Scientists have posited that there could be an infinite number of universes out there, which to me sounds like the stuff you’d see on such sci-fi shows as Sliders or Fringe. This of course means that somewhere out there, an Earth exists where I’m married to Christina Hendricks and additionally, where Mercury could survive and exist within the realm of my matrimonial bliss.
Picture this: It’s 2008, and Ford executives are popping massive quantities of Xanax whilst trying to figure out the future of the blue oval. The top brass all conclude that selling the Premier Automotive Group is a no-brainer, but it leaves a hole that Volvo once filled. The solution? Use Mercury as a salve for to cover the loss of those sweet Swedish vehicles. Lincoln is pretty much dead anyway, so existing dealers will be given the option of converting to the “new” brand, or being shown the door. Desperate times call for desperate measures, after all. Alan Mulally and company decide that the post-recession world will want luxury at non-luxury prices, so this premium brand will go face-to-face with its former corporate cousin, Volvo, as well as Buick, at home and abroad.
Even though the best and brightest at Ford didn’t envision the above scenario, it could have very well been plausible. Again, we have Casey over at artandcolourcars.blogspot.com to thank for the excellent technical skill and imagination.
As for this particular creation, it could have been the first effort to revitalize the brand. Starting at about $34,000 and reaching the low forties, the 2013 Milan would have come standard with the 2.0 EcoBoost and with the 3.5 liter V-6 optional.
Casey’s inspiration obviously came from the current generation Mondeo, but its a great design to build upon. After all, Ford did it for the current Fusion.
Next up, we have the next generation of Mercury CUV. Casey thought to bring back the Villager name, but I think Mariner would work just as well. Notice the suicide doors? A little extravagant for a Mercury, but it would differentiate the brand quite nicely. I think it does a good job at blending the Lincoln MKC with elements of Acura’s MDX. Piano black wood trim would work well here.
What about the Mountaineer? Well, create a shorter, less angular Flex and you have an eye-catching design. Put the 3.5 Ecoboost under the hood and you’ve created some tasty morsels for the Whole Foods demographic to check out between dinner and yoga lessons.
There’s no render to see here. Forget what you’ve heard. “One Ford” is a misleading title, as this picture of the Mondeo (Fusion) wagon illustrates. Could it have worked as a Mercury? Sure! And I bet if priced right, it possibly might have poached some sales from Subaru. With Ford building the Fusion at two plants now, there really is no excuse not to bring this over in its current form, but that argument is for another day.
Lastly, for the, “they should bring it over here!” argument, we have the Galaxy minivan. This would be a great candidate for the Villager moniker. After all, Ford did abandon this segment almost ten years ago, so why not re-enter it by facing the Town Country directly?
Hindsight is definitely 20/20, but it is fun to speculate, right? Do you agree with my fantasizing, and if so, are there any other products that Ford could be put toward a revitalized Mercury in an alternate reality?
I like the impressions, the Cyclone Hybrid reminds me of a Maserati Quattroporte.
Nice idea,in a parallel world I’m married to Sam Elliott and have a black cherry 68 Cougar 302 4 barrel auto.This time make the Mercury a little more special than a Ford with a different grille.
Mercury landed here after WW2 as a Ford with more trim and a larger engine as its differential to the base Ford,
Except in NZ Mercury engines went into ALL Fords to cut down on the parts supply needed they just didnt tell anyone and it was my generation souping up old flatheads that noticed the trick.
There was a time when Mercury were a lot more than a Ford with a different grille.Better equipped and quieter they were different enough that people didn’t mind paying extra
For various reasons, I don’t think the market will support more than 2 brands from Ford, or any other auto maker for that matter. Ford is having a hard enough time re-creating a distinct identity for Lincoln, let alone another for Mercury. Toyota can’t even effectively field 3 brands. “Fiatsler” is a mess. And really, GM is only a 2 horse entity; it’s just that it would be so messy purging Cadillac or Buick along with GMC.
It’s not the 1950’s anymore, where auto styling was the overwhelming priority. Cost constraints, crash, mileage, and emission standards as well as increased competition combine to make it much more difficult to market multiple vehicle brands.
VAG-Group: 8 car brands.
