“There are a lot more people out here living in abject poverty than what people like to think or admit to. You voted for this—and now we’re paying the price.”
Employees learned of the cuts on Monday in a video message from Michael Adams, CEO of BlueOval SK.
Adams announced the transition would mean “the end of all BlueOval SK positions in Kentucky.”
I mean it’s Trump that removed their entire market. People don’t buy EVs unless there’s legislative pressure being built on ICE emissions.
Not that Ford couldn’t have handled this with more grace of course… But I honestly doubt they were happy about the idea of building an entire plant and then shutting it down
Trump may have put a small speedbump in the path, but Ford could have absolutely pushed forward with promoting EVs if they wanted to. People do buy EVs even without incentives, and car companies have been telling people what their preferences are the whole time.
Enthusiasts (and occasionally virtue signalers) buy EVs without incentives. Average person doesn’t want to pay extra for an EV.
This IMO holds true for some other things going on in the car industry. The annoying large touch screens in particular. But not people wanting ICE vehicles which tend to be more affordable
People are blowing massive amounts of money on giant overpriced trucks, which also cost a lot more in the long run because of fuel costs vs charging.
You are just repeating industry propaganda.
Well, idk about power prices in the US, it’s definitely cheaper to fill up than charge in my country. Of course I drive a diesel for the fuel efficiency. Petrol may be a different story.
And if people are blowing massive amounts of money on giant overpriced trucks - well, that’s what they want then, and they get more of said giant overpriced truck for the same amount of money by not having 20-40k worth of batteries in it. It’s still the consumers (who in this case are idiots) that want large overpriced V8 diesel trucks and telling them otherwise IS the car company trying to tell them what their preferences are.
It is far, far cheaper to charge at home here in the US.
A 2026 Nissan Leaf starts at under $30k in the US like most other comparable ICE cars. Batteries do not add 20-40k.
Everything you are saying is wrong in the context of the US. If your prices are that far apart where you live, that sucks.
I at one point looked up the price of a new Audi E-Tron battery and it was 37k. Dealer markup is part of it for sure, but the battery has to be pretty expensive to begin with. The E-Tron was more expensive than the bigger and better equipped Q7 too IIRC but I could be wrong.
You are asking a publicly traded company to just kill itself, which would ALSO be illegal, so here we are. They are literally required to make the decision that most economically benefits the company, and that is clearly not to build products for a market that does not exist and which may never exist.
I mean yeah, we are getting fucked, but at the moment in this particular case its Trump doing the fucking.
That’s not how the shareholder theory of value works. Companies have wide latitude in how they pursue profit, including being able to focus on the long term over the short term. As a shareholder, the only way you’re winning a lawsuit against a publicly traded company for not seeking profit is if they do something insane to deliberately lose money. Like if the CEO gathers up a billion in cash and holds a literal money bonfire. That’s what it would take for you to actually be able to sue a company for not seeking maximum profit.
Right, but it means they cannot ignore their own analysis just because it feels right.
That is like saying Toyota was going to screw itself over by releasing the Prius.
No, that not true. Many shareholders will push for that, but many companies i vest heavily into development that stifles short term profits for long term gain and running a company into the ground with poor decisions is not illegal in any way whatsoever.
How would the law even know what decisions are the most profitable anyway? That bit of misinformation needs to die.
Seriously. Yes, the management of the company could be sued for intentionally tanking a company, but even that would need some egregious shit like emails saying “lol we’re tanking the company on purpose” to get anywhere with it.
Long term profits, building brand awareness and goodwill are things companies can aim for instead of short term profits.
Remember that scene in the Dark Knight where the Joker holds a giant cash bonfire, burning all that mob cash? I’m pretty sure a CEO would have to do that before they could actually be sued by shareholders for not seeking maximum profit. There are just too many possible paths to profit otherwise, and they’re allowed to focus on the long term rather than the short term.
Some richer people buy EVs without incentives. Most people can’t with how expensive they are upfront. Same with solar panels.
EVs have been expensive in part because it costs money to switch production from ICE or build new production capacity, and to establish supply chains and take advantage of the economics of scale. That’s a huge investment, but one that they have to make if they want to remain competitive in the long term.
