ford Tempo and Saab 900, and its performance virtues didn’t compensate for these appearance quirks.
Performance: The 2.3 turbo was fast – but the engine wasn’t well matched to Ford’s intended target market. Turbocharged sport models added a nice halo to many 1980s car lines, however these power plants had their downsides with peaky power delivery and minimal low-RPM strength. The Merkur’s engine was no exception. A V-6, even if not as fast as the turbo, would have been better suited to the first-time import buyers the company tried to attract, and would have also paired better with an automatic transmission. While the 2.3 turbo was spirited with a manual, the optional three-speed automatic sapped a good bit of its liveliness.
The Merkur handled well – as one would expect of a rear-wheel drive European sporting car. Purists tended to criticize its handling as too soft, but still this was Ford’s fastest, and likely best-handling, family-type car of its day. Incidentally, the North American version of this car was 280 lbs. heavier than the European XR4i. About 80 lbs. of that was due to the 2.3 engine… with its iron block and turbo hardware it was heavier than the V-6.
Hatchback: Hatchbacks were popular in the 1980s, but notably sparse in the premium field. In the US market, only Saab offered hatchbacks in this price category – so probably not the best choice for luring first-time import buyers. One wonders if Ford had brought the Sierra sedan to North America instead of (or in addition to) the hatchback, whether Merkur would have achieved greater success. Of course, hatchbacks do have their advantages. In the XR4Ti’s case, the car could hold over 30 cu. ft. of storage with the rear seat down, and even with it up, could hold ample luggage.
Interior: Overall, the interior’s design – both dash and seats – strikes a good balance of functionality and uniqueness. The uniqueness comes through both with lots of rectangular shapes and some interestingly placed controls. Climate controls are the vertical sliding controls to the instrument binnacle’s right. Rear defroster and wiper controls are rocker switches to the binnacle’s left. This car’s owner has made some modifications by replacing the digital clock/calendar with round auxiliary gauges, which actually look like they were born there. XR4Ti’s came well equipped, though Ford did offer a few options. This Merkur features leather interior (at $890, the costliest option for 1989) and a moonroof, while heated seats and an automatic transmission were left unchecked when this example was built. The interior’s expanses of hard plastic betrayed the Sierra’s pedestrian origins, though the overall impression was sophisticated-looking, unique, and of decent quality.
While this car’s very survival is impressive, even more extraordinary is that it likely achieved the top percentile for total Merkur mileage, with over 280,000 miles on the odometer. I spoke with its owner at the car show – he bought it used, and has had a few other Merkurs previously, so he’s well-versed in these cars’ intricacies. This is his daily driver, as well as his long-distance cruiser. He told me that he recently drove from Virginia to Colorado (and back). Given its mileage and daily use, this car is in outstanding condition. If an award existed for mileage champions of orphan cars, this Merkur’s owner ought to win a medal. This was a great car through which to reacquaint myself with a model I hadn’t seen in nearly a half-decade.
Overall, the Merkur episode was an outlier in an otherwise good decade for Ford. While a good car for the times, it wasn’t good enough to overcome the obstacles thrown in its way by clumsy marketing and misreading consumers’ interest. If given a better chance to make a positive impression on North American consumers, the Merkur brand could easily have succeeded with a steady flow of European Fords. And if that had happened, the brand wouldn’t have been relegated to footnote status, and just maybe could have outlasted Mercury itself.
Photographed at the Labor Day Car Show in Fairfax, Virginia in September 2024.
Related Reading:
1985-89 Merkur XR4Ti – Too Close To The Sun by William Stopford
1986 Merkur XR4Ti – What’s In A Name? by Jeff Nelson
1989 Merkur XR4Ti – Last Merk Standing by Paul Niedermeyer
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SierraGolf became Europe’s best-selling car for 1983 ” (succeeding Renault R5’s four year run) and remained so the following thirteen years.Thanks for pointing that out – I’ll amend the text to avoid any confusion.
I went back and checked my sources to see where I got that from, and there were a number of US magazine and news articles in 1984 that cited the Sierra as being Europe’s best-selling car in 1983. Others cited that Sierra was the best-selling car in the first half of ’83. I suspect that the authors of the former claim took some liberties.
The New York Times article below had a bit more information, claiming that Sierra was Europe’s best-selling car in the first six months of 1983, but for the total year the Escort exceeded it. I just looked quickly around for European total sales or production numbers for this period and couldn’t find it – but to avoid any confusion I’ll change the text to “one of Europe’s best-selling cars.”