I meant in the American and Canadian markets. Porsche is now part of VAG, which I overlooked, but beyond Audi and Volkswagen, you really can’t say the remaining 5 brands have any kind of market saturation here. Bentley sells a very small number of cars, but Bugatti, Lamborghini, Seat and Skoda?
Bentley, Bugatti and Lamborghini aren’t the typical commuters here either….
Are Ducati motorcycles sold in North America ? That would make 3.5 brands.
dont see how Mercury would have been a better salvage for a near-luxury nameplate. When you are talking about luxury from Ford first thought is always Lincoln regardless of who your trying to compete with. Think towncar, continental, xr7 etc. Mercury just never came to thought. Not sure that the outcome with Mercury would have prevented the current Dilemma that Ford has with Lincoln.
if they had scrapped Lincoln instead of Mercury, then they’d just be scrapping Mercury 5 years later.
And we would be complaining how they should have kept Lincoln, lol!
Apart from the Lincoln Touring Sedan (which I didn’t know about til I saw it here) there’s been nothing to interest me from Lincoln since the MK VII & MK VIII coupes.
Lincoln is pretty much unknown outside the US apart from those seen on TV shows and the odd bumper dragging lowrider.
There’s the odd Navigator SUV over here,the most common Lincoln is a stretched Town Car limo
The only sub 30 year old Lincolns in Australia are limousines.
10 years ago I thought the had the opportunity to keep the cheaper Fords and bring the Euro Fords to the US as Mercurys, I can see how what they did makes more sense. The relatively small number of sales they would lose purely on the basis of price would have a very low margin – much better to sell more high trim cars.
Instead they scrapped Mercury instead of Lincoln, and then they’ll just be scrapping Lincoln 5 years from now.
…May as well milk the extra profit margins for the few years Lincoln has left…
Very interesting hypothetical. Honestly, when I saw the title, I was figuring it just meant use the Mercury name for the same vehicles currently sold as Lincoln instead. But as a competitor to Volvo, Now That’s Interesting!
Most of those concepts above are fantastic looking. They convey the right image for the brand. That Milan, Cyclone, and Mountaineer in particular look like something I’d buy.
It’s a great vision, and certainly better than the current Lincolns, but in reality I don’t it would be successful. Just look at how other lower status luxury brands are doing. Volvo and Lincoln in particular, as well as Acura and Infiniti are selling no where near as many cars as BMW, Mercedes, and Lexus. For Acura, Infiniti, and most of Volvo, there’s nothing wrong with their vehicles. It’s just really a matter of prestige. In this case go big or go home.
“Very interesting hypothetical. Honestly, when I saw the title, I was figuring it just meant use the Mercury name for the same vehicles currently sold as Lincoln instead. But as a competitor to Volvo, Now That’s Interesting!”
Volvo sold 61k cars here last year, a 10% drop from a year prior and is still declining.
doesn’t sound like a winning strategy.
“but in reality I don’t it would be successful.”
Yes I did make a typo, but I think my point is clear enough. I don’t see what you’re getting at.
I preface this by saying that the ’41 Continental is my favorite car of all time, but in today’s marketplace, Ford should probably just focus on Ford. I believe it’s too late for Lincoln, and my visit to the Detroit Auto Show this past week just cements that feeling for me. Cadillac just escaped Lincoln’s fate, and they started to turn things around 10 years ago with the CTS. They’re still not all the way there.
Maybe they shoulda kept one more Ford on the books, a revamp of the Falcon could have become a Mercury, its unknown outside the Pacific lower edge and could have been a whole new car to Americans and Europeans with RWD as a difference to sell in BMWs market segment.
the E8 platform would need more than a revamp to support LHD. It would practically have to be a completely new car.
Well it would be very different to any Ford and LHD isnt hard to engineer GM did it for their Chevrolet exports from OZ I’m sure Ford has the talent,
Commodores were all derived from LHD platforms, (Opel V-cars) or designed from the ground up to be built in both formats. The current Falcon would need effectively to be a whole new platform to be competitive as it was not engineered for that.
Probably cheaper and easier just to buy Volvo back!
