The 2010 North American International Auto Show was a watershed moment in time for Ford. Riding high on American pride and optimism, the one major American manufacturer that didn't need a bailout or bankruptcy protection in '09 started the show in Detroit by sweeping the North American Car and Truck of the Year awards. The 2010 Ford Fusion Hybrid beat out the VW Golf Mk6 and Buick LaCrosse for the car award, while the 2010 Ford Transit Connect compact commercial van beat the Chevrolet Equinox and Subaru Outback in the truck category. It was only the third time in the award's history that a single manufacturer has taken both honors. To note, Honda did so in 2006 with the Civic and Ridgeline and GM did it in 2007 with the Saturn Aura and Chevy Silverado.
One look at Ford's massive, enclosed display said it all. The thing bathed the showgoer in a softly glowing shade of Ford pride blue. Henry's surname was to be found on every wall, in every corner of what looked like you had entered into a totally different, if not entirely well-organized, building. Ford's display was by far the most impressive among all the manufacturers and it exuded confidence.
Of course, Ford's big debut at the show was the 2012 Focus sedan and 5-door hatchback. In a raised, cordoned-off display at the center of the Ford complex, the new Focuses rotated, out of the reach of prodding fingers. The new car marks Ford's return to offering the same Focus in New World as will be sold across the pond in the Old World - something that hasn't been true since Europe got an all-new (and much nicer) Focus in 2004, while North America got two different facelifts of the new-to-us-for-2000 model.
The sedan, of course, is more conservative-looking, with a tall rear deck and inward-slanting Audi-esque taillamps. However, the sedan's rear wheelarches manage to make the rear quarters look butch, rather than severely under-tired, like the new Fiesta sedan does.
If I have one criticism of the overall exterior design, it's at the car's front end. The lower grille is in three sections, with two triangular ducts located outboard of an inverted trapezoidal opening. It looks too tall, too fussy, and doesn't harmonize with the rest of the vehicle, or key into a family resemblance with other Ford vehicles. Above the odd bumper-mounted air intakes sit a slim rectangular grille opening. In the center of this opening is a single slim chrome horizonal bar, on which the customary Ford oval is mounted. If Ford hopes to create a family resemblance among its passenger cars, the Focus is clearly discordant with that goal.
You see, the new Fiesta sedan shows an oddly-styled 3-bar grille with chrome strips so slim, I call it the Gillette Mach 3. The Fiesta 5-door hatch features a body-color grille surround with a slot-type opening and a central Ford badge. The Fusion comes with a 3-bar chrome grille so massive that the upper bar stretches from wall to wall, above and around the headlights. And the new Taurus has a totally different textured grille treatment with a slim central horizontal bar holding the Ford badge. Now that the new Focus has broken cover, it appears that totally different groups of people designed each Ford vehicle and that none of them talked to each other while involved in their particular processes.
Scattered throughout the Ford display were various cutaway displays, showing the inner workings of Ford's new line of poweful, fuel-saving EcoBoost (i.e., twin-turbo direct-injection) four-and six-cylinder powerplants. The Mustang Alley was in its own corner and showed the car's all-new 3.7L base V6 and 5.0L GT V8, along with a new "California Special" trim package that featured bodyside tape stripes and a flush-mounted slim chrome horizontal bar grille insert.
Ford has 4 vehicle divisions, though. Not just one. So, moving away from the massive and impressive Ford stand to the small strip reserved for Mercury, one couldn't help but wonder how much longer Ford plans to keep the ever-shrinking brand alive.
With no new products to show, no major announcements about the brand, and the looming cancellation of half of Mercury's 4-car lineup, had you blinked walking past the Roman god's tiny, obstructed view display, you might have wondered if Ford themselves had forgotten about the brand. Much like customers have already. While Ford has announced that a Focus-based compact Mercury coming for '12, the fact that the Volvo stand - representing the brand Ford is days from selling to Geely - had 3x the floor space was quite telling.
No major announcements about the Volvo brand were made at the show, either. However, the recently revealed facelifted C30 hatchback and C70 hardtop convertible were on offer. Strangely, the all-new S60 sedan was not.
At the Lincoln display, Ford put in far more effort. With a tall, open structure finished in black wood and accompanied by a roped-off 1940 Continental convertible, the Lincoln section of the show felt very classy, avant-garde, and tied in very well to the feelings evoked by Lincoln's latest ad campaigns. But the Lincoln stand wasn't all show and no intro. A significantly facelifted MKX crossover was on offer, eschewing its old rectangular chrome grille for the divided crosshatch "wings" grille.