💥 I have the dealership Merkur product book.
Shows all options, colors, etc. It’s a 3 ring binder.
Always wondered if it has any value to a collector.
I do see them advertised occasionally – this is something like that currently on eBay for $79.00:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/126309200641?itmmeta=01JMJNKSFJFFZCSRJYDS5B2CC3&hash=item1d689d7301:g:VXYAAOSwF7Njml-X
…but I have no idea how many people will actually pay that kind of money for a binder of sales information. I guess a very dedicated enthusiast might.
Ford hit a home run accidentally and undeservedly with an Italian body on a Falcon platform, but every effort to appeal to an intelligent clientelle has failed.
Ford of South Africa built a run of XR8i’s that might have worked.
Their excellent but torqueless solid lifter 2.8 was installed in Rangers with a 3.08 gearset.
A 1934 roadster is now their only hope.
Ford tried hard. There was plenty of marketing, and press, supporting these. Perhaps if they were more affordably priced from the beginning, and followed up the grounding-breaking Taurus/Sable, they would have been better received. Merkur meant nothing to most people. Launching a brand, with an unfamiliar car in NA, was overly ambitious. As Ford of Europe, and Ford USA, were still literally, an ocean apart to buyers. Except for the most engaged, in what Ford was doing on the Continent.
How many T-Bird and Tempo owners, likely didn’t realize how heavily these cars, were influenced by the Sierra. Or even heard of the Sierra.
Credit to the owner for keeping this one pristine. I did prefer the look of the first versions. With their grey lower bodysides, red pinstripe trim, and distinctive alloys. More sophisticated and period correct IMO, than the appearance of this one.
The Sierra (or Merkur) is superior in everything to the Cimarron, the american response leaves much to be desired.
Another example that the european automotive industry in the 80s crushed the american one.
I remember when these first came here, and was immediately put off by the high cost. A BMW 318i was awfully expensive (about $16k, if memory serves) for what you got, but at least you were buying some snob cred. Everyone knew that this was a Ford.
I never found these attractive, and I am pretty sure I had plenty of company. It was too “boy racer” for the demographic Ford was aiming at.
The other problem was that miserable turbo 4. Ford made another effort at selling that in a too-expensive car with the Mustang SVO, with more-or-less the same result. All that said, I can respect a guy who likes it for what it is and drives the heck out of it.
Very true – and your first paragraph makes Honda’s success with Acura even more impressive. The Legend (in 1986) was costlier than a BMW 3-series, and everyone knew it was a Honda, yet it succeeded. Even with the cheaper Integra sharing showroom space. The Legend was very refined, well-styled for North American tastes, and Honda’s investment in a separate dealer network must’ve been ungodly expensive, but it succeeded. Ford tried the cheaper route with a less-refined, awkward-looking car, and it didn’t pay off.
On a bizness trip to the UK in 1985 I briefly drove a UK base version of this car. It had the 1.6L and manual transmission with steering wheel, of course, on the wrong side! I was instantly IMPRESSED with the car; it felt like it would easily outrun and out handle the Citation X-11 I had back home. Even that brief drive, thanks to a UK based Case Engineer, was a real eye opener about what a excellent car Ford could build, but really didn’t in the U.S. Our second car was a Ford Escort, manual……uhhh………
OTOH, my third car was my beloved, modified 1956 Chevy 150 2 dr. sedan with its ’66 275hp 327. Handling, brakes? Who needs em??? 🙂 DFO
I had a 86 SVO and liked it, so this the kind of car I liked. But, by 1989, the turbo was blowing oil and I was headed to Texas, so I sold it got a Chevy truck, mostly to get AC
I don’t have sales figures. But as I recall, even on the European continent including Scandinavia the Sierra XR4 wasn’t a particularly successful car in terms of sales (It may have been different in Britain with its preference for Ford sports versions – I don’t know).
I did quite like the BMW 318i-like dashboard, with the central part of the dash angled towards the driver. And the immediate primary instrument cluster facing the driver, emerging outward from the dash. Lending a sense of three-dimensionality, and depth. While prioritizing primary instruments. A clever and unique look, that added visual sophistication. This car was well thought out.
I used to feel this would have been a good choice, especially for upwardly mobile ladies.