Ford need another platform anyway and while the Falcon is hopelessly out of date the components are good Turbo Territory as the new Villager anyone, turbo diesel Territory as the Flagship SUV, Mullaley has dumped a far better product than he realises, I’m sure a Falcon could be reengineered to at least compete with Mondeo based cars it doesnt at present but its old. It could even become a Lincoln and compete with Cadillac more effectively.
” I’m sure a Falcon could be reengineered to at least compete with Mondeo based cars it doesnt at present but its old. It could even become a Lincoln and compete with Cadillac more effectively.”
or they could base it on the S550 (Mustang) which is supposed to support both LHD and RHD.
*sigh*
the GM V-body and Zeta platforms were designed to accommodate both LHD and RHD from the start. They were used in Europe and AUS/NZ. The Ford E8 platform was not, it was AUS/NZ only. End of story. “Talent” has nothing to do with it. “Money” has everything to do with it. Redesigning E8 for LHD applications would be a complete tear-up of the architecture, and for such a niche application makes absolutely no financial sense whatsoever.
Actually E8 was designed to cater for lhd, they even had a government ‘co-investment’ approved to design the lhd bits but the project was cancelled.
Engineering ops are said to continue at this point, Ford Aust are currently doing the Escort sedan for China (One Ford…)
We’re interrupting this thread to inform you that both Ford and GM in Australia have given notice of their intent to essentially shut down their engineering and manufacturing operations there…..
Ok; now you can continue; in the realm of fantasy, that is…. 🙂
Personally, I have plans to test drive the 2015 Hupmobile when it hits the showrooms.
Yes we know, the Fusion is probably coming down under as the Mondeo isnt a big seller in OZ and the Taurus is already tainted gawd knows what Holden will do as they are a one car company here, I was thinking more ‘what if’ than reality
er, the Fusion and Mondeo are the same frickin’ car.
The current Mondeo is an older model that is a different car from the Fusion.
The next Mondeo, which is due out later this year, will be the same car as the current Fusion.
If Lincoln would build something like some of this Mercury car porn, they wouldn’t have the problems they have now
The only reason that Lincoln still exists is because it’s too costly to shut down the dealer network. Ford must be hoping that it starves itself out of existence.
A US-only brand makes no sense in the current global automotive market. If Ford wanted to maintain a luxury presence, then it should have kept Volvo and possibly Land Rover, and then invested enough resources into them both so that they could become solid global players that could compete with the Germans.
Closing down Mercury was a smart idea. Mulally generally makes good decisions, and that was one of them. (The resurrection of the Taurus, on the other hand, wasn’t such a stroke of genius.)
Mebe they shoulda kept Jaguar rather than Volvo.
Sure, Jaguar could have worked for this purpose, too. (No need to keep both of them, though.)
The idea would be to have a luxury badge with some global recognition. Lincoln has zilch, and Mercury probably has even less than that.
If the looks of the Lincoln dealer here in Eugene is any example, maybe they’re just keeping it open hoping to get a buy-out. A tiny thing, and shared with Mitsubishi. One car in the showroom; a couple out front, and one very elderly salesman, the only guy in the place.
The Cadillac dealer here is a huge palace in comparison.
Perhaps they can add Hupmobile and Packard to their lineup.
I have little love for car dealers, but the thought of a guy trying to keep a Lincoln-Mitsubishi store afloat wins even my sympathy. (A SAAB-Saturn-Peugeot store would have been a real heartbreaker.)
The lack of investment by Ford makes it obvious that the company isn’t very serious about Lincoln, which is good business but terrible for nostalgia.
Some of my best auto buying experiences, and prices, have been at small, dated “Mom and Pop” new car franchises. They are getting harder to find but I travel out of my way to patronize them.
Have they considered adding Diahatsu and Daewoo to their roster?
I am sure Ford would have preferred to keep Jaguar but they could not have sold Lincoln for what they got for Jaguar & co, and survival was the only thing that mattered.
Cadillac has Had about 15 years of turning around, the same could be possible for Lincoln given time but I think it will need more investment than was announced last year ($10b?), which is less than Audi spends and they are not attempting a huge recovery and public perception change.
Mulally’s strategy for Ford (the company) is to focus on the company’s core assets, i.e. Ford (the brand).