Also new is a front fender line that arches above the front wheel wells, giving a more powerful, distinctive look. At the rear, new taillights drop their former wall-to-wall treatment and in their place are two blocky individual units. In the luxury segment, design identity is absolutely critical. And while pleasing in and of themselves, the new rear styling ultimately fails to tie the revised MKX in with the rest of the Lincoln line's styling cues. However, inside you'll find a revised instrument panel with the brand's new MyLincoln Touch system. This interior control system leaves rotary knobs and buttons firmly in the past, and in their place offers buyers touch-sensitive panels modeled after Apple's iPod Touch ("MyLincoln Touch?" Ford got really creative with the name, didn't they?) interface. When used in combination with the vehicle's SYNC system, the car quite literally becomes a rolling personal electronic device in the iPhone mold.
While a very successful mid-cycle update, the 2011 MKX still highlights a greater problem with the Lincoln line at large: most of the vehicles too closely resemble the much less expensive Fords they're based on. One look at the Ford Edge, and you'll doubtless notice that the doors, rear fenders, and roof are still carried over into the Lincoln MKX. And they're pleasing enough. But they don't lend the MKX an air of special-ness. Of exclusivity. Or of outright competitiveness with other companies' luxury crossovers. Which is why vehicles like the Cadillac SRX and Lexus RX350 - both based on platforms shared with lesser vehicles, while sharing no external parts with them - handily outsell the Lincoln.
All in all, Ford had many good things to show for itself, including those twin North American Car/Truck of the Year awards. A promising new Focus, new engines, and a thoroughly updated and important Lincoln showed that Ford - while still facing many pressing problems - has every intention of continuing on its roll, riding the tide of good public opinion, clever new technologies, improved quality and reliability, and enough fresh, new metal to keep customers interested.
Chrysler, on the other hand, had a very different story to tell. Come to think of it, they didn't have much of a story to tell at all. Which is probably why the company never held a single press conference at the show. What they did have is shown above - The Chrysler Delta Concept...errr...Chrysler-Lancia Concept...errr...
Actually, Chrysler didn't bother to give the car a name...just a different grille and the brand's new winged badge. What it actually is is an Italian Lancia Delta. Confused? You won't be if you remember that Chrysler is now part-owned by Fiat, of which Lancia is one of their Europe-only upscale brands. And Olivier Francois, head of the Lancia brand has also been put in charge of the Chrysler brand. His task going forward is to converge the future Chrysler lineup with Lancia's, using different badges depending on the market the particular brand is better known in. And Lancia's newest model is the Delta compact 5-door hatchback you see before you. Chrysler would not confirm at the show whether this exact vehicle would be offered on our shores. Instead, they talked about it being a symbol, pointing to a future of greater synergies between the Chrysler and Lancia brands.
Beyond that, Chrysler threw a Ferrari 599XX and the new Maserati Gran Turismo Cabrio into the display. Fiat owns these brands as well. Also included were a pair of Fiat 500 hatchbacks, one with the hot Abarth EsseEsse treatment, the other with an electric-only powerplant. Both added visual interest to a display that didn't have much in the way of new vehicles or significant updates to show.
The updates to the Chrysler-branded vehicles were few and far between. The current 300, in its swan song year before being replaced by a redesigned 2011 model, showed off new 300S6 and 300S8 trim packages. Complete with massive wheels, smoked headlight bezels, and wire honeycomb grilles, but lacking the normal cars' bodyside rub strips, the new S models showed that the six season-old 300 can still manage to mix imposing lines with beautiful details.
Dodge showed off the Challenger's new "Plum Crazy" paint color, with write bodyside tape stripes and a striking white leather interior to match. As garish as that may sound, it looked spectacular. And it was all I could do to keep from drooling while I was within 5 feet of it. The nearby Nitro Detonator SUV wore its new, bright yellow appearance package, with tape stripes, revised interior bits, and of course, bigger wheels.
Jeep showed three new wheel-trim-and-graphics packages, as well. The Liberty Renegade featured a matte black hood decal, smoked headlight lenses, and special interior trim. The new Wrangler Islander and Mountain Edition were on the floor, as well. The Islander package resurrects an old Wrangler trim line from the early '90s, but this time, more tastefully.
The rest of the Chrysler stable showed the current crop of, frankly, lacklustre vehicles. But they were all dressed up with large chrome wheels, and appeared in paint colors that flattered them as much as possible. And the new 2010 Motor Trend Truck of the Year, the Ram Heavy Duty - freshly shorn of its Dodge emblems - was shown, as well, by means of a fascinating cutaway model.
All in all, what the Chrysler display lacked in new metal to show, it gained back in overall pizzazz. But it did serve to underscore the fact that Chrysler has a shocking dearth of good product at the moment. It's clear that they're doing the best they can - whatever they can - to keep the customers in the door and the company afloat until the new Fiat-funded products come online. But make no mistake, the next 18-24 months might be a little rough going.
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