The Advocate wrote on Sep 12, 2011, 13:35:
Not even close. Did you ever read about the GT or the interviews with Colletti about the GT? The GT was meant to be an all American supercar killer without the supercar price tag. It was to re-birth what the original GT was, America's answer to European engineering.
Nobody went in to a Ford dealer looking for a GT and said "Well, golly, I guess I should buy a totally different type of vehicle instead. I wanted a sports car but, fuck it, I'm gonna buy something I can haul dirt in."
Seriously?
The GT was designed solely for the halo effect:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halo_effectBeating the italians at their own game, which I'd argue the GT did, is part of the halo effect. It was done to make Ford seem cool and sell F-150s, not to sell 4000 GTs.
It's the same with the Viper: Dodge dealers didn't fight to be one of the few with a Viper in their showroom because they thought they'd sell a Viper, they did it to get Joe Plumber to come into the dealership and oogle the untouchable vehicle, think about how badass Dodge was, and buy a Ram over an F-150.
Halo cars have three main purposes, listed in order:
1) Increase brand equity and drive people into showrooms
2) R&D and proof-of-concept for new design and feature work that may slowly trickle into more mundane cars
3) Sell
Do you really think that Ford many any real profit on a car that sold under 700 per year?