It would seem that he jettisoned PAG because he believed it to be a distraction and a misallocation of resources, which interfered with the goal. Lincoln almost certainly would have been killed off, too, had the costs of shutting down the dealer network not been so high. The minimal amount of investment in Lincoln speaks pretty loudly to how unimportant it is to the future of the company.
somewhere out there, an Earth exists where I’m married to Christina Hendricks
You talk about my woman like that again and I’ll knock you back to 1963.
Yup. Bring in those tantalizing EuroFords. Instead of sticking the old Mercury badge on them, lets give them a more exotic name…like maybe Merkur……..oh …wait….
‘course here in AMC week, we have talked about Studebaker trucks built by Packard in a former Kaiser plant, with Hudson engines and sold in Nash dealers….so…who am I to quibble?
Beginning with the first LTD Ford started crowding into Mercury territory. There’s no reason to offer two closely related brands with heated leather seats!
“Beginning with the first LTD Ford started crowding into Mercury territory. There’s no reason to offer two closely related brands with heated leather seats!”
I think you hit it on the head.
That’s the problem with automakers nowadays and the one they are facing.
Everybody expects a premium product so you have Ford moving upmarket for less than Lincoln or Mercury and when you look inside, they are similar in terms of luxury.
It’s hard nowadays to justify the premium of a luxury car over a normal one unless you are just doing it for the prestige. Many cars, Hyundais even, come with heated and cooled leather seats, navigation, a zillion speakers, good sound deadening, more gears than you can count on your hands and good fuel economy with a good amount of pep. The need to go to a luxury brand for those things has essentially disappeared.
So why would anyone, that doesn’t care about image, pay the premium of a Lincoln MKZ over a Fusion when they will basically have the same quality materials inside, same engine, platform, etc.
Back in the day, there were discernible quality differences depending on what you paid and features (safety and luxury) that only a few (Cadillac, Mercedes, et.al.) offered, but nowadays almost everything has to meet a standard and people expect more.
Mercedes and BMW are doing the opposite, moving downmarket (bad for the image in my opinion) and taking away from the lower end brands that are selling upmarket for cheap. So you have Mercedes for the price of Ford or Mercury, etc. and people would rather say they drive a German often times.
In California, you are judge based on what you drive. It’s basically one of the first questions people ask, or they check out what you arrive in. Sad but true.
“So why would anyone, that doesn’t care about image, pay the premium of a Lincoln MKZ over a Fusion when they will basically have the same quality materials inside, same engine, platform, etc. ”
Because they care about image.
In the city where I work (as opposed the city in which I live) I’m seeing a lot of Lincolns over past few years. They are driven by people who several years ago would have been driving a Lexus or a Bimmer. Part of it is the “Buy American” mentality in this part of the country (MI), but part of it is they wouldn’t be caught dead in a Ford. Anyone can buy a Ford. Only certain very successful people can pay a lot more for a Ford called a Lincoln. They want people to know what they can afford. There will always be a market for this type of buyer.
Yeah, agreed.
They buy it for image. To say they drive something “better” than a Ford. Not because the Lincoln is a better car than the Ford is.
There will always be that type of buyer like you said, but I was also saying that they need to attract other buyers (the ones that look for a legitimate luxury car, regardless of brand…the ones that cross-shop anything in a price range), to really stay relevant so they need to differentiate more.
Like with Cadillac, you buy it cause a) it’s a Cadillac (image) and b) it’s so much more than a dressed up Buick or GM. They have RWD, distinctive design and CUE (though that might have trickled down by now). And different engines too, for the most part. Manual transmissions too!
Cadillac is now thrown around in the same sentence as the Germans. Lincoln isn’t quite there yet.
When we first moved to California, my parents cross-shopped many SUVs in the 50k price range and it came down to the Enclave and the ML350 (both were about 47k). The ML won but I assume mainly because it was a Mercedes since they liked the Buick too. Other factors like depreciation and stuff were looked at but my point is that it was cross-shopped and almost won.
Every driveway had an RX350 (Lexus) it seemed so it didn’t make the cut.
That was in 08 for the 09 models.
On a side note: I rarely see new Lincoln’s around these parts (Riverside, Los Angeles, Thousand Oaks) but towards LA and TO, I’ve lost count at the amount of Tesla Model S around. At one point I had two beside me in the freeway and they were not together.