What’s missing here is that this was Bob Lutz’ doing; it was his idea and he pushed hard for it, and made it happen.It’s a classic Lutz-mobile: throw a lot of brash visual performance cues (spoiler, body kit) on a car and stuff a hot engine in it, and…it will sell! “I can turn a Ford Sierra into a BMW killer, even in America!” I can just see him selling Dearborn on the Merkur name: “You guys, it’s German! For Mercury! Get it? It’s brilliant! That’s all it takes; Americans will slurp up anything with a German name on it and some spoilers!”
Lutz came up with this idea when he was head of Ford UK and championed it with all of his usual convincing style and hubris.
And of course the XR4Ti was an almost perfect preview of what Bob did with the Australian Monaro transformation into the US market Pontiac GTO; another Lutz fiasco, to add to his significant number of other ones.
Another Bob Lutz dismal failure, to which he admitted in his book, was his GMC Envoy XUV.
I recall when these came out. First thing I thought to myself was Merkur? What kind of name is that? Then there was those two spoilers on the back which I couldn’t get past. Why two since all they are is show. Mind you I am 30-36 during this time as are most of my friends. Hatchbacks weren’t on their mind as they thought hatchback seemed cheap versus sedan. The 2.3L four brought back memories of the Pinto even if turbocharged. Oh, and what car were friends buying at the time? It was BMW but not the 318i it was the 528i with the inline six. One adventurer the Saab 900 turbo sedan while others went Japanese.
This survivor still has that look that I thought was so polarizing back then as it is today. Of course, in my frame of mind those straight out exhaust pipes do it no favors.
In the `80s, a friend of mine sold Lincolns and Mercs at a dealership in North New Jersey. From the time the XR 4TI and the Scorpio arrived his dealership only sold less than 25 of them-combined. The owner of the dealership was so desperate to unload……..err sell them that he offered a $500.00 cash bonus to any salesman who sold one.
Wow. I can image a few salesmen tried hard to talk their customers into a Merkur. “The Sable is so ordinary… I think you’d look great in one of these neat German Merkurs!“
Maybe the weirdest facet of the Merkur program was that toward the end, Ford tried to guarantee the resale values. I think that might have been introduced for the Scorpio alone around the time they decided not to continuing importing the XR4TI, but I’m not positive.
The way it worked was that Lincoln-Mercury “indexed” the Scorpio’s resale value against a six-cylinder Mercedes 190E and promised to pay the difference as an additional cash trade-in allowance if the buyer purchased another Mercury, Merkur, or Lincoln. (I assume there was a time limit, I’ve never seen the fine print.)
That was a weird program, though it had so many limitations I doubt many people took advantage of it. I suppose it was more for show, to assure buyers that this unknown brand was comparable to Mercedes.
The program was applicable only if owners traded in their cars within 4 years, and would apply only to the purchase of a new Lincoln, Mercury or Merkur (fat chance). As far as I can tell, the resale program was offered only in 1987, shortly after the Scorpio was introduced.
I think Cadillac offered a similar program a few years later with the Allante, which is odd because by that time it clearly hadn’t helped Ford with Merkur.
I remember that my father test-drove a Scorpio in about 1988 – because the local dealers actually gave people money ($20 if I remember correctly) for test-driving one. The salesman was annoyed; I think he’d seen quite a few people come in for their $20 test drives.
It appears the resale indexing was still offered through at least 1990 — it’s mentioned in the Consumer Guide 1990 Auto Book.
Interesting – thanks!
Would it have made more sense to market the XR4Ti both as a hatch and sedan under the Mercury name such as Montego for example? The Scorpio could have been a Lincoln Sports Sedan, not sure of the name. Maybe the vehicles would have been more successful marketed this way?
In hindsight, IMO Ford probably should have just canceled or renamed the Fox-body Mercury Capri, allowing them revive using Capri as a well-recognized submarque for sporty imported Euro Fords sold through Mercury dealers, rather than inventing the hard-to-pronounce Merkur brand with zero name recognition. They could even use the same Lincoln-esque logo they designed for Merkur and have it simply say Capri instead. The retired Fox Capri’s handsome boxflared fenders could move to the Mustang for its ’87 facelift to add some visual brawn and help recoup/extend their investment in those stampings.
Then, as with the original Capri imports, this model would have started out badged as simply a Capri, no other marque or model. Then later they might give it a more specific model designation—maybe just XR4, as XR4Ti was too much alphabet-soup, or maybe Sapphire as some versions of the Sierra abroad were called—when they added the larger sedan model as the Capri Scorpio. Mazda-built captive-import Mercury models such as the first-gen Tracer and the final Capri roadster (badged as, say, a Capri Barchetta or XR2?) could have slotted in as well, to expand Capri into a full-line captive-import marque.
