Ford Motors released their latest vehicle, the new Ford (F) GT, at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit, Michigan today to critical praise. The supercar will boast a 600-horsepower, twin turbo engine and will go into production late next year. No price has been announced, but Yahoo Finance’s Rick Newman predicts the car will cost well over $100,000. Previous iterations of the GT have been marked at around $140,000 but have sold at higher premiums due to their scarcity.
The GT is just one of 12 new performance vehicles that Ford has recently added to its lineup. The GT, Focus RS, F-150 Raptor, Shelby GT350 and Shelby GT350R will all be available by 2020.
Ford CEO Mark Fields says he’s using the new GT as a showcase for all the innovation and technology that Ford has put into its vehicles “Things like our EcoBoost engines, light-weighting materials like aluminum and fiber and the overall aerodynamics really highlight all of things, particular things, that have gone into our vehicles for the last few years and will be coming in the future.”
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But what demographic is Ford targeting with these expensive, supercars?
“These are called halo cars,” says Rick Newman. Ford will likely sell very few of these, but they get people into the showroom. They’re meant to create excitement around the brand and get people to associate the name with high-performance.
“Overall when you look at performance vehicles there is a certain segment of the population that really wants these vehicles,” says Fields. “And it cuts across all demographics, Millennials, Boomers and Generation X.” He believes that these vehicles are important for building brand image. They also bring in a huge profit, he says.
But the profit isn’t cut-and-dry, according to Rick Newman. “Ford will mark the car up by a ton but it’s hard to know the true cost,” he says. Building an assembly line and all new components for a limited edition car is hardly profitable, but if Ford counts this as a showroom draw they could include a boost in sales of other cars to the profit they report for the GT.
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