Ford is targeting new audiences they want to pull in that never considered a truck before and 1 of those in the younger urban crowd as seen in commercials. They also know there is a very significant demand for a smaller compact truck like the old Ranger, as well as older Boomers who don't want or need a larger truck like F-150 or even a Ranger.Why do you say Ford doesn't know its sales Demographics? Have you looked at the Marketing photos? They were looking for the young active crowd, Honda did this with the Element, however, another demographic that came along was the active older (boomers). Ford knows what they are doing with this truck. Look at the age demographic of this forum, it's a good sample to go by.
In regards to sales, Ford has over 100K orders for the truck already, and the Hybrid is outselling the EB. The data is there and I'm very sure Ford has plans for a PHEV (they have an escape) and a full EV version too.
I'm betting in 3 years you will see a PHEV of the maverick. There is a market for it.
Demographics include more than age groups too, they need to see what regions generate the most sales and what configuration levels and financial categories sales fit into, etc. I believe it was 1 of the dealers posting on here who said most the hybrid orders are coming from CA? I don't recall seeing the overall number of ORDERS are for hybrids- despite the polls here which are mainly enthusiasts for this particular product and maybe not be representative of the total American population.
Also, there are NOT 100K confirmed ORDERS- that was RESERVATIONS. Conversion rate last I read is more like 25-33% for actual orders. We'll see, but if they are nowhere close to the 100-110k annual SALES they were hoping for I doubt they invest heavily in different technology options for a vehicle that may have a short lifespan. Again, PHEV popularity and acceptance depends on range and convenience of plugging in and the infrastructure is not there. CA already admitted they can't support the number of plug-ins on the roads now and asked people NOT to plug in at home during heat waves because the grid can't handle it. Still wait and see for a couple years to fine tune future offerings I think, but I could be wrong...
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