Posted on 02/06/2007 7:34:06 AM PST by Spktyr
Ford will announce on Wednesday plans to rename its Five Hundred mid-size sedan "Taurus," according to a report by Dow Jones Newswires. The name change will be announced at the Chicago auto show.
A month ago, a report in BusinessWeek suggested Ford could revive the Taurus name, but it seemed unlikely at the time.
CEO Alan Mulally was quoted as saying Ford should have never dropped the nameplate in the first place. "I havent had time to do the deep dive on why we stopped investing in Taurus, but I'd like to," said Ford CEO Alan Mulally. "The Ford Five Hundred should have been the new Taurus."
In the same report, Ford's new marketing chief Barry Engle expressed a similar sentiment. Asked why Ford doesn't rename the Fusion or the Five Hundred "Taurus," Engle said, "stranger things have happened […] I don't know why we invest hundreds of millions of dollars in a name over 20 years and then walk away from it."
Ford revealed the redesigned 2008 Five Hundred at the Detroit auto show in January. Ford gave the sedan new headlights, taillights, and its three-bar signature grille.
They should have called it the Galaxie. Nobody remembered the "500" nameplate.
Wierd. It was a high price model with AWD. Nothig like a Taurus really.
AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
You beat me to the "Galaxy 500"!
The Taurus was extremely popular with the senior-set.
Because it was CHEAP, the same reason the rental fleets bought tons of them - not because it was good.
The 500 isn't anywhere near as cheap to buy as the last Taurus was.
Sounds like Ford has more "identity issues" than the Duke lacrosse accuser's Cousin Jakki.
Geez, why don't they just name it Edsel and get it over with?
Deck chairs.
Exactly. The 500-now-Taurus is a V6 FWD or AWD sedan in a market segment that is getting owned by V6 or V8 RWD cars. Even GM is coming to the same realization and has a crash program to make the next Impala RWD.
The Five Hundred is much pricier than the old Taurus. It's a very nice ride, but BORING!
Give me a Pontiac Grand Prix.
You can have it, the GP isn't much better, and it still is a scion of the GM House Of Useless And Ugly Plastic Bodycladding.
Actually, the Taurus had good sales and became well known as the standard in fleet cars.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/1779796/posts
Just give me a car.
:-p
I think it is a pretty smart move - at least relative to all the other not-so-smart moves they made lately. Only old geezers remember the Galaxie mark.
Apparently Ford did not learn from the "New Coke" fiasco years ago. No wonder they lost so much money.
I've had Fords, GMs, Dodges, Toyotas, and Hondas. Right now I'm driving a Ford truck and I love it. If only Ford and GM could really compete. I think it's less the cars they design and more about the union they support.
And everyone that had to drive one as part of a fleet hated them.
Yours truly included.
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Yes, and Christina says she will change her name to Rosie O'Donnell . . . |
The taurus had some early transmission problems back in the late 80's and very early 90's. But all in all it was a good car. Stable on the road. Great gas mileage, and comfortable. I never owned one but we rented one a couple years ago for a 2500 mile vacation and we were very pleased.
We really like the Fusion. I think the 500, er Taurus is a scaled up model of the Fusion. I suggest trying one out before criticizing the models. Just as good as toyota camry, but priced somewhat lower. I guess thats why Ford is losing 12 Billion Dollars.
It's still FWD/AWD with a front bias, and its still a V6 in a class that's lead by a RWD sedan with a V6 or V8. It's still boring.
My guess is the named it the "Five Hundred" to have names that all started with "F" as in Focus, Fusion, and Freestyle.
There are still a ton of them on the road.
Didn't Ford just rename Crown Victoria.... "Mustang"?
"Powerful like a gorilla, yet soft and yielding like a Nerf ball..."
I was referring to the Five Hundred being renamed Taurus (which, you'll note, doesn't start with "F" ;o) ).
The Fusion is a totally separate all new car, and not related to the Five Hundred at all.
I've posted this before - the Fusion and its corporate siblings the Milan and the Zephyr/MK Z are excellent cars (as reviews and consumer reports agencies have shown). I still don't know why Ford hasn't been promoting the fact that the Fusion has been scoring better than the Camry in multiple venues.
The Five Hundred is a continuation of the old Taurus line and it really is a POS. Most of the Tauri in rental fleets were under 20K old. If you got one with more, you got to see just how badly and just how quickly they decayed.
Get the GXP version for quite a thrill for a 4 door sedan.
Not quite,
Fusion is based on the Mazda 6 chassis and the Taurus is based on a Volvo Platform.
Nope, they backed way the heck off of that plan once people started threatening to burn down the Ford HQ.
i remember my grandpa's galaxie 500. i bought a used ford 500, got a good deal on it and i like it. then again i quit drag racing quite a few years ago.
Exactly. Even the Pontiac Solstice, a very cool looking vehicle (if you can get past the Pontiac front end) could be a winner, but for some inexplicable reason GM cheaped out on the quality of the interior. Hard to fathom.
I rented a Taurus. Hated the name but thought it was better engineered than the GMs I'd always rented. I couldn't understand why Ford stopped producing the Taurus either. I hoped they'd bring it back with a better look and possibly a different name. Funny confessional from Ford exec.
R.L. Polk says otherwise. There are a lot of them on the road, but that's because they sold a lot. Percentage-wise, not so much, most Tauruses that were sold are dead now - something like 20% or so is all that remains, IIRC.
Not good, considering that the Corolla still has 50% of its sold copies still around.
Another 12 billion down the drain...
Is Matt Millen running Ford as well as the Lions?
Some people hate Ford because it's fashionable to do so.
Some people hate Tauruses because it's fashionable to do so.
It doesn't have to make sense, nor does it have to relate to reality. There's nothing rational about it.
Look for words related to "excitement" or "style" as a clue that rational discussion is not happening.
Really,
And so is the Volvo it was sprung from? Go drive the revamped 08' model.
CEO Alan Mulally. Nostalgic for crap.
I guess that homosexual niche market is working out for Ford very well.
AWD would have been great but they mated it with a CVT transmission which is questionable at best. I was seriously thinking about buying one last year but walked away because of the transmission issues.
No, the Volvo is actually better. Mostly because it's not put together by UAW goons.
I'm waiting for the dealer over here to get an 08 in (sales have been slow for their remaining inventory, I wonder why) but based on past experience, it will probably still suck. The suspension tuning was rubbish, and the very first one I drove a few years back with a CVT had the transmission grenade with 20 miles on the clock. The second one had a transmission that made some very disturbing noises. The third one I drove was a rental (last year) and it was pretty bad for the class. Not as embarassingly bad as the last Taurus, but in a class with the Chrysler 300, it's definitely not up to par.
In short residuals stunk from so many in fleet sales. Hard to get people to buy when the used values are going to be low and you could buy a Hertz Fleeter for a good price.
Designing a replacement with a different name from Volvo DNA that is a quantum leap was not such a bad idea.
I drive a Freestyle (Wagon Version) and got to drive an older Taurus back to back a few months ago. A world of difference.
Interestingly, Nissan seems to have gotten their CVT to work, unlike Ford/ZF. Most of those Muranos running around have a CVT behind a V6 and AWD - and they put it in their Maxima last year, no problems.
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