The ancient Phoenix, a bird of myth and legend. It was an all powerful bird that dominated the skies until it turned old. Then it died in fire, only to be reborn anew.
There is another bird that is close to this. It didn’t die in fire, it died in decay. However, that doesn’t mean it can’t come back in fire, reborn. Let me explain.
Detroit, 1950’s, a glorious time! Car Culture was alive and new. Big beautiful powerful cars flew off the assembly lines. People clamored to the dealerships to have a fabulous piece of Detroit. In that time, though, a car emerged onto the scene, a scary car. A horrible car. A dismal, miserable car. A small car. Was it a big powerful V8? Nope, it had two whole cylinders removed. Was it strong durable American steel? Nope. Was it fast? Barely. All the ingredients for failure.
What complete imbecile would buy this monstrosity? Who would DARE to park this thing in their driveway. Who would give up their big beautiful car for this fiberglass weakling? Who would own……a “Corvette”?
Well, Ford saw this, and they saw an opening. “Hmmmm….” Said their designers, “How easy is it to beat this thing in sales?” Small, fine. However, strong steel and a juicy V8, and park it in showrooms.” And so they did.
The Ford Thunderbird was born.
Sales were brisk. The car was a hit. That miserable piece of &$%^@(%$* “Corvette” will wither up and die and never be heard from again. 3 years of glorious TBirds, the “Baby Birds” as they were nicknamed due to their size. 3 years of joy did we Americans have.
You might momentarily ask, “Why are you talking about a car that is no longer around?” Two reasons, the first I will share now. I had one. Yep, I had a Baby Bird, the 1955 Thunderbird. My father, God rest his soul, loved the car and bought it new. First owner and only owner. He drove it consistently, loving it, until 1973, when it was showing signs of age. However, his wonderful love of cars gave him a darn bright idea: Tuck the car away in a garage, save it for my son when he turns 16. It will be cheaper to fix this car than to buy him a new car, and he will learn to appreciate car culture in the same way. He was correct on the latter.
I have been driving since I was 10. From sitting in my father’s lap, to riding the tranny hump, to driving up and down our home street, I logged many many miles before I was 15 and could get my Learner’s Permit. We then pulled the car out from the garage to fix up. What a great project! Father and son, working on the car. We did many things together on that car. I will state that the “Cheaper than buying a new car…”, well, that didn’t go as planned. Some learning experiences, some price gouging, a case where a body shop owner chased us with a tire iron until the police showed up, we definitely got an education on restoring cars. However, it was worth it. That car is technically my first born. Driving that car gave me the most incredible feeling you could imagine. The smell, the sound, the power…….sorry, need a moment…Ok, a little longer….and now a cigarette…..ok, that’s better, now I need a nap.
And now, back to the main story… in 1958 Ford made its very profitable mistake. Yes, profitable… yes, mistake. Profitable part was that they noticed that with the now-named “Baby Boomers” needing family cars, Ford wanted to tap into that market. They needed a bigger car, a more luxurious car, a “kinder, gentler” car. Did they do it? Yup. The car was a hit, it had great sales, it was what the public wanted. Profits continued to roll in.
Their mistake? They named it “Thunderbird”. Instead of leaving the TBird alone and making an entirely new model of car, they transformed the Thunderbird. Nowadays, car companies have tons of models. BMW has about 1,342 different models on their website to choose from. All Ford had to do was to come up with a new name for the new model, and leave the TBird alone to continue fulfilling its niche. Nope, Ford made THE “mistake”.
The days of sport, the days of legend making were over. Year after year, the kinder gentler Thunderbird rolled off the lines, lumbered in the streets, and posed absolutely zero challenge to that hideous fiberglass ugly monstrosity known as a “Corvette”. In the 1970’s, they made it even more embarrassing with making it 150 ft long and giving it enough horsepower to pull a child’s wagon. Oh, the shame. Looking at Wikipedia at the various 1970’s models, the shame is just too much. Quite frankly, how did any American car company survive that time? I can’t believe how disgracefully ugly these cars were. Would you dare own a “Mustang II”?
The 1980’s rolled around. Ford decided to try to make it better. They smoothed it out, made it a little more modern, but still kept its roots firm…..in aching boredom. As you know, however, it still didn’t change the perception. It still was a car that barely looked good at the supermarket parking lot. In 1997, the Thunderbird was cancelled, the band broke up, the house of cards fell, dogs and cats started living together, it was the end of a miserable era.
All was lost.
