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03'Darin thats the most frustrating part, is that Ford doesn't even make easy for you guys to get the info.
Still no eta on my truck. Now sitting for over two months in area59
I agree they should make better info available to the dealership level. I understand their reason for not wanting to release what the issues are but at least put some time frames on things so we can give the customer an idea. I don't like to wait but if I'm given a window I can at least prepare myself for that wait.
"Current word is next year will be handled THE SAME WAY." This was the quote I was referring to. And I think the disparity here is who is in charge of the "Current Word"? Is it the dealers or is it Ford. If it's the dealers, it's almost understandable. If it's Ford, then they need to get their shit together. That was my point to my earlier rant. It just doesn't make sense to me that Ford is mishandling this launch so terribly. Let everyone know what is going on and half the problems will disappear.
The Ramp 59 thing is laughable as well. Can't imagine a multi-billion dollar company like Ford having only one gate in and one gate out. I think someone needs to tell the guys that have been waiting since July exactly WTF is going on. Because if I was one of them, I would have told Ford to shove their "halo" vehicle in their ass. Especially when I'm seeing guys that ordered their trucks last month getting them before mine.
There, rant over. Like I said, I don't even a dog in this race so I probably shouldn't be as passionate about it as I am. Just sick of seeing thread after thread after thread with guys begging Ford for information and getting shafted. Shouldn't be that way for the consumer, no matter what the product is......
Current word is from Ford. We as a dealer have no control over that. Look at it from our standpoint..... we have buyers and can't get vehicles. Imagine how that feels as a dealer or myself as a salesman. I get paid straight commission so having buyers but not being able to get units kills me.
I've had conversation with engineers and marketing guys dating back to the start of SVT regarding availability of this type of vehicle. Their response has been pretty much the same every time since 1993. One of Fords key ideas with the "Halo" vehicles is exclusivity. So if they project numbers correctly you'll never see Raptors readily available and sitting in numbers on dealers lots. Their goal is to keep the hype and demand up on the product. They base 2018 allocation on the success of the 17' model year sales. they may produce more, the same or possibly even less. Keeping hype and demand up on the "Halo" vehicles builds brand value for Ford. So they walk a fine line of trying to project the proper number of vehicles to produce that keeps up with demand but not over producing that they sit on the dealers lots. One reason they never put incentives on the halo units.
Ford won't tell the consumer or the dealer what the delays are. If they said it was fitment of the tailgate to the body every single customer that buys a truck would be hyper sensitive to the fitment of their tailgate. Kind of like someone looking their car over after a body shop repair. I've had cars come out of the body shop looking better than it did from the factory but now the customer looks it over with a magnifying glass they find what they think are problems.
Bottom line here is Ford hit very close to their projected date for the trucks to get to the consumers. The people that placed orders back in july should have been told by their dealers a "realistic" time frame. Anyone in the car business with any length of time under their belt knows how this works. I've been doing this 30 years. I've seen it countless times. From day 1 I told my first order to expect his truck maybe by the end of the year. He was second on my Raptor want list and he's been on there since 9/18/2015. So he's waited over 15 months already.
Ford normally only builds stock orders to start and new build. Then once OKTB is achieved they'll start scheduling retail orders. That way the delays on the initial builds don't affect the retail orders. They did it different for the Raptors. Ford doesn't know how many issues a new build will have. They may have gotten lucky and the early builds only had minimal issues that were easily correct and BANG, shit shipped out quick and everyone is happy. This didn't quite work out that way. So would you rather put in your retail order and not get it scheduled until after OKTB is achieved and at that point still have to wait 6 - 8 weeks or take the chance things come off the line smooth and your truck gets here sooner?
Just like the last Gen, at least in the 13/14 model years, if you wanted one you got it.
The bottom line is how many people are going to drop $65K-$70K (or more with ADM) on a truck that isn't really good for anything than its designed purpose, which is awesome by the way. You're certainly not buying one to haul crap around or do any serious towing with.
You can already get deep discounts on 17 SD's and F-150s. Thats what most people are going to buy
We didn't have free availability or 13 or 14 Raptors. Yes there was better availability of them but I couldn't just get what I needed. I was able to dealer trade a couple that I needed but inevitably I referred two buyers to another dealership because I couldn't get trucks. I'm in the NE so maybe it was different depending on your area. I know the southwest gets a lot more Raptors than we get up here
