Ford Motor Co. managed to use a stronger flow of semiconductors and booming sales of its electric vehicles, such as the F-150 Lightning, to escape the auto industry’s downward sales spiral that hampered its rivals in July.
For the second month in a row, Ford was the only major automaker to produce sales gains, company executives said. Ford July sales grew 36.6% even as industry sales slipped 10.5 percent. Sales by rivals reporting July sales as such Toyota, Honda, Subaru, Mazda, Hyundai and Kia all fell.
The automaker’s total market share hit 13.9% — up one full percentage point from June and 4.8 percentage points over a year-ago.
Gains come EVs, F-Series and large SUVs
Ford’s electric vehicle sales were up 168.7% with sales of Mustang Mach-E up 74% and F-150 Lightning delivering its best month since its launch while the new electric E-Transit maintained a dominant share position.
“Ford was America’s best-selling brand in July powered by strong demand across our line-up. Our overall sales rose 37% in July and electric vehicle sales grew at three times the rate of the EV segment,” said Andrew Frick, vice president, Sales, Distribution & Trucks, Ford Blue.
“F-Series hit the 60,000-truck mark for the first time this year, with our all-new electric F-150 Lightning having its best sales month yet. Ford SUVs were up 70%, while E-Transit leads the electric van space with 95% of the electric van segment.”
Strong EV and hybrid sales give boost Ford
Ford’s EV sales also grew more than three times the rate of the overall electric vehicle segment in July.
Sales of Ford hybrid vehicles continues to climb, increasing 35.3% in July, placing the Ford brand second in hybrid vehicle sales to only Toyota. F-150 hybrid sales totaled 4,364 vehicles, while Maverick hybrid sales totaled 2,153 trucks.
Ford also reported its fledgling subscription business is producing results. To date, 66,500 customers have purchased Ford’s BlueCruise hands-free driver-assist technology.
Ford is expanding BlueCruise through Power-Up software updates adding nearly 15,000 2021 F-150 and Mustang Mach-E customers in July, with another 35,000 in process. Ford BlueCruise customers accumulated 11.4 million miles of hands-free highway driving since July 2021.
For the fourth straight month, Ford reported a record pace of just over 50% of retail sales coming from previously placed orders. Meanwhile, on Aug. 2 retail order banks re-opened for Bronco Sport, Edge, Explorer and Ranger. This follows the company’s reopening the order books for the F-150 and Transit in early July.
Ford overall pickup sales, including F-Series, Ranger and Maverick, total 74,034 units, which was up 27% over a year ago. Ford’s total pickup share for the month was 31.6% — up more than 6 percentage points compared with last year. It’s the highest share of any brand in the pickup segment.
Ford brand SUV sales gained 70% year-over-year — totaling 66,266 SUVs. This includes combined Bronco family sales, including Bronco Sport, sporting a 227% increase compared to 2021’s numbers.