And in LA like two weeks ago, I counted like 7 in 10 min. So I guess Lincoln does better in other parts than here.
Judging from the new F-150 and Mustang, Mulally understands rear-wheel drive about as well as he probably needs to.
The rear-drive family car market is pretty much dead. It has gone the way of the dodo and the rumble seat.
The Falcon also no longer makes sense, now that the Aussies have reduced their market barriers and the ALP has decided to argue about the subsidies. These days, it’s more cost effective and certainly more profitable to just import what’s needed.
Sorry, my post above was intended for NZ Skyliner below. (Multitasking has its price…)
They did keep Mercury, they just call it “Lincoln”.
The price gap between the Ford/Lincoln is smaller then ever, closer historically to Ford/Mercury.
Ford, like every other brand it seems, has tried to move upmarket, despite the “low-priced three” stigma for those that remember.
Lincoln, has fallen markedly and can no longer be considered a top brand, just a premium Ford. Which was Mercury.
There were some great Mercuries,the 67/8 Cougar being my all time favourite American car.My 1st American car was a 64 Comet sedan with a 6,the last Mercury I wanted was the short lived Marauder sedan.This was supposed to save Mercury,we all know how that worked out.
A very interesting question you’ve posed Edward. I think it wouldn’t have mattered which ‘brand’ Ford kept, as it comes down to the two abbreviations USP (unique selling point) and POD (point of difference). Neither Mercury nor Lincoln had/have enough of wither of those.
Cadillac survives because its USP and POD are quite clear and distinct from the Chev/Buick line-up. Cadillac have a clearly stated and consistent styling theme, and are mostly playing in the RWD luxury-sports market where Mercedes/BMW/Audi/Lexus/Infinit etc are. Whether Buick is relevant would be worthy of debate too!
No matter what Ford did/does with Mercury/Lincoln, it currently comes across as a gussied-up Ford. It can be as good as anything else in the luxo class, but if it doesn’t stand out, it’ll never be ‘in’.
For the record, I think they should have kept Lincoln, as its perceived place in the market was further up the food chain from Ford, whereas Mercury would have overlapped. Of course Lincoln doesn’t currently feel like its further up the food chain, and therein lies Ford’s current problem: how to give it a USP and POD. Personally, I believe they need to have a RWD model or two. That is what the luxury and luxury-sports segments are really about. It seems crazy that Hyundai and Kia have large RWD sedan flagships, whereas Lincoln doesn’t. The new Kia K9 (or whatever it gets called in the States) is more of a Lincoln than any actual current Lincoln.
The ‘halo’ effect such vehicles have can spread acceptance over lesser vehicles in the product line. I believe that Mr Mulally doesn’t ‘get’ RWD (bye bye Falcon, which will see Ford Aussie descend into irrelevance), and doesn’t ‘get’ the luxury and/or luxury-sports market (a gussied up Lincoln-badged Ford is not a Lincoln). But what do I know – I’m watching from the Other Hemisphere, and I’d prefer a Mercury Grand Marquis over a Crown Vic because I like the grille and the name better. And that demonstrates how fickle the market can be!
Lincoln has a clear styling theme – the baleen whale grill. Maybe they need to go back to the drawing board.
” Whether Buick is relevant would be worthy of debate too!”
It doesn’t matter, they sell more Buicks in China then they do in the US, If the Chinese like it that’s pretty much what everyone else is going to get. Car makers are catering to the tastes of they largest market and it’s no longer the US
GM has masqueraded around identical models with Chevy/Vauxhall/Opel/Holden badges for decades to suit their respective markets, why not do the same with Buick for the Chinese if they like it so much?
If Ford hadn’t hired Jacques Nasser as CEO, Mercury would still be around and Lincoln would still be the best selling premium marque in the USA. Nasser spend money on Volvo, Jaguar and Land Rover/Ranger Rover that should have been used to move both Mercury and Lincoln upmarket. Ford wound up selling Volvo for a fraction of what they paid for it, and Jaguar and possibly Rover would have died off without the billions Ford poured into their ill fated attempt to buy their way into the Euro-Snob premium car market.