Ford to cops: Crown Vic is out
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Ford to cops: Crown Vic is out
Automaker faces fight as it pushes replacement Taurus
Bryce G. Hoffman / The Detroit News
Dearborn -- In June, Ford Motor Co. invited the heads of some of the nation's largest police fleets to Dearborn to talk about the future of police cars.
For nearly two decades, that market has belonged to Ford's Crown Victoria -- a vehicle that departments from coast to coast have come to respect for its toughness and reliability. Now the Crown Vic is running out of road.
"They told us that 2011 would be the last year they build the Crown Vic," said Larry Tagawa, commander of the Los Angeles Police Department's Motor Transport Division. "But Ford also made a commitment to support departments with a new vehicle."
Then Ford took the assembled police brass out to its test track and handed them the keys to its new Taurus.
Most motorists would be happy to trade in their old Crown Vic for Ford's latest flagship sedan. It is faster, safer and gets better mileage. But the Taurus, like most modern cars, lacks some of the features that have made the Crown Vic so popular with police.
That is one reason why Ford has yet to make a final decision on the Crown Vic's successor. But there are others: new competition -- not only from Ford's cross-town rivals, but also from a new start-up that promises to give police the vehicle of their dreams -- and the Canadian Auto Workers, which is keen to protect thousands of jobs at the plant in St. Thomas, Ontario, where the Crown Vic is produced.
"We've got some big decisions to make, and we're making them," said Jim Farley, head of global sales, marketing and service for Ford. "We have no intention of walking away from our share of that market."
Ever since General Motors Co. stopped production of the Crown Vic's main competitor -- the Chevrolet Caprice -- in 1996, the Crown Vic has been America's police car. It was crushed by the falling rubble of the World Trade Center and transported Paris Hilton to prison.
About 85 percent of the approximately 75,000 police cars sold in the United States each year are Crown Vics.
That is not a huge number of vehicles, and margins on sales to public agencies are notoriously slim, but analysts say it is still a profitable business for Ford.
"The majority of the investment in the Crown Vic was paid off so long ago that they're basically a license to print money," said auto analyst Jim Hall of 2953 Analytics LLP in Birmingham. "They also have zero marketing cost."
While that would not be the case initially with a vehicle like the Taurus, Hall said it would not take too long for it to replace the Crown Vic's contribution to Ford's bottom line.
But Ford Americas President Mark Fields said the police business provides other benefits to Ford that go beyond the bottom line.
"Every municipality has police, so you have Ford product everywhere across the country," Fields said. "It reinforces that Ford is part of the community."
Desirable features
Ford stopped selling Crown Vics to consumers in 2007, but many police officers say they would prefer to keep the outdated sedan. Though long past its prime and easily outrun by vehicles as mundane as the Honda Accord, it nonetheless offers cops some features they can find in few other vehicles -- most of which are considered liabilities, not assets, by civilian motorists.
It is one of the last body-on-frame cars still in production. That makes them tough and easy to repair, but also less safe because they lack crumple zones. The Crown Vic has a column shifter, which frees up the space between the driver and passenger seats for electronics and guns. And it is big enough to accommodate all of the gear a modern cop might need and still has room for two bad guys in the back seat.
Moreover, most of the aftermarket equipment produced for police vehicles -- everything from computers to light bars -- is designed to fit the Crown Vic. When some departments tried to make the switch to Chevrolet Impalas, they found that their communications equipment and computers did not fit in the narrower vehicle.
Then there is rear-wheel drive. The Crown Vic has it, and many competing vehicles do not. Many officers prefer this configuration because it offers more even weight distribution, better traction during acceleration and better handling, at least on dry roads.
Finally, there is familiarity. Most officers know what the Crown Vic will do and how to make it do it without having to think about it.
For cash-strapped agencies like the LAPD, abandoning the Crown Vic would also pose a serious fiscal challenge. It has millions of dollars invested in not only the cars, but also in parts, equipment and training.
Tagawa, commander of the department's Motor Transport Division, and his team have turned servicing the Crown Vic into a science. When a cop rams a bad guy, LAPD mechanics simply unbolt the damaged body panels, slap on new ones that have already been painted with the department's livery and put the car back on the street. They even have their own shop to refurbish busted parts.
"If they do go to a new platform, it will definitely cause us some grief," Tagawa said. "We would have to start all over."
