Ford’s June Sales Numbers Impress Again

Normally, we don’t cover a manufacturer’s sales numbers every single month. Why? Because they’re usually just not that interesting. Tesla sold EVs. Other people sold some EVs. Lots of EVs. Over the course of a year, it may impress us more, but monthly numbers just aren’t that exciting in most cases.

But, this is like the fourth month in a row that we’re covering Ford’s sales numbers here at CleanTechnica. Every month, Ford is actually doing impressive things with electric vehicle sales in new categories that there are practically no other players in, and June was no exception. Overall EV sales are still up, totaling 4,353 units sold. Those aren’t Tesla numbers, obviously, but it’s still 76.6% more than they sold last year at this time. So, Ford is making progress on EVs and is doing better than they’ve ever done.

“Amid industry-wide supply constraints, Ford outperformed the industry driven by strong F-Series, Explorer and new Expedition and Navigator SUV sales.” said Andrew Frick, vice president, Sales, Distribution & Trucks, Ford Blue. “Combined, these vehicles represented just over 56 percent of our sales in June – up about 8 percentage points from May. F-150 Lightning was America’s best-selling electric truck in June in its first full month of sales, while our overall electric vehicle sales were up 77 percent over last year.”

As Frick points out, F-150 Lightning electric pickup sales are a big driver now. In June, Ford sold 1,837 of the trucks to customers and about three-quarters of buyers came from another brand. This shows that being first (at least among big manufacturers, not including smaller companies like Rivian) has advantages. Some people just don’t want to wait for an electric Chevy Silverado or Ram. Also, Ford is now the #1 seller of electric trucks, a title it claimed for the first time only after a short time selling any electric pickup trucks.

Ford Transit van sales are also up, gaining 73.3% over last year this time. While Ford sells many more gas-powered vans than electric ones, it is still beating the competition, combined. The company has sold 3,008 E-transit electric vans so far (through June). This isn’t a huge number, but it’s sixteen times the sales of all other electric van makers, even if you add all of their sales up.

Obviously, this is a brand new market, but it shows that there’s a lot of room to sell electric commercial vehicles, especially now with gasoline topping $5 per gallon.

Overall, Ford is still only second to Tesla for US EV sales. It’s not a close second, but Ford is still getting a lot more electrified action than other brands by selling vehicles customers want and need. While EVs are a lot better than they have been in the past, you still have to give something up to get an EV in 2022 in most cases. The VW ID.4 only has five seats. Chevy’s offerings are still economy hatchbacks.

Ford is now giving people what they want in a vehicle generally. The company has a very normal electric truck that looks and mostly works just like the top-selling vehicle in the US overall. Ford has direct replacements for work vans, and also has a vehicle that’s more like what the other manufacturers are offering (the Mach-E).

Making #2 sales shows that this strategy of adapting EVs to customers instead of adapting customers to EVs works, and Ford could easily climb to compete with Tesla given more time.

Featured image provided by Ford.