The bigger issue has been that they aren’t designing lower cost EVs. It’s not exclusively an EV issue since they have been moving away from lower cost ICE vehicles for years too, it’s just that EVs didn’t have existing low cost product lines, and they’re more interested in delaying EVs and using them as HALO products than in building a functional but low margin model. To say nothing of the many dealerships that have no interest in selling EVs and would rather steer people to a high margin gas guzzler.
As for solar, at the grid scale it’s the cheapest power source available, with or without government funding, not to mention the fastest to deploy. And residential solar does make sense even without incentives. It will pay for itself, it’s just the upfront cost that’s the problem.The incentives make that easier, but even without them and with the need for financing, you still come out ahead as long as your monthly payment is in the same ballpark as your electric bill because the solar payments will stay the same over time until the loan is paid off, while your electricity rate will only ever go up.
I think they overestimated their market. I think the Lightning was the perfect truck to spearhead the EV transition. It looks, drives, and feels like a normal (yet powerful) truck. Being the highest volume seller, electrifying the F150 made sense on paper.
But that’s where it really stops.
The kind of person that buys a 4x4 F150, is not the same demographic that wants to be seen in an EV. As childish as the mentality sounds, that’s the demographic.
Where they sell 70,000 F-series (150 through 550 I think super duty’s included until dump beds), they only sold ~1,500-2,000 lightnings a month. Which honestly isn’t that bad for such a niche product.
I think the move to give it a plug in hybrid style powertrain will help sales as our travel charging infrastructure is still garbage. But try and tell people that they can just charge at home with an L2 and they freak out. It’s also frustrating that most people who are against EV’s just don’t understand technology in general.
In contrast, Ford sells about 15,000 mavericks a month. More when it was newer, same with the Lightning.
I do agree with your points and that Ford isn’t happy, and they could have handled the whole situation a little better.
I think it’s less about aversion to EVs and more about aversion to the $100,000 price tag.
If that thing is $50k, I think sales at least stay even, if not pick up.
That’s the thing, most of these trucks were ~$50,000. But people see the ~220 mile range on the base truck and overdid it on range anxiety and blew the problem way out of proportion.
Someone mentioned somewhere that the original creators of Tesla aimed for the high end market because there kind of wasn’t an industry around making EVs, so there wasn’t a way to do economy of scale with them, so an electric car was GOING to be a luxury item. It seems like nobody has tried to change that.
Remember when marketing departments existed and it just drones pushing noise into the social media streams?
There was a time when company’s would sell people on ideas to create the demand.
Why is it that electric cars have to be weird, ridiculously high performance, or both?
I don’t want strange controls, I don’t want virtual door handles, I don’t want a cab full of computer screens, I don’t want bizarre styling, and I honestly don’t want a 250mph 0-60 in 0.2 seconds hypercar. Give me a car that looks and acts normally but has an electric powertrain so that I can plug it in at home rather than having to go to a gas station all the time.
I agree. Finding a car that is front wheel drive and not 1000 hp is ridiculous.
I also think that PHEVs are great for all the rurals. Especially if they keep the ICE fairly powerful. Just tell people "for your grocery run to town you don’t need any fuel, but to get to the next town over you can just hoon the ecoboost. Or fuck it, build a V8 diesel PHEV. Nothing stopping them from doing it, it’s not like F series buyers care about excess weight lmao
This is where manufacturers should have started years ago.
It’s annoying as ford has repeatedly stated they won’t being the plug in hybrid ranger that gets 30 miles on a charge to the US because it will cannibalize sales from the maverick and f150 lightning….
They should have a fully electric Maverick.
I think it’s in the pipeline, and we can only hope. And if ford doesn’t do it, hopefully the Slate Truck gains traction.
To me it’s more about commitment that charging infrastructure will be there tomorrow. I know it’s fine in some cities and suburban areas already, but anywhere Ruralish charging availability is a crapshoot so you range anxiety is a real problem. If you know the government is forcing EVs to be the future, some of that anxiety goes away as you know they will have to build more charge infrastructure.
Definitely part of it IMO