In the 1950s, Ford had a gap in its lineup. Owners who did well in the postwar boom were trading their Fords for pricier Pontiacs and Buicks, and Ford had little to offer them in between. Its answer was a whole new brand, designed with more market research than any car before it. The result became a byword for failure.
Research, research, research
Ford executives thought about market niches first and cars second. The company hired motivational researchers to study the psychology of car buyers. David Wallace, Ford’s director of planning, who held a PhD in sociology, commissioned studies that concluded, for example, that Ford stood for “rugged masculinity” and Buick for “upper class solidarity.” The new car, Wallace decided, should be “the smart car for the younger executive or professional family on its way up.”
Naming it was an ordeal. Researchers tested scores of names on random Americans, and Wallace even wrote to the poet Marianne Moore for suggestions. She offered “Intelligent Whale,” “Mongoose Civique” and, most famously, “Utopian Turtletop.” In the end the car was named after Edsel Ford, Henry Ford’s son, over the strong objections of the Ford family.
In November 1956, Ford formed an Edsel Division with a network of 1,187 dealers.
The hype
Ford decided the best marketing was mystery. For a year, it kept the car hidden. Edsel ads ran everywhere but never showed the car. In June 1957, three months before launch, Newsweek published a cover photo showing only the right front wheel and a few inches of bumper. The unveiling was branded “E-Day.”
On September 4, 1957, the secret ended, and nearly 3 million Americans flocked to Ford showrooms to see the Edsel.
The letdown
What they saw was a cream-colored car with a strange grille. Where other cars had horizontal chrome grilles, the Edsel had a big vertical chrome oval, which quickly became a running gag. Innovations like a “Teletouch” push-button transmission mounted in the center of the steering wheel, where most cars had a horn, were more puzzling than exciting.
Then came the quality problems. As The Washington Post recounted, oil pans fell off, trunks stuck, paint peeled, doors failed to close, and the push-button transmission had a tendency to freeze up. And there was bad luck: the Edsel, an upscale car, launched only a couple of months after a stock market plunge set off a recession.
People came to look, and went home without buying.
The end
The Edsel was sold for the 1958 to 1960 model years. By November 1959 Ford had pulled the plug, having lost an estimated $250 million, nearly $2 billion in 2007 dollars.
Why it failed
- The hype outran the product. A year of secrecy set up expectations of something revolutionary. What arrived was an odd-looking mid-priced car.
- Research replaced judgment. Ford studied buyers’ psyches in detail but still produced a design and name many people didn’t like.
- Quality let buyers down. Early mechanical problems turned curiosity into bad word of mouth.
- Timing was terrible. A recession hit just as Ford asked buyers to trade up.
Legacy
“Edsel” became a synonym for a spectacular commercial failure. Ford recovered, but the Edsel remains the classic warning that marketing can bring people to the showroom, and cannot make them buy a product that doesn’t live up to the story.