Ford Focus last year’s global sales champ
SOUTHFIELD, MICH. — It’s official: The Ford Focus was the bestselling car in the world in 2012, according to R.L. Polk & Co.
While the title comes with all sorts of caveats, the rise of the Focus nameplate says all kinds of things about the U.S. and Asian automotive industries, the importance of global manufacturing and how Thailand became the new Spain.
Ford Motor Co., leading U.S. automakers in building their best cars in decades, registered 1.02 million Focus cars in 2012, topping 872,774 for Toyota Motor Corp.’s Corolla, according to Polk data that Ford released on Tuesday. Ford’s F-Series pickup line was the No. 3 nameplate, its Fiesta subcompact was No. 6, and General Motors Co.’s Chevrolet Cruze was No. 8, ahead of Honda Motor Co.’s Civic.
The Focus, Fiesta and Cruze are among several models from U.S. automakers that are succeeding against Japan’s Toyota and Honda, which used to dominate car segments.
Ford has been revived by chief executive Alan Mulally, who has overhauled its lineup with more fuel-efficient models to round out its strength in big pickups and sport-utility vehicles and pushed a global productdevelopment plan called One Ford.
“Since Alan has been with us, we’ve put a tremendous amount of attention toward balancing our product portfolio,” said Erich Merkle, Ford’s U.S. sales analyst. “We had to better represent what the majority of the world is looking for, and they’re looking for smaller passenger cars.”
Polk’s estimates may be rough. Toyota said global Corolla sales last year reached 1.16 million vehicles, or 33 per cent more than the researcher’s figure. The difference may be that Toyota includes sales of models with names such as Corolla Axio and Corolla Altis.
The numbers themselves don’t necessarily mean anything if robust profits don’t follow. The top-selling car in the U.S. remains the Toyota Camry, as it has been for 11 years, and Toyota regained the global sales crown from GM last year.
All that said, the announcement is good reason for Ford — and, more broadly, the resurgent U.S. auto industry — to cheer.
Ford probably hasn’t been able to claim ownership of the global bestselling model since the days of founder Henry Ford’s Model T or its successor, the Model A, said John Wolkonowicz, an independent auto analyst based in Boston. Volkswagen AG had the most global reach with its Beetle starting in the mid-1950s, and Volkswagen’s Golf and Toyota’s Corolla have traded worldwide sales leadership by model more recently.
“It’s a significant achievement for Ford,” he said.
Global Focus registrations rose 16 per cent last year from 879,914 in 2011, when Ford says it was also the world’s bestselling car, according to Merkle. Polk is unable to provide data on global sales by nameplate beyond what Ford has released, said Michelle Culver, a Polk spokeswoman who works for Lambert, Edwards & Associates.