Ford head Jim Farley said the brand’s electric vehicles could shift to fixed prices and sell entirely online. Speaking today at an IBM conference, Farley described a future where Ford dealers would no longer store inventory, but serve as customer service centers for picking up online orders or repairing existing vehicles — with buyers also having the option of delivery. to house. In this hypothetical scheme, eliminating car dealerships would put an end to bargaining with salespeople.
“We need to move to an unnegotiated price,” Farley said. Of course, he also used his speech to throw some jabs at competitors. “I believe some Mach-E and Lightning customers would like to have a Mustang for the weekend. Maybe they want a Super Duty. I can do that,” said Farley, “they can’t.”
The company announced plans this year to become the best EV carmaker in the world, hoping to beat Tesla and other companies with strong EV brands like BMW, Nissan and Kia. Farley said Ford aims to produce 600,000 EVs by 2023, a significantly smaller number than Tesla’s 936,000 deliveries last year.
The CEO said he believes prices for EVs will drop to an average of $25,000 as the cost of batteries and distribution gets cheaper.
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