But wait. A flicker of light came in the 2000’s. Someone at Ford actually had an idea….”Let’s resurrect the Thunderbird”. I remember the day my brother called me up and said “A new car is coming out, and I bet you would sell your current car just to get it”. Well, it sounded great. A brand new Thunderbird. Well, ok, let’s consider this for a moment. Ford will learn from its mistakes, it will make a great new car. It will blow the Corvette away. It will be a groundbreaking new flagship that will light Ford on fire and to bring people back into the showrooms. It will be revolutionary. It will be sexy! It will go like a bat out of hell. It will be………ABYSSMAL!!!!
My God, what a monumental disaster! It was ugly, slow, had all the wrong curves, wrong shape, it even was sloped completely opposite of having any downforce. Every single part of the car was ugly. Then, they had a sticker of $50,000 for it! In modern money, that would be about $80,000 now. The brand new 2017 Corvette starts WAY below that, let alone back then. Who the heck at Ford said “Let’s overcharge for a brand new car that is a rewarming of a dismal failure car?”
Then, to add insult to injury, I remember the commercial they played on TV. The Thunderbird pulls up to a traffic light in the middle of the desert. A guy in his 30’s dressed as if he was in his 60’s is driving. A Lamborghini pulls up next to him. Young guy and young girl. He wants to race, so he kicks his girl out of the Lambo to do the scarf waving to start the race. She waves, the Lambo takes off in a cloud of billowing tire smoke and is loooooooooooooooooooong gone by the time the smoke rolls away. The TBird is just sitting there. The guy tells the girl to get in, and they drive in the opposite direction.
Ford built a big, boring, slow, ugly car that can’t handle competition, they compare it to a Lambo and let it lose, and then say that the hot chick goes home with the loser. Ford, seriously, one big fat “WTF” goes to almost every department at Ford that was responsible for this horrible car and its horrible marketing.
So now, we get to the SECOND reason I am talking about the TBird. For years and years, we have had the Corvette. Fiberglass, unwieldy, filled with plastic, and God help you if you even run over someone’s sneeze it would fishtail into a nightmarish spin. Yet, it is a true classic that people pay lots and lots of money for. The last ZR1 was basically a rental car full of plastic with a big engine, hideous interior, and of course a six figure price tag. Its competition from Dodge was actually better, and that is from the company that espoused Al Bundy (kids, if you don’t know who Al Bundy is, ask your Mom). The brand new Z06 and ZR1 Corvette is the FIRST Corvette that actually isn’t completely hideous. However, looking at the ZR1, it looks like it would be competition for the Top Gear review done on the Gumpert. Their quote “From every angle, it is ugly”.
Of the “Big Three” American automakers, each with a flagship, GM has the Corvette, Dodge has the Viper, and Ford has…….. zzzzzzzzz…… sorry, I fell asleep thinking about Ford…. they have the “Taurus”. One could claim the new GT40, but that is a specialty car in its own exotic class. Limited production, ridiculous high price tag. So, it is not the “flagship”.
Ford, again, WTF?!? Can Ford not smell the opportunity? With Ford increasing its performance division, with Ford bumping up the Mustang to 660hp and making the pony a beast, why not bring back the stallion? Where is the big glorious race horse, the one that will eat the track up? Americans still clamor for power. Screw gas prices, we don’t care if it hits $8/gallon, we will have our Ferraris and Lambo’s and anything else that will make us replace rear tires every 5000 miles.
Ford, what happened? As Heath Ledger’s “Joker” asked the Mob, “What happened, did you lose your balls?” Did Mommy punish you for something? Did you “shoot your eye out?” Ford…….why are you sitting on your kiesters and not stepping up to the flagship plate?
If I could work as a car designer, to truly make a car from scratch, from design to engine to seat to side mirrors to every single knob on the car, I would design every last inch of it. I already have most of it in my head. The car I would make…..3 guesses…..ah, you already got it on the first try, good….THE THUNDERBIRD! The details I have in my head, well, I could write 20 pages on every last bit I have rolling around in my skull. I won’t drone on about that.
Ford, make your true flagship. Make it the same way you did when you designed in 1954, make it everything the same in flagship sportiness, but make it entirely different from the Corvette and the Viper. Create a vision, assemble a department filled with the best and brightest, empower them to build a true dream. American car companies would love to have a car that compares with the Europeans. M3, Audi R8, Alfa Romeo Giuglia, all these crazy dream cars, let alone having a car that is named after a keyboard key (F12). Heck, even the “Rental Car of Bad Dreams” company of Nissan has the GTR and that car is a beast. Ford, you are being whipped by the car company that makes the cars that people most rent to beat on and put out their cigarettes on the seat because they did purchase the Loss/Damage Waiver when they got the car at the airport.
You did it before, now its time to do it again. With both the Corvette and the Viper having glaring errors in design, you have a wide open opportunity to repeat 1955.
Ford lost its Thunder……bird once. Time to regain their thunder. Thunderbird!
Mark Fields, feel free to email me. I’ll be waiting to talk.