Ford Transit Lineup Production To Get Boost Via Third Shift

Early last month, Ford announced that it would be ramping up production of several of its more popular and in-demand models, including the Ford Mustang Mach-E, Ford F-150 Lighting, Ford Transit, Ford E-Transit, Ford F-150, Ford Bronco Sport, and Ford Maverick. At that time, The Blue Oval noted that it was targeting an annual production increase of 38,000 units for the Ford Transit and E-Transit at the Kansas City Assembly plant following a $95 million dollar investment in that particular facility. Now, in its most recent sales report, Ford also noted how it plans to accomplish that goal.

In its March sales report, FoMoCo revealed that it plans to add a third shift to boost Ford Transit lineup production at the Kansas City plant, which will begin operating this month. The move comes at a time when the commercial van remains as popular as ever, outselling its rivals by a large margin in 2022, with the second-place Ram ProMaster falling nearly 40k units behind it as the Transit enjoyed a 37 percent share of the full-size van market in the U.S. last year.

Ford is also looking to ramp up E-Transit production after the United States Postal Office announced that it would be supplementing its transition from the Grumman Long Life Vehicle (LLV) to the Next Generation Delivery Vehicles (NGDV) built by Oshkosh Defense with an order of 9,250 E-Transit vans. As Ford Authority reported last month, this purchase is expected to impact other orders for the EV van in a significant way.

Meanwhile, Ford plans to add a third shift to boost Maverick production at the Hermosillo Assembly plant in Mexico in June, and it will reportedly hire 1,100 new direct workers and 5,000 indirect employees to support that expansion. As for the F-150 Lightning, Ford will work to increase production of the EV pickup by moving 800 workers from the Dearborn Truck plant to the Rouge Electric Vehicle Center  while also hiring 300 new employees at the latter plant.

We’ll have more on Transit production soon, so be sure and subscribe to Ford Authority for the latest Ford Transit news and continuous Ford news coverage.