Bryce G. Hoffman / The Detroit News
Dearborn -- In June, Ford Motor Co. invited the heads of some of the nation's largest police fleets to Dearborn to talk about the future of police cars.
For nearly two decades, that market has belonged to Ford's Crown Victoria -- a vehicle that departments from coast to coast have come to respect for its toughness and reliability. Now the Crown Vic is running out of road.
"They told us that 2011 would be the last year they build the Crown Vic," said Larry Tagawa, commander of the Los Angeles Police Department's Motor Transport Division. "But Ford also made a commitment to support departments with a new vehicle."
Then Ford took the assembled police brass out to its test track and handed them the keys to its new Taurus.
Most motorists would be happy to trade in their old Crown Vic for Ford's latest flagship sedan. It is faster, safer and gets better mileage. But the Taurus, like most modern cars, lacks some of the features that have made the Crown Vic so popular with police.
That is one reason why Ford has yet to make a final decision on the Crown Vic's successor. But there are others: new competition -- not only from Ford's cross-town rivals, but also from a new start-up that promises to give police the vehicle of their dreams -- and the Canadian Auto Workers, which is keen to protect thousands of jobs at the plant in St. Thomas, Ontario, where the Crown Vic is produced.
"We've got some big decisions to make, and we're making them," said Jim Farley, head of global sales, marketing and service for Ford. "We have no intention of walking away from our share of that market."
Ever since General Motors Co. stopped production of the Crown Vic's main competitor -- the Chevrolet Caprice -- in 1996, the Crown Vic has been America's police car. It was crushed by the falling rubble of the World Trade Center and transported Paris Hilton to prison.
About 85 percent of the approximately 75,000 police cars sold in the United States each year are Crown Vics.
That is not a huge number of vehicles, and margins on sales to public agencies are notoriously slim, but analysts say it is still a profitable business for Ford.
"The majority of the investment in the Crown Vic was paid off so long ago that they're basically a license to print money," said auto analyst Jim Hall of 2953 Analytics LLP in Birmingham. "They also have zero marketing cost."
While that would not be the case initially with a vehicle like the Taurus, Hall said it would not take too long for it to replace the Crown Vic's contribution to Ford's bottom line.
But Ford Americas President Mark Fields said the police business provides other benefits to Ford that go beyond the bottom line.
"Every municipality has police, so you have Ford product everywhere across the country," Fields said. "It reinforces that Ford is part of the community."
Desirable features
Ford stopped selling Crown Vics to consumers in 2007, but many police officers say they would prefer to keep the outdated sedan. Though long past its prime and easily outrun by vehicles as mundane as the Honda Accord, it nonetheless offers cops some features they can find in few other vehicles -- most of which are considered liabilities, not assets, by civilian motorists.
It is one of the last body-on-frame cars still in production. That makes them tough and easy to repair, but also less safe because they lack crumple zones. The Crown Vic has a column shifter, which frees up the space between the driver and passenger seats for electronics and guns. And it is big enough to accommodate all of the gear a modern cop might need and still has room for two bad guys in the back seat.
Moreover, most of the aftermarket equipment produced for police vehicles -- everything from computers to light bars -- is designed to fit the Crown Vic. When some departments tried to make the switch to Chevrolet Impalas, they found that their communications equipment and computers did not fit in the narrower vehicle.
Then there is rear-wheel drive. The Crown Vic has it, and many competing vehicles do not. Many officers prefer this configuration because it offers more even weight distribution, better traction during acceleration and better handling, at least on dry roads.
Finally, there is familiarity. Most officers know what the Crown Vic will do and how to make it do it without having to think about it.
For cash-strapped agencies like the LAPD, abandoning the Crown Vic would also pose a serious fiscal challenge. It has millions of dollars invested in not only the cars, but also in parts, equipment and training.
Tagawa, commander of the department's Motor Transport Division, and his team have turned servicing the Crown Vic into a science. When a cop rams a bad guy, LAPD mechanics simply unbolt the damaged body panels, slap on new ones that have already been painted with the department's livery and put the car back on the street. They even have their own shop to refurbish busted parts.
"If they do go to a new platform, it will definitely cause us some grief," Tagawa said. "We would have to start all over."
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Registered User
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 9,705
From: Oakland, California
FWIW, Our department tested a couple Dodge Chargers, however the Chief didn't like his. Our latest purchase (a few months ago) was all Crown Vics. I'm curious to see what we end up buying next year. 
