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Ford Moving toward Build-to-Order, Away from Packed Dealer Lots

• The pandemic and the resulting chip shortage have changed how Americans buy cars, and Ford thinks that a build-to-order process is the right way to go moving forward.
• To help sell cars online, Ford recently introduced Ford Express Buy for the Mustang Mach-E and Ford Blue Advantage for used cars and other digital options.
• CEO Jim Farley, quoted by Reuters, said he knows Ford is wasting money on incentives, which is less of a problem when the customer says up front, “This is the car I want.”
  • Ordering the exact vehicle—color, trim level, accessories, everything—that you want is how many Europeans have been buying their cars for ages. But the U.S. has been more committed to the model where shoppers go to the dealership and then drive home in one of the cars off the lot. The pandemic has changed how Americans interact with their local dealership. People are now choosing to do more communication online, and they’re expressing less insistence on going out to take a test drive.

Ford noticed, and now the company wants to shift more future buyers to the vehicle ordering process, Ford CEO Jim Farley said on a conference call this week with reporters to discuss the company’s second-quarter results. Getting more buyers to order a specific vehicle online can also help Ford’s bottom line.

“We are really committed to going to an order-based system and keeping inventories at 50 to 60 days’ supply,” he said. “I know we are wasting money on incentives.”

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a37187201/ford-build-to-order-online-ordering-changes/