Edsel



Founded: November 19, 1956; 67 years ago
Defunct: November 19, 1959; 64 years ago
Headquarters: Allen Park, Michigan, US

Products:
Full-size: Citation, Corsair, Pacer, Ranger
Station wagon: Bermuda, Villager, Roundup

Parent: Ford Motor Company


1958 Edsel Corsair

Edsel is a discontinued division and brand of automobiles that was marketed by the Ford Motor Company from the 1958 to the 1960 model years. Deriving its name from Edsel Ford, son of company founder Henry Ford, Edsels were developed in an effort to give Ford a fourth brand to gain additional market share from Chrysler and General Motors. Established as an expansion of the Lincoln-Mercury Division to three brands (re-christened the Mercury-Edsel-Lincoln Division), Edsel shared a price range with Mercury; the division shared its bodies with both Mercury and Ford.


1959 Edsel Corsair

Competing against Buick, Oldsmobile, Pontiac, Dodge, and DeSoto, Edsel was the first new brand introduced by an American automaker since the 1939 launch of Mercury and 1956 launch of Continental, which ended and merged into Lincoln after 1957. In the year leading to its release, Ford invested in an advertising campaign, marketing Edsels as the cars of the future. While 1958 Edsels introduced multiple advanced features for the price segment, the launch of the model line became symbolic of commercial failure. Introduced in a recession that catastrophically affected sales of medium-priced cars, Edsels were considered overhyped, unattractive (distinguished by a vertical grille said to resemble a horse collar), and low quality.

Following a loss of over $250 million ($2.47 billion in 2022 dollars) on , manufacturing, and marketing on the model line, Ford quietly discontinued the Edsel brand before 1960.

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History

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Models

1958





{Upper}: A 1958 Edsel Pacer 2-Door hardtop; {lower}: Edsel Pacer interior, showing
the Teletouch system and Rolling Dome speedometer {and air conditioning}

For its inaugural model year, Edsel introduced a seven-model product line, including four sedans and three station wagons. The lower-trim Edsel Ranger and Edsel Pacer shared bodies with Ford Fairlane sedans (118-inch (300 cm) wheelbase) while the higher-trim Edsel Corsair and Edsel Citation shared bodies with the Mercury Monterey and Mercury Montclair sedans (124-inch (310 cm) wheelbase). Sharing its body and 116-inch (290 cm) wheelbase with Ford station wagons, Edsel offered the two-door Edsel Roundup and the four-door Edsel Villager and Edsel Bermuda.

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Discontinuation


1960 Edsel Ranger sedan

Ford announced the end of the Edsel program on November 19, 1959. However, production continued until late in November, with the final tally of 2,846 model year 1960 cars. Total Edsel sales were approximately 116,000, less than half the company's projected break-even point. The company lost $350 million, or the equivalent of $2.4 billion in 2018 dollars, on the venture. Only 118,287 Edsels were built, including 7,440 produced in Ontario, Canada. By U.S. auto industry standards, these production figures were dismal, particularly when spread across a run of three model years.

On Friday, November 20, United Press International's (UPI) wire service reported that book values for used Edsels had declined by as much as $400 based on condition and age immediately following the Ford press release. In some newspaper markets, dealers scrambled to renegotiate newspaper advertising contracts involving the 1960 Edsel models, while others dropped the name from their dealerships' advertising entirely. Ford issued a statement that it would distribute coupons to customers who purchased 1960 models (and carryover 1959 models) prior to the announcement, valued at $300 to $400 toward the purchase of new Ford products to offset the decreased values. The company also issued credits to dealers for stock unsold or received following the announcement.

Edsel's failure

Historians have advanced several theories in an effort to explain Edsel's failure. Popular culture often faults vehicle styling. Consumer Reports has alleged that poor workmanship was Edsel's chief problem. Marketing experts hold Edsels up as a supreme example of the corporate culture's failure to understand American consumers. Business analysts cite the weak internal support for the product inside Ford's executive offices. According to author and Edsel scholar Jan Deutsch, an Edsel was "the wrong car at the wrong time."

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