Ford sells 177 FFE's in March

[jmueller065]

http://insideevs.com/march-2014-plug-electric-vehicle-sales-report-card/

Interesting their "boring" take:

Holy snoozefest

. Considering the prior month was only 129. That is ~37% sales increase! LOL

 

[Ohmmm]

They've had that same line there for months. It refers to the fact that there have been 100-200 FFE's sold every month for a long time.

I wish Ford would promote this car more. Nissan moved over 2,500 LEAFs in March. There's no reason Ford couldn't sell at least 500, given how loaded-with-features and competitively-priced the FFE is.

 

[jachady]

They need more sales people like me

 

[v_traveller]

Agreed!

 

[jeffand]

Note the interesting trend in sales as compared to last year. When you compare the first three months of this year with last year’s firth three months there is an increase for ever month. I think this is mainly due to two reasons. The recent price reductions and more public acceptance of electric vehicles are the main reasons. The question I have what happens to sales when the federal $7500 tax credit ends? For the higher priced models like Tesla not much of a dent. For lower price vehicles like the Leaf the sales hit could be significant.

 

[EVA]

Hard to say what will happen when the $7500 tax credit goes away. Honestly, I'd still be a buyer without it. On my first purchase, the dealer didn't say much of anything about the credit. In an odd way, it was a bonus that arrived nine months later on my income taxes (talk about a long delay to get pleasure). I never counted on the Illinois rebate, and that was a bonus that arrived about the same time.

The second buy was a lease. The $7500 got buried in the lease price. The monthly lease payment was what I could afford and liked, so it worked. If the lease was that much more and not counting the $7500, I would still buy the lease

The third car I am about to purchase - there is a lot of conversation about the $7500, different state rebates, and the effective cost of purchase. But at the end of the day, I have to come up with that $7500 that I will get back a year from now. So it really almost doesn't count. I'm also not counting on the Illinois rebate - that money could disappear any day.

So on three purchases, that tax credit didn't really change my mind one way or the other about buying an all electric car. The first FFE made me an addict.

 

[jmueller065]

Considering the fact that Ford would have to sell 200,000 plugins for the federal credit to expire I think it will be here for a while (most likely for the next two years at least depending on the inclinations of the next president/congress).

http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1085549_when-do-electric-car-tax-credits-expire