Moreover, imagine if they’d updated these with the SHO V6 when that debuted? I’ve read of modders doing that swap, using the bellhousing from an Aerostar minivan that was briefly available with a Vulcan V6 and manual transmission.
I agree – importing the Sierra and calling it a Capri would have made more sense.
Fun article, Eric!
I say “fun” because that’s my primary association with these cars. Somewhere around 1986 or so, I got an invitation from Ford/Merkur to attend an event that featured driving one of these. It was 40 years ago, so I forget most of the details other than it was an event in a cleared parking lot at my local state university (which was also my employer at the time). There were 4 or 5 cars…all black…that participants could take turns driving. I drove a standard transmission version around some cones for a while. It was fun – my daily driver was a VW Rabbit Diesel L at the time – and I thought that the hatchback was a good thing (as always, out of step I was with the American auto-buying public). But that was about it.
I bought a BMW Bavaria a few years later. My work buddy (who also participated in the event) bought a 2002tii at about that time which kicked off a succession of BMW ownership for us.
Obviously Ford/Merkur had our number. We just didn’t answer. 😉
I attended a similar Dodge GLH event around about that time (also at the University parking lot). That was equally as much fun, but was equally non-productive in terms of turning me into a customer.
Thanks for the memories.
That’s a great story! Back then I would have jumped at the opportunity to drive one of these (or actually any car for that matter) around a closed parking lot.
I hope Ford fired the Madison Avenue outfit. I did enjoy the article and ads very much. Reminded me of how many pathetic vehicles were on the market
To me, the name Merkur was a turnoff. I know it was supposed to be pronounced “Mare-koor,” but when I see the word printed out, it reminds me of “murky,” not an endearing word.
I agree with SubGothius that using the Capri name would have been a much better idea, as long as the Fox-body Capri (Mustang near-twin) was discontinued at the same time.
Other than being easier for Americans to pronounce, I’m having a hard time seeing how it would have been better if Ford had applied the name of a car that Americans associated either with a cheap European pony car or a Mustang clone (as well as the Mk3 version of the original Capri that was still in production in Europe for the UK market) to cars intended to compete with European executive sedans. Badging the three-door Sierra XR4TI as a Capri wouldn’t have been the worst idea, I guess, but it’d’ve been a weird fit for the Scorpio.
They should have called the whole brand Scorpio instead of “Mare-coor” from the start. Something that draws out its sting against BMW, Saab and the like.
The small sports model named “Scorpio XR4”, a small basic model “Scorpio XL4”, the large basic model “Scorpio XL5” and a possible large sports model “Scorpio XR5”.
That seems like at least a less-bad idea: Ford couldn’t use the Sierra name in the U.S. anyway for trademark reasons (GMC was using it), and it didn’t have the confusing prior associations of Capri. For that to work, though, they would have really needed to launch the U.S. Scorpio alongside the XR4TI rather than after the fact. It would also have still presented the same dilemma of having to either establish a completely new and separate sales organization (expensive, difficult, bad history) or trying to wedge those products into an existing Lincoln-Mercury dealer network that had no obvious niche for them to fill and that had no real experience in or enthusiasm for selling this kind of car. (Just getting those salespeople to get their heads around the distinctions between a Scorpio and a Mercury Sable was already an uphill battle.)
Yes, it’s damn difficult to get people to buy something that even the seller isn’t convinced about.
May be a larger profit margin for these chariots would have “convinced” salesmen to convince customers.
Well, that was the whole problem: Lincolns had very sizable margins — not as fat as in the Mark IV/Mark V days, but still enough to make a Town Car sale a very nice windfall for the salesperson. I assume the Cougar had pretty good margins, and the Sable probably okay. The Tempo, Lynx, and Topaz didn’t, but they kept the lights on between Lincoln sales. Giving the Merkurs a big enough margin to make them really attractive to dealers and the sales force would have meant higher prices (already a problem), cutting costs (difficult, for a car built in West Germany in the ’80s for export to the U.S.), or dropping existing models with a more established U.S. niche (risky, unpopular, likely to prompt a backlash from dealers).
Very good article, Eric. I worked at a Lincoln/Mercury dealership in the eighties and had a little experience with these.
