Ford has been cashing in on Mustang exports in Europe for a few years now, moving enough units to make it a potentially profitable venture. And now, the automaker is slowly adding to its Euro export offerings with the recently launched Ford Explorer Plug-In Hybrid. It may be a low-volume, niche part of its business, but it’s one that the automaker plans on pursuing.
“It’s one of our pillars, and we do intend to build on it,” Stuart Rowley, president of Ford Europe, said during a JPMorgan auto conference. “It’s going to be a niche business for us. It’s relatively low volume, but I think it can be a very brand-enhancing and, importantly, profitable business.”
The 2021 Mustang Mach-E will also launch in Europe and join the Mustang and Explorer PHEV on that export list. But that won’t happen until early 2021 because of the additional travel time needed to transport those vehicles to European customers from the Ford Cuautitlan Plant in Mexico, as we reported back in May.
Helping matters is the fact that the euro is in the middle of a major rally, reaching historic highs against the dollar. Earlier this month, that peaked at 1.19 euros per dollar, which was the highest it’s been since May of 2018, largely due to a landmark rescue fund from the European Union.
Profitable Mustang exports have been a bright spot for Ford of Europe after it cut 12,000 jobs and considered closing or selling up to six plants last year. That included a proposed closure of the Ford Bridgend Engine Plant, along with closing the Ford Aquitaine Industries Transmission Plant in France and the Ford Naberezhnye Chelny Assembly Plant, Ford Sollars St. Petersburg Assembly Plant, and Ford Elabuga Engine Plant in Russia, along with selling the Ford Kechnec Transmission Plant in Slovakia.
We’ll have more on Ford’s expanding list of European exports soon, so be sure to subscribe to Ford Authority for more Ford Mustang news, Ford Explorer news, Mustang Mach-E news, and continuous Ford news coverage.
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