Registered User
Joined: Jan 2000
Posts: 10,285
From: Albany, NY
My town uses only Impalas and Tahoes. NY State police are buying a lot more Tahoes, I'd say their fleets around me are 33-40% Tahoe, some 4x4 some 2wd. You can tell by the wheels, 2WD are black, 4x4 are silver. Tahoe also has the exact same EPA MPG rating as a Crown Vic. The City of Albany is moving over to all Chargers.
Registered User
Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 13,713
From: The Golden State
When Ford kills off the Crown Victoria, despite all the effort and talk they are making to law enforcement agencies, they are still walking away from the police car market.
When GM discontinued the B-body, Crown Vic dominated the market by default. GM tried to steer LE to the Chevrolet Impala. With disaterous results at first (cracked unibodies being the biggest early issue). Although there are quite a few agencies that use Impalas today, the number is not even in the same ballpark as the number of 9C1 Capices GM used to sell, and the Crown Victoria wound up singlehandedly with 85+% of the police market. For a time, GM even pushed, of all things, the Tahoe as a competitor to the Crown Vic.
If law enforcement was hot on the idea of FWD cars, there are plenty of cars out there that they would have bought already from Impalas to Intrepids, to Oldsmobiles (even they were in the LE business till they shut down), even Volvo (the CHP ran a couple as normal police cars for evaluation about 10 years ago).
Although Impala emerged as the main CV alternative over the years, Impala never caught on with state highway patrol agencies as a highway cruiser. Issue again, FWD.
The RWD Dodge Charger is currently becoming the car of choice to agencies that aren't already set up to maintain and service almost exclusively Impalas. It also essentially a given that the Charger at this point will become the vehicle pointing the radar gun on the interstate. Given the choice of FWD Taurus, an expensive AWD Ecoboost Taurus, a Carbon which is not only expensive up front, but has no ability whatsoever to recoupe any money after it's service life by selling to the general public and will be expensive to maintain (very low volume + unique parts that aren't shared with a gazillion civilian vehicles = very high parts cost), or going to Chrysler who is more than willing to do some dealing to get you all the RWD, warehouse-full-of-parts-and-5-years-in-production Chargers you need... it doesn'ty take long to realize Ford is making as dumb of a mistake as they would have killing off the Lincoln Towncar last summer.
When GM discontinued the B-body, Crown Vic dominated the market by default. GM tried to steer LE to the Chevrolet Impala. With disaterous results at first (cracked unibodies being the biggest early issue). Although there are quite a few agencies that use Impalas today, the number is not even in the same ballpark as the number of 9C1 Capices GM used to sell, and the Crown Victoria wound up singlehandedly with 85+% of the police market. For a time, GM even pushed, of all things, the Tahoe as a competitor to the Crown Vic.
If law enforcement was hot on the idea of FWD cars, there are plenty of cars out there that they would have bought already from Impalas to Intrepids, to Oldsmobiles (even they were in the LE business till they shut down), even Volvo (the CHP ran a couple as normal police cars for evaluation about 10 years ago).
Although Impala emerged as the main CV alternative over the years, Impala never caught on with state highway patrol agencies as a highway cruiser. Issue again, FWD.
The RWD Dodge Charger is currently becoming the car of choice to agencies that aren't already set up to maintain and service almost exclusively Impalas. It also essentially a given that the Charger at this point will become the vehicle pointing the radar gun on the interstate. Given the choice of FWD Taurus, an expensive AWD Ecoboost Taurus, a Carbon which is not only expensive up front, but has no ability whatsoever to recoupe any money after it's service life by selling to the general public and will be expensive to maintain (very low volume + unique parts that aren't shared with a gazillion civilian vehicles = very high parts cost), or going to Chrysler who is more than willing to do some dealing to get you all the RWD, warehouse-full-of-parts-and-5-years-in-production Chargers you need... it doesn'ty take long to realize Ford is making as dumb of a mistake as they would have killing off the Lincoln Towncar last summer.
Registered User
Joined: Sep 2002
Posts: 9,705
From: Oakland, California
I'm not sure what we paid for our Crown Vics, however I know the new F150s we also purchased we got for a song. (About $15k.) Because of fixed government pricing I can't see how gov't fleet vehicles are very profitable; its the volume of sales that make it worthwhile.
