Making Mach-E A Mustang Was A Master Stroke By Ford

Go ahead, tell me I’m wrong.

Since Ford announced its new electric vehicle would be called the Mustang Mach-E, I’ve read many comments and articles (like this and this) complaining about the company’s choice. Some say it’s an insult to the Mustang name. Others say it’s a brazen marketing ploy. I say it’s a genius move that sets up Ford to become the first automaker with an EV that can truly challenge the dominance of Tesla.

Let’s look at the EV landscape, shall we? You’ve got Tesla selling roughly 77.7 percent of all electric vehicles in the U.S. The Tesla Model 3 alone represents around 60 percent of total EV sales in this country. The rest of the market is left for over a dozen other EVs to divide amongst themselves.

Why have none of these automakers threatened Tesla’s dominance? Two reasons, both of which Ford has shrewdly targeted with the Mustang Mach E.

The first reason is obvious: no EV on the market is as good as a Tesla, particularly the Model 3. They all fall short when comparing range, performance, pricing, and/or technology. Some get close in one measure yet fail to mount a challenge in the others, while others arrive on the scene woefully outgunned in all regards. Love them or hate them, the Teslas have been unbeatable to date on the whole.

Gallery: 2020 Ford Mustang Mach-E

2020 Ford Mustang Mach-E

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2020 Ford Mustang Mach-E






2020 Ford Mustang Mach-E






2020 Ford Mustang Mach-E






2020 Ford Mustang Mach-E






2020 Ford Mustang Mach-E






2020 Ford Mustang Mach-E






2020 Ford Mustang Mach-E

We thought the Porsche Taycan might unseat the seven-year-old Model S. Alas, while it can boast faster charging times and superior handling, its range estimates fall far short of the Model S (which happens to be the king of long-range EVs), its slower in a straight line (and around one famous German race track), it’s smaller with much less space for passengers and cargo, and it’s wildly more expensive, in some cases by as much as $100,000.

The Mustang Mach-E is taking aim, though, at the upcoming Tesla Model Y, a crossover-ish version of the most popular EV in the world, the Model 3 sedan. What Ford has smartly done is make matching the Model Y spec-for-spec a must. The Mustang Mach-E and Model Y both start in the low $40K-range. They both have a maximum range of about 300 miles. Their 0-60 times will both range from around 5.5 seconds for standard models to 3.5 seconds for performance models. And they both have four doors, seat at least five people, and can carry a lot of cargo. Indeed, if you were looking only at their specs on paper, you couldn’t tell these two cars apart.

Even if people are writing articles about how dumb Ford is for calling it the Mustang Mach-E, they’re talking about the car, and that’s all that matters.

The second reason no automaker has legitimately challenged Tesla before is that those brands and/or the EVs they’re selling just aren’t cool. Teslas are cool. Tesla are like Apple-cool circa 5-10 years ago. There’s a little extra something magical about the brand and its products that makes them stand apart from stodgy legacy automakers and their gas-cars-turned-electric.

The Chevy Bolt, Audi e-tron, Jaguar I-Pace, Nissan Leaf, Mercedes-Benz EQC, and the like are all ground-up EVs that somehow still feel like there’s nothing special about them. Yes, they are all technically inferior to the Teslas, but they’re also so much less interesting and exciting.

Enter Ford with a choice before it: Do we launch our electric vehicle with a new model name and identity that has zero impact in the marketplace, or do we something incredibly bold and bank on the coolness factor of the Mustang to help our new EV make an impact on arrival.