Moreover, the reliability of 93 per cent of Ford's models comes in at average or better in CR's latest survey. That's a jump from 63 per cent in 2007.
There is more, too.
In J.D. Power and Associates' 2008 Initial Quality Study, released last month, Ford is in a statistical dead heat for quality with Mercedes-Benz, Toyota, Honda, Ford's own Mercury brand (not sold in Canada), Jaguar, Audi, Cadillac and Chevrolet.
Mercedes, Jaguar, Cadillac and Audi are luxury brands and Toyota and Honda are generally acknowledged as the quality kings in the car business.
In all, six Ford, Lincoln or Mercury brand vehicles were ranked in the top three among individual category winners in the widely followed Power study. Honda had just four, though Toyota had nine.
Vans? The Ford E-Series was No. 1 in its class.
Big activity vehicles or SUVs ? The Lincoln Navigator was No. 1.
Mid-size pickups? The Ford Ranger was right there, a runner-up to the Dodge Dakota.
Compact activity vehicles or SUVs? Ford Escape, runner-up.
Mid-size cars? The often-overlooked Ford Fusion, a runner-up.
These latest quality scores are no fluke.
"They've been making incremental improvements in their reliability year after year," says David Champion, senior director of automotive testing for Consumer Reports. He adds that recently launched vehicles such as the 2007 Edge and the 2006 Fusion have shown "excellent reliability right out of the box."
This is the sort of praise that Joe Hinrichs, Ford's global manufacturing chief and a former Ford of Canada CEO, wants to hear — especially as Ford plans to launch six new or revised vehicles this year and two more critical models early in 2009. The latest launch: the 2009 Ford Flex out of Ford's Oakville, Ont., assembly plant.
The Flex is a crossover wagon with love-it-or-hate it styling and a pile of cute but not necessarily useful features, including an actual refrigerator that's optional. An even more important model launch comes at the end of the year: the new but delayed 2009 F-150, Canada's best-selling pickup for some 22 years.
No Ford model yet receives Consumer Reports' much-coveted automatic "recommended" rating for unproven new vehicles (as the Toyota Camry used to and as the Honda Accord still does).
But if Ford maintains its current track record on quality and quality new-model launches, Champion says Ford has a chance in a few years of being automatic with CR. That's something unheard of for a Detroit-based auto maker.
John Wolkonowicz, a Global Insight product analyst, says quality may soon become Ford's biggest showroom advantage. "Quality is Ford's ace in the hole right now," he recently told industry bible Automotive News.
Quality may be an ace, and it may even be one reason why billionaire investor Kirk Kerkorian has taken a large, 6.49 per cent ownership stake in Ford. Nonetheless, much of the rest of Ford's hand looks weak.
Revenue from sales of Ford's big pickups and SUVs is under siege in the United States, largely a result of a slowing economy, the credit crunch and surging pump prices. Ford of Canada is not facing a credit crunch among its buyers, as in the United States, but Ontario's manufacturing economy is clearly struggling with the high Canadian dollar, and fuel costs are having a negative impact on sales of light trucks of all kinds.
Consumers are moving in record numbers away from gas-guzzlers into more economical cars and crossovers. Ford has slashed production at factories three times this year and has now said it will push back the launch of the '09 F-150 to the end of the year — to give dealers time to clean out remaining '08s, of which there is something in the neighbourhood of 150 days supply.
Not surprisingly, Ford is warning of more losses in 2008 — more than the $1.1-billion (U.S.) it lost before taxes in 2007. Ford also said it would burn through more cash than the $14-billion to $16-billion it previously projected for the period from 2007 through the end of 2009.
This is a harsh turn of events for Ford after a surprise $100-million profit in the first quarter. Instead of touting a turnaround plan that is on track for profitability in 2009, Ford CEO Alan Mulally now says consumer confidence, the weakening U.S. economy and high fuel prices make for a volatile brew.
Ford, of course, is fighting to reinvent itself after spending the better part of two decades squandering profits on money-losing or barely-profitable brands such as Jaguar, Land Rover, Aston Martin and Volvo.
Jaguar and Land Rover have since been sold to India's Tata; Aston has been off-loaded to an investment consortium; and rumours persist that Ford would part with Volvo if the right buyer comes along.
The biggest challenge for Ford now is to get new, in-demand models into dealer showrooms. This is not easy.
During the 1990s and the early part of this decade, Ford was flush with cash rolling in from profitable SUVs and pickups. Foolishly, Ford largely ignored developing the kinds of fuel-efficient vehicles so in demand today.