Registered User
Joined: Dec 2005
Posts: 1,502
We all knew this day was coming, I guess, but farewell to the last of the traditional domestic BOF/V8 sedans.
(I wonder how many police departments are going to 'stock up' on 2011 CVs just to avoid switching models for a while.)
(I wonder how many police departments are going to 'stock up' on 2011 CVs just to avoid switching models for a while.)
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Joined: Mar 2004
Posts: 1,503
From: BFE, Ohio
They just recently announced where it was going to be built. I believe production is supposed to start in 2012
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Joined: Dec 2002
Posts: 681
However, I wonder how much more expensive they are initially.
Banned
Joined: Mar 2004
Posts: 3,577
From: Sandy VJJville
Ever seen a Tahoe make a high-speed sharp turn? I'll betcha a Crown Vic would handle that scenario a lot better than a Tahoe.
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Joined: Jul 2005
Posts: 9,507
From: Okemos, MI
I thought this line was interesting:
I had that thought too. Seems likely.
I can't help but wonder just how much worse it would be. A driver trained in that sort of maneuver (e.g. a police officer) should be able to execute it well enough. 
It was crushed by the falling rubble of the World Trade Center and transported Paris Hilton to prison.
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Joined: Mar 2004
Posts: 3,577
From: Sandy VJJville
Physics will eventually take over. A taller, heavier vehicle just can't perform as well as a shorter, lighter one.
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Joined: Mar 2001
Posts: 13,713
From: The Golden State
As far as automobiles go, all the Crown Vic has to do is make enough to keep the factory lights on and it's workers paid. Unlike other vehicles that sell fleet, Ford doesn't need to sell the Vicky to make up lost retail volume. All Ford has to do is put the thing in a small factory somewhere (along with the slow-selling-but-nothing-but-profit Grand Marquis and Lincoln Town Car) with only a few workers, and leave it alone.
So the "printing money" analogy is pretty accurate.
Why would Ford drop it, then?
My guess, although the CV (and it's platform mates) are free money, Ford has finally got itself to the point where it doesn't need to scramble for every possible dime. While the CV is free money, as a car line it doesn't add a ton of money. Although Ford needs to make an effort and spend money to sell a Taurus or Fusion, the amount of money each brings in makes it far more valuable to Ford (and it's limited resources) to move the "Panther" resources to something more profitable.
GM did the same thing when they shut down the profitable B-body production in Texas to make even more profitable Tahoes and Suburbans in the plant instead.
1. Fritz (and others at GM) have an issue with a car showing up in Chevrolet showrooms that save for a Holden/Chevrolet nose, is identical to a car that was (or in some areas, still will be for some time) on sale, sitting in a BPG showrooms.
2. What's the wisdom of selling a car that's so close to being restyled since the Holden VF and WN cars are due within a couple of years (the GTO came on line towards the planned ending of the Monaro's life cycle.. it was extended due to GTO).
My take based on what I know, the timelines involved, and the repositioning of the next Chevrolet Malibu, it currently looks like the next generation Holden full sized car will be imported here and will be positioned above the Malibu.
1. Impala's replacement was moved out a year.
2. When the RWD Impala was killed (by the old GM) it seemed it would be on FWD Espilon.
3. It seems the RWD Impala's styling will end up on the next Malibu, which is also being resized downward slightly.
4. The new date for the Impala replacement coincides with the Holden VF.
5. GM is condensing all Impala-Malibu buyers into the Malibu via marketing and design, leaving an opening above for a lower selling full sized sedan that seems to be aimed (via Impala) to fleet (re: Police) buyers and potential sports sedan buyers as well... potentially along the mid 90s 9C1-Impala SS model.
6. The "new" GM doesn't have to honor the old CAW "exclusive rights" agreements that mandate Impalas (or Regals, or...belatedly...Grand Prixs...come from only from the Oshawa plant).
The idea of importing Commodores from Holden as police cars is still somewhat alive. But Bob Lutz has been publically overruled (IMHO, I suspect it was more to teach a lesson to BL, not because the Caprice plan wasn't strong), so I'm not sure.
I'll leave it at this: the G8-turned-Caprice idea had a iron clad case, was all but set in stone, and would have likely been out within the next 6-8 months.
Last edited by guionM; Aug 28, 2009 at 11:22 PM.
