May 2025 Mustang Sales Figures

[robvas]

Ford Motor Company sales increased 16 percent to 220,959 units during May 2025 in the United States.

• Ford Mustang sales decreased 3.17 percent to 5,010 units
• Ford Mustang Mach-E sales increased 11.02 percent to 4,724 units

4,229 units behind last year

Sponsored

 

[MCS]

I'm surrprised it was not worse.

With tariffs in full effect across the automotive sector, as well as raw materials for production, I expect the next few quarters are going to look like a dumpster fire.

 

[robvas]

I'm surrprised it was not worse.

With tariffs in full effect across the automotive sector, as well as raw materials for production, I expect the next few quarters are going to look like a dumpster fire.

How much did Mustang prices increase because of tariffs?

 

[MCS]

How much did Mustang prices increase because of tariffs?

Mmmm, it's a little more complicated than just "How much did the price go up".

Think of it like throwing a stone into a pond with ripples that spread out from the point of impact.

• Tariffs in place on assembled/finished products, as well as raw materials, result in increased production costs which are then passed to the consumer so as not to affect the balance sheet which is all Shareholders care about. "Ford" is beholden to the shareholders as much, if not more so, than the CEO and the Board.
  
  
• Since the consumer now has to deal with increased costs of what is, essentially, the same car it was a year ago, a lot of people tend to either buy something else entirely or choose not to buy anything until they are more stable in these "uncertain economic times".
  
  
• Less people purchasing a product means that company doesn't need to maintain as large a workforce to produce said product. Let's say 1 or 2 lines a day instead of 3 full shifts. People get laid off.
  • Less people working for that company show up on a balance sheet as "increased profits" however that is actually a reduction in OpEx. Unfortunately this looks good for a quarter or two until companies start to realizse that the decrease in opex is offset by the decrease in revenue.

• Less people working means less disposable income for individuals or families. People tend to be risk averse and so aren't making large purchases (houses) or discretionary purchases (fun stuff like cars etc).

I'm sure there are other factors involved that I'm unaware of. And the example above is just one company. Now what about people in the Computer and Tech industry? Stuff coming from china is still up in the air for costs. What about other people at dealerships selling german cars? Not many people buying when they have to pay the markup so less people working there too. Scale this out across all kinds of different industries.

 

[AzkAdAsh]

Easy to skew the stats in any direction to achieve your desired outrage. Yes the overall sales numbers are down, but they're also not building as many, so there is a larger percentage being sold by production volume than in previous years. Selling 80% of 25,000 units is more profitable than selling 50% of 100,000 units. Look at the complete report and not just one line before jumping to conclusions.

 

[robvas]

Selling 80% of 25,000 units is more profitable than selling 50% of 100,000 units.

Except they weren't selling 50% of 100,000 units. How is that even relevant?

They are only down 3% this month, which seems like no big deal. But they are down 20% this year compared to last year.

I thought they might see a little jump with the employee pricing special they ran.

 

[Germansheperd]

This is absolutely horrible on all accounts. You have a car that it’s sales were down last year with a new model (almost NEVER happens), still plummeting the next model year and even employee pricing can’t save it.
This will only get worse.

 

[AzkAdAsh]

Mmmm, it's a little more complicated than just "How much did the price go up".

Think of it like throwing a stone into a pond with ripples that spread out from the point of impact.

• Tariffs in place on assembled/finished products, as well as raw materials, result in increased production costs which are then passed to the consumer so as not to affect the balance sheet which is all Shareholders care about. "Ford" is beholden to the shareholders as much, if not more so, than the CEO and the Board.
  
  
• Since the consumer now has to deal with increased costs of what is, essentially, the same car it was a year ago, a lot of people tend to either buy something else entirely or choose not to buy anything until they are more stable in these "uncertain economic times".
  
  
• Less people purchasing a product means that company doesn't need to maintain as large a workforce to produce said product. Let's say 1 or 2 lines a day instead of 3 full shifts. People get laid off.
  • Less people working for that company show up on a balance sheet as "increased profits" however that is actually a reduction in OpEx. Unfortunately this looks good for a quarter or two until companies start to realizse that the decrease in opex is offset by the decrease in revenue.

• Less people working means less disposable income for individuals or families. People tend to be risk averse and so aren't making large purchases (houses) or discretionary purchases (fun stuff like cars etc).

I'm sure there are other factors involved that I'm unaware of. And the example above is just one company. Now what about people in the Computer and Tech industry? Stuff coming from china is still up in the air for costs. What about other people at dealerships selling german cars? Not many people buying when they have to pay the markup so less people working there too. Scale this out across all kinds of different industries.

For today's lesson: Fun with Macroeconomics.