Ford, led in this department by Hinrichs, is racing to retool its factories to produce smaller, more fuel-efficient European models. Even as this is under way, Ford is reviewing every product in its pipeline.
Those that no longer make sense with $1.50-a-litre gas prices will be axed, say company officials. Those economical models that do make sense will be rushed to market.
Unfortunately for Ford's bottom line, smaller vehicles produce profits of a hundred or a few hundred dollars, while in their heyday, the biggest Ford SUVs and pickups spun up as much as $20,000 in profit.
So the race is on at Ford: reinvent the product line, keep up the quality work and get new models to market fast.
Within Ford, frantic work is under way to transform the company into a single, global enterprise not unlike Toyota or Honda, both of which use a handful of basic product architectures to produce global and regionally unique models in flexible manufacturing facilities.
In a nutshell, the goal is one Ford for the world, rather than a patchwork of regional fiefdoms, which had been the case for decades.
That's not to say Ford won't tap into the strengths of its regional units. Take Europe, for instance.
Ford of Europe — now free of Jaguar, Land Rover and Aston Martin — has transformed its products to such a degree that even the new Ford Mondeo was featured in the latest James Bond movie.
Ford Europe, which posted a pre-tax profit of $739-million in the first quarter, can offer some help and much inspiration for the North American business. The big problem is a strong euro, which makes it virtually impossible to import European models profitably to Canada and the United States.
That does not mean Ford in North America cannot build and sell a European-designed model. The upcoming Fiesta small car, unveiled in March at the Geneva car show, is cutting-edge modern in its looks and engineering, and Canadians and Americans will be able to buy it in 2010.
However, the North American Fiesta will be built not in Europe, or Canada or the United States, but in Mexico.
It is also possible that Ford will find ways to produce other successful European models here in North America — particularly now that fuel prices have skyrocketed.
In the meantime, Ford is moving as quickly as possible to produce as many of the current Focus compact cars as possible. Ford has already ramped up Focus capacity three times this year and Ford expects to be able to produce 280,000 units of Focus annually. The Focus had North America sales approaching 200,000 in 2007.
But this year in the United States alone, Focus sales are up some 36 per cent. Focus sales in Canada are up just 1.2 per cent, with the car being Canada's No. 10 seller over all.
"We view the move to smaller, more fuel-efficient vehicles as permanent, and we are responding to customer demand," CEO Mulally said in a recent statement.
The next move in that response will be the arrival of an all-new 2011 Focus. Ford plans to sell sedan and four-door hatchback versions of the European-developed Focus in both Canada and the United States. Production will start in North America in late 2010.
Indeed, the move to a global version of the Focus means Ford could assemble it alongside other vehicles that share the same platform — such as the C-Max crossover.
Reports say Ford could build the C-Max in the same Wayne, Mich., plant that makes the Focus and do so as early at 2011. This is the key advantage of building a Focus — or any other model — that is common with vehicles also sold in Europe, South America and Asia.
The truth is, in the current climate, the S-Max (minivan) and Mondeo (family sedan) would not look out of place in a Ford of Canada showroom at all, nor would the Kuga, a handsome compact SUV Ford is just now launching in Europe. It will compete with the Toyota RAV4 and Honda CR-V.
The overarching challenge for Ford in all this is to maintain the momentum on quality — to avoid the kinds of glitches that led to 10 recalls in two years of the original Focus.
This year alone, Ford is launching not only the new Flex and Lincoln MKS and the re-engineered and restyled 2009 F-150, but also the re-skinned 2010 Ford Fusion and Mercury Milan (though the Mercury is not sold in Canada) and the Lincoln MKZ. An updated version of the Ford Mustang is to follow early in 2009.
Ford will introduce all these new models with a third fewer salaried workers than it had earlier this decade. To compensate for staff reductions and to keep Ford on the cutting edge of product development and manufacturing, officials say they are being disciplined about every detail and using new digital planning tools and weekly reviews with Mulally to get the launches right.
The digital tools are especially important. More than 45 models have gone through what Ford calls its virtual manufacturing process. This involves the use of computerized simulations to develop manufacturing and assembly processes for each new vehicle.
All this happens well before engineers finish their work designing components and assembly line layouts. Virtual tools — computer-aided design and manufacturing — save time and eliminate costly re-work late in the launch.
As far as new models are concerned, the proof of success won't come in just getting on Consumer Reports's recommended list. Ford will know it has turned the quality corner when its vehicles get on CR's good side automatically, before a redesigned model even hits the showroom floor.
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