My medium size, conservative city in central Texas was not a place to see many European cars. We only had a Mercedes and Volkswagen dealer. Most of them belonged to the university students. I don’t recall any XR4’s in the new car inventory, but they would come through the service department occasionally. I remember the technicians talking about the ‘Pinto’ motor they had. I did drive one and was much more impressed with the way it drove than the way it looked.
There was one Scorpio they had in stock. As I recall, it was loaded and had a sticker price over $30k. It sat there a long time, and when they finally sold it the whole detail department was working on it to get it ready. They were glad to see it go down the road.
I bet these were a hard sell outside of areas that were already import-friendly. When Merkur debuted, about 800 Lincoln-Mercury dealers sold them, but after a year or two at least 150 dealers dropped Merkur, and I bet they were largely outside of major metro areas.
Sierra owner here! The XR4i was offered new in NZ from 1984-85 as a ‘halo’ model above the strong-selling wagons. There weren’t many sold, but 23 are left. Ours were UK-spec with the 2.8 V6 and 5-speed manual, and most were black, red or blue. A/C and electric windows were about the only options. As a 10-year-old, I thought the XR4i looked incredible, and I still love them all these years later. Usually 1 or 2 for sale on Trade Me for me to drool over too, although my ’89 2.9 V6 4×4 Sierra wagon provides me with more than enough old Euro Ford issues to deal with…
This is a gorgeous example of an XR4Ti, and the colour and aftermarket wheels suit it so well. 280,000m/448,000km is a great innings for one of these, and I applaud the owner of this XR4Ti for using it as a daily driver – each time I drive mine, some other 1980s part breaks or goes wrong, and some replacement parts are made of unobtanium. They’re still such nice cars to drive (especially with the V6!) that it all makes it worthwhile though. My V6 is horrendously thirsty for an 1100kg car, I wonder how the owner of this XR4Ti finds the 2.3T for fuel consumption.
The Sierra sedan didn’t arrive until February 1987, when all Sierras received a new front end with wraparound indicators and a new bonnet that swept down between the new headlights. The XR4Ti retained the old front until the end, and I’ve always wondered whether Ford continued to build the old parts especially (eg to avoid having to recertify it with the new front end) or if they had so many of the old fronts stockpiled at Karmann that they had no choice but to use them.
Thank you Eric, great find!
Great to hear your perspective as a Sierra owner! When these were sold new in the US, I was fascinated by the thought that there were other versions of this car elsewhere in the world. Back then it was tough to get information about cars on other continents, but I’d really wished that Ford would have sold other versions here.
I didn’t ask the owner about fuel consumption (and honestly I wish I’d taken notes from my conversation because I’d forgotten some of the details he shared with me), but he did mention that online Merkur groups are extremely helpful in finding parts and other solutions to problems.
I reckon they kept the early high-spec Sierras’ front-end for the US market because that was the simplest/cheapest solution for headlight regs compliance here, not to mention being a very distinctive, futuristic look for the time.
Nearly all US Ford models/marques in that era used some minor variation of the same, large and squarish composite headlights that first debuted in the ’84 Lincoln Mark VII, which was the very first US-market car since 1940 equipped with flush-mount headlight lenses. This unit was a fairly easy fit to the early Sierra nose panel, but not so much for the later Sierra nose.
Being assembled at Karmann due to all the component differences, retaining the early front for those didn’t really interfere with production of the revised front elsewhere, and probably also simplified matters for Karmann who didn’t have to adapt to the revision.
A blah front end, too many windows, and a ridiculous spoiler made for a car that looked both overdone and underdone at the same time.
Then stir in a Pinto engine with a turbo – back when turbos all to often meant trouble. Finally give it a name people couldn’t pronounce. (Yes, Capri would have been a better bet)
What could go wrong?
“A blah front end, too many windows, and a ridiculous spoiler made for a car that looked both overdone and underdone at the same time.”
It couldn’t have been worded better.
I’ll take the unpopular viewpoint here – I actually like the biplane spoiler. Gimmicky for sure, but it was distinctive and (from a 1980s spoiler-obsessed era) kind of neat. I missed it when it went away for ’88.
Just as watching more than a few Bugs Bunny cartoons puts one at risk for being unable to pronounce strategy as anything other than “stragedy”, seeing one of these—just one!—made me permanently unable to say it as anything other than “Exerati”.
I seem to remember one of the car rags (prolly Car & Driver) riffing on “X-Rated” about it, along the lines of “XR4Ti’d Fun” or the like.