This was a great write up. A lot of people don't know or don't understand how the "little changes" implemented by executive leadership to improve operational excellence can snowball into massive costs when they realize that they overlooked variables like how significant reductions in workforce can reduced touch time and increased takt time. Then the added costs of rehiring and retraining new employees to bring those variables back into balance need to be accounted for and calculated as an operating loss. All the while, these accumulated overhead costs are refactored into product costs to shift the burden to the consumer in order to keep shareholders happy, and company profits in the black. It's never as simple as one line on a sales report.

 

[Germansheperd]

Easy to skew the stats in any direction to achieve your desired outrage. Yes the overall sales numbers are down, but they're also not building as many, so there is a larger percentage being sold by production volume than in previous years. Selling 80% of 25,000 units is more profitable than selling 50% of 100,000 units. Look at the complete report and not just one line before jumping to conclusions.

Except selling 80% of 25,000 units calls for the car to be axed. 20,000 isn’t worth keeping the factory open or the model plain and simple.

 

[AzkAdAsh]

Except selling 80% of 25,000 units calls for the car to be axed. 20,000 isn’t worth keeping the factory open or the model plain and simple.

It was an arbitrary number to assist my point, but your argument here is still wrong. If the vehicle is still turning a large enough profit margin it will keep being produced. That's why I made the point about selling 80% of 25,000 units being better than 50% of 100,000 units.

Let's say that a car is built for a $10,000 production cost and then sold for $20,000 to consumers.

Producing 100,000 cars at $10,000 would cost $1B. If you only sold 50% of them at $20,000 your gross profit would be $1b, leaving a net profit of $0 after production costs.

Producing 25,000 cars at $10,000 would cost $250M. If you sold 80% of them for $20,000 your gross profit would be $400M, leaving a net profit of $150M after production costs.

This example is extremely simplified, I know, but the point is still valid: you don't need to sell more units to be more profitable. You just need to not produce more than you can sell.

Last year and this year are not apple-to-apple comparable because the production values have changed significantly. Unit-to-unit comparison isn't what should be evaluated here. It doesn't provide an actual view of the health of a production line.

 

[AzkAdAsh]

Except they weren't selling 50% of 100,000 units. How is that even relevant?

They are only down 3% this month, which seems like no big deal. But they are down 20% this year compared to last year.

I thought they might see a little jump with the employee pricing special they ran.

See my reply to Germanshephard above.

 

[Germansheperd]

It was an arbitrary number to assist my point, but your argument here is still wrong. If the vehicle is still turning a large enough profit margin it will keep being produced. That's why I made the point about selling 80% of 25,000 units being better than 50% of 100,000 units.

Let's say that a car is built for a $10,000 production cost and then sold for $20,000 to consumers.

Producing 100,000 cars at $10,000 would cost $1B. If you only sold 50% of them at $20,000 your gross profit would be $1b, leaving a net profit of $0 after production costs.

Producing 25,000 cars at $10,000 would cost $250M. If you sold 80% of them for $20,000 your gross profit would be $400M, leaving a net profit of $150M after production costs.

This example is extremely simplified, I know, but the point is still valid: you don't need to sell more units to be more profitable. You just need to not produce more than you can sell.

Last year and this year are not apple-to-apple comparable because the production values have changed significantly. Unit-to-unit comparison isn't what should be evaluated here. It doesn't provide an actual view of the health of a production line.

And you wonder how Ford loses 5 billion a year. Your “economics“ rank up there with the worst business minds today.

 

[Zig]

For today's lesson: Fun with Macroeconomics.

This was a great write up. A lot of people don't know or don't understand how the "little changes" implemented by executive leadership to improve operational excellence can snowball into massive costs when they realize that they overlooked variables like how significant reductions in workforce can reduced touch time and increased takt time. Then the added costs of rehiring and retraining new employees to bring those variables back into balance need to be accounted for and calculated as an operating loss. All the while, these accumulated overhead costs are refactored into product costs to shift the burden to the consumer in order to keep shareholders happy, and company profits in the black. It's never as simple as one line on a sales report.

And never has ever the price deceased due to their improved efficiencies. Get more efficient at doing business simply increases profit and not necessarily reduces cost.

 

[AzkAdAsh]

And never has ever the price deceased due to their improved efficiencies. Get more efficient at doing business simply increases profit and not necessarily reduces cost.

I'm not arguing that. You are correct, but there are also a lot of factors that go into that as well, which is my point. There are a lot of variables that affect the overall value of a product, and the sales numbers are only one of them.

 

[AzkAdAsh]

And you wonder how Ford loses 5 billion a year. Your “economics“ rank up there with the worst business minds today.

Clearly, you have a lot to teach me about how large corporations operate. Please continue.

Sponsored