As a company that’s been in business for well over a century to this point, Ford has plenty of milestones to celebrate on an annual basis – including, most recently, the Ford Chicago Assembly plant celebrating 100 years in operation. However, that isn’t the only centennial The Blue Oval has to celebrate this year, as this very week also marks 100 years since Ford Netherlands was founded back on March 6th, 1924.
As one would imagine, things have changed considerably since then, as at the time, Ford Netherlands operated out of a Rotterdam hotel and employed a mere 55 people. However, just four years later, Ford had already become the most widely owned vehicle in the Dutch fleet with 12,336 units in operation. By 1932, Ford began building vehicles including the Model A at a plant located on the North Sea Canal, though World War II wound up causing issues with that operation due to materials shortages.
Things really picked up in the 1950s, however, as Ford Netherlands was selling models like the Anglia, Cortina, Corsair, and Taunus in large quantities, and by the late 1960s, it was even building the iconic Ford Mustang in Amsterdam before switching over to vans and trucks like the Transit and the Transcontinental in the 1970s.
Ford Netherlands ceased its manufacturing operations in 1983, but remained active in terms of vehicle sales, and as of today, has moved a whopping 1.5 million units. Last year, Ford Netherlands reached another milestone with the introduction of the agency sales model – becoming the first established volume brand in that part of the world to sell cars and services directly online, potentially setting it up for another century of success, too.
We’ll have more Ford related milestones to share soon, so be sure and subscribe to Ford Authority for 24/7 Ford news coverage.
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