Ford fans may not have to visit a dealership to purchase one of the motor company’s electric vehicles in the coming future. Speaking at a conference in New York on Wednesday, Ford CEO Jim Farley revealed that he wants the company’s EVs to be sold online-only, allowing customers to avoid the usual inconveniences that come with the car-buying process, such as dealer markups and/or price negotiations. Selling vehicles directly to consumers is something that Tesla pioneered, but Ford and other traditional manufacturers have been prohibited from doing something similar due to state laws driven by fears over vertical integration. Ford currently advertises eight EVs on its website, including the 2022 F-150 Lightning and 2022 Mustang Mach-E.
“We’ve got to go to nonnegotiated price,” Farley said. ” We’ve got to go to 100% online. There’s no inventory (at dealerships), it goes directly to the customer. And 100% remote pickup and delivery,” he said in New York during Bernstein’s 38th Annual Strategic Decisions Conference streamed live.”
“Then we have this opportunity to use our physical presence to outperform competitors,” he added. “I think our dealers can do it. But the standards are going to be brutal. They’re going to be very different than they are today.”
Ford CEO Jim Farley said Wednesday consumers should plan to see dramatic change in the near term as companies compete amid the shift to battery-operated vehicles.
He teased that the company sees potentially huge profits in building an electric vehicle for ride-hailing services Lyft and Uber.
Meanwhile, the way car companies generate revenue may change, too — like renting cars for limited use and allowing customers to pay per mile or per day, Farley said.
Source: Detroit Free Press (Alternate Link) (via Ars Technica)