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April 15, 2008

It has a nice personality: Ford boosts Focus production by 30% to meet demand

Filed under: FocusProduction, ford focus sales, FordFocusSales, focus production, 2008FordFocus, focus, 2008 ford focus, ford — @ 4:02 pm

Filed under: Car Buying, Economy, Plants/Manufacturing, Ford, Earnings/Financials

Click above for high-res gallery of the 2008 Ford Focus SES Coupe

We’ll admit it. We didn’t think sales of the 2008 Ford Focus would take off like they have, even after we had a 2008 Focus SES Coupe in the Autoblog Garage and for the most part liked it. The redesign for 2008 just left a bad taste in our mouths, and we didn’t think anyone would fall for those garish fender vents. For whatever reason, be it the car’s smooth ride, competitive pricing or exclusive availability of the SYNC system, the 2008 Focus is selling like crazy. Ford says that it sold 49,070 Focuses this year through March alone, which is up 23 percent compared to last year. More importantly, all of those additional Focus sales were to retail customers, not fleets. Last year the Blue Oval built 191,000 Focuses, but today it has announced that production will be ramped up at its Wayne Stamping and Assembly Plant so that 245,000 units can be built in 2008.

For comparison’s sake, Toyota sold 371,390 Corollas in 2007, while Honda sold 331,095 Civics and Chevy sold 200,620 Cobalts. The Corolla and Civic are both handily outselling their domestic competition so far this year, but the Focus is now slightly ahead of the Cobalt, which sold 48,024 units through March.

Gallery: 2008 Ford Focus SES Coupe

[Source: Ford]

Continue reading It has a nice personality: Ford boosts Focus production by 30% to meet demand

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April 14, 2008

Next Ford Focus will be a “global project”, C1 platform coming Stateside

Filed under: focus, ford focus, FordFocus, 2011FordFocus, 2011 ford focus, 2010 ford focus, 2010FordFocus, ford — @ 6:05 pm

Filed under: Euro, Plants/Manufacturing, Hatchbacks, Ford

Click above for a gallery of the 2008 Ford Focus ST.

During the SAE World Congress in Detroit, Ford’s product chief, Derrick Kuzak, told attendees that the next generation Focus will benefit from the joint efforts of FoMoCo’s engineers here in the U.S. and abroad. The redesigned Focus is set to debut sometime in 2010 or 2011 and will be built off the C1 platform that underpins the current Euro Focus. According to Kuzak, 87-percent of the parts will be sourced from Ford’s global parts bin in a move to cut costs and globalize Ford’s engineering process. While we’ve heard this numerous times before, this is the first time a definitive timeline has been outlined for the official entry of the superior C1 platform to the U.S. market. Here’s hoping that Ford sees the light and we finally get ST and RS variants of the Focus here in the States.

Gallery: 2008 Ford Focus ST