Luxury automakers are moving up their annual year-end discounts earlier in 2012 in a bid to outsell one another in the U.S., said Mark Fields, Ford Motor Co.’s president of the Americas.
“You’re seeing some of the luxury brands actually pushing even earlier now for what used to start Dec. 1,” Fields told reporters Thursday as the automaker celebrated the opening of a new design studio for its Lincoln premium brand near its Dearborn, Mich., headquarters. “We’re seeing more activity there.”
BMW AG is shifting allocation of thousands of its cars to the U.S. and Asia this year and offering lease customers the chance to skip payments on their current vehicles to buy new models as it loses ground to fellow German automaker Daimler AG. Daimler’s Mercedes-Benz brand has delivered 5,221 more vehicles this year through September after trailing BMW last year.
BMW and Mercedes passed Toyota Motor Corp.’s Lexus in 2011 after that brand led in the U.S. for 11 consecutive years.
Ford faces what Fields called a “daunting task” in rebuilding Lincoln, which has fallen behind BMW, Mercedes, Lexus and Volkswagen AG’s Audi in the U.S. and globally. A successful luxury brand “is essential for us to be a global and successful enterprise,” he said.
Fields declined to comment on whether Ford’s board is preparing to promote him to chief operating officer as part of a plan to have him eventually succeed Chief Executive Officer Alan Mulally. The promotion is expected this year, one person familiar with the situation has said.
“I am very focused on just contributing as much as I can to the profitable growth of Ford,” Fields, 51, told reporters.
