The Ford Mustang Mach-E electric crossover will soon be headed to a dealership near you. The automaker's first modern dabble into an all-electric platform has grasped the attention of consumers, creating enthusiast-level demand for a utilitarian family ride bearing the nameplate of a sports car—and it's created the perfect storm for dealers to reap the rewards with a little trick called: Additional Dealer Markup (ADM).
Late last year, Ford announced the Mustang Mach-E with an MSRP of $43,895. Early buyers would get the chance to commit to purchasing a special First Edition Mach-E, which is peppered with various luxury bits. The MSRP for the unique variant was announced to be $59,900. Nowadays, however, it appears that folks who didn't pre-order their units will have to fork out some more cash.
As pointed out on Mach-E forums, that's already happening at some Ford dealerships. Some posters report that their local dealership was tacking on between $5,000 and $15,000 for ADM alone—that's as much as 35 percent over the Mach-E's base MSRP.
Ford dealers are no stranger to markup. The concept has been a long-standing pain point for enthusiast cars and is often something complained
forums. In fact, those three little letters are at least partly responsible for killing a number of perfectly good platforms heavily desired by consumers. Remember the Focus RS?
The last thing Ford needs is another car with poor sales performance due to markup, especially when that vehicle happens to be the first long-range platform powered exclusively by batteries.
Then again, there's usually someone willing to pay ADM at the car's launch—without them, we wouldn't have upside-down car loans. And, fortunately, there are also some dealerships out there who are planning to move Mach-Es without marking them up, something that the forum is also keeping track of.
As the cool-effect wears off, dealers will generally concede to slipping sales to avoid issues with allocation or stale inventory. It seems that there's always a trade-off between how early one wants a car, and how much one is willing to pay for it.
Maybe Tesla has the right idea about direct to consumer sales.
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h/t Electrek
