New Edge leads Ford "step change" 27 | 07 | 2016

FORD’S NEW EDGE SUV, the first blue oval-badged car imported from Canada, sustains a step change in the company’s product offensive, which also includes the US-built Mustang, GT supercar and its highline Vignale range.

That is the verdict of Chris Muers, Ford’s UK product marketing manager, speaking at the Edge’s launch in the Roxburghe estate, near Kelso (Ford Edge SUV Exclusive).

Priced between £29,995 and circa £40,000, for the Vignale specification flagship due to arrive toward the end of this year, conquest sales from Edge, she claimed, will involve a significant percentage of defectors from conquest brands, particularly Audi, BMW and Volvo.

Muers maintained that Ford is the UK’s fastest-growing SUV seller and Edge — exclusively in all-wheel-drive form, will involve a modest 3000 units this year rising to 5500 — will contribute to the company’s total sports utility tally of 55,000. That represents a 35% rise for Ford in the burgeoning category.

Ford’s marketing manager admitted that for the brand’s dealers, including five specialist Scottish Ford Stores selling a new generation of £30,000 plus cars covering Focus RS, Mustang and Vignale variants, involved “relatively new territory.”

This meant catering for a higher income group with household incomes of over £80,000.

Topping the range of Ford SUVs, including EcoSport and Kuga, the Edge’s claim to premium rivalry status was underlined by having a forecast 52% residual value after three years and 60,000 miles. That places it third only to Range Rover’s Evoque and Land Rover’s Discovery Sport.

At the other end of the portfolio spectrum, the new Indian-built Ka+, replacing the Ka that was assembled alongside Fiat’s more successful 500, is due to market this Autumn with ST-Line derivatives succeeding Zetec S models. First deliveries of the Ford GT supercar with a starting price of around £250,000 will start from the end of this year.

Muers said Edge continued the trend established by the S-Max MPV, which attracted customers from the German premium brands.

“This continues the step change for our brand and sales network,” she said. “S-Max created the precedent and proved that we could do it. An ever richer model mix will translate into the Edge’s Vignale model taking around 10% of sales.”

Ford has no plans for a two-wheel-drive version of Edge, although there is one available in Korea, partially because it would mean aiming for higher sales targets. Equally, shipping cars from Oakville on the Canadian side of Lake Michigan added a couple of months to delivery times and keeping model types and specifications simple reduced ordering complexity.

Ford executives are confident that Ford’s world car approach, involving engineering models for right and left hand drive versions from design concept, meant that European market models would not suffer from the compromises involved in previous efforts to market and sell North American cars in the UK.

For Mustang, that means exorcising memories of the Mazda-cloned Probe and Cougar, while Edge should more than eclipse previous less than successful Stateside SUVs including the Explorer and the V6 petrol only Maverick, also badged as Mazda’s Tribute.

Related: Ford Mustang 5.0 V8 GT Fastback road trip

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Hugh Hunston