Mondeo sedan ‘won’t be missed’

FORD says the discontinuation of the Mondeo sedan will not impact sales of its revised and expanded MB series that was launched in hatch and wagon versions launched last week.

Ford Australia vice president for sales and marketing Beth Donovan said buyers of the previous Mondeo tended to choose the more practical and better-looking five-door hatch.

She refuted comments that Ford Australia had dropped the Mondeo sedan to give the sedan-only FG Falcon large car a better chance.

“Yes, there was discussion about having three Mondeo body styles in this segment,” Mrs Donovan said.

“But we always go back to the customer, and what happened was, when we had a sedan and a hatch, the customer was much more favourable toward the hatch in the styling. And people said they looked too similar.

“So we said that, from a complexity perspective, we don’t need to have two offerings when we can pretty much meet the need of the customer with what we already had with the hatch, so we made that decision (to axe the sedan).

“But we knew we wanted to bring in the Mondeo wagon because we have a very good opportunity for a niche (to exploit).

“Plus you can have too much complexity – where you offer every flavour possible, but you don’t end up with much more than if you targeted your product.

“And we really didn’t look at all on Mondeo sedan’s impact on Falcon sedan when we made that decision, based on medium segment customers and what they were buying.”