Is Ford’s new Mustang Mach E a Real Mustang? [OPINION]

The new Ford Mustang Mach E crossover is another example that car companies are coming out with more new all-electric cars every year, making prices come down as the rate of production increases and technology improves. More working-class people can afford these greener alternatives, but the downsides of adopting a new technology are still forcing the marketing departments of giants in the industry to come up with ways to make their products attractive to consumers.

You already saw it, the words “Mustang” and “crossover” in the same sentence. That is the biggest hurdle Ford has to overcome with their new Tesla Model-X fighter.

Could Ford have picked a better name for the new Mustang Mach-E? They are definitely going to have to pull out the big guns in the advertising and marketing departments to convince those who are loyal to the 116-year-old American car company of the new name.

Obviously diehard Mustang enthusiasts are appalled by the copy-and-paste manner in which Ford decided to brand its new electric car. The Mustang is America’s car. Ford has sold enough Mustangs since 1965 to give at least one to every two people living in the United States right now.  

“It won’t change anything,” said Sales Manager at Heiser Ford Tom Sobieski when asked how Fords new name for their electric crossover will affect traditional Mustang sales. “Mustang enthusiasts are Mustang enthusiasts no matter what.”

There is no doubt Mustang enthusiasts love their cars since they’ve been buying, modifying, racing, evading police with, getting caught by police with and running into crowds with them for more than half a century. These people have made the Mustang an American icon. This pony car has so much influence it was even able to help make Vanilla Ice famous. What a feat.

While it’s gone through many phases itself, Mustang has largely been the same formula since day 1, Ford Probe aside. It will have two doors, a long hood, short rear overhang, the engine will be in the front drive the rear wheels.

Many Mustang enthusiasts picture models powered by earth shaking V8 engines with the obligatory H-pattern gear knob next to the steering wheel when they think of their favorite Mustang models. Owners of the Mustang Mach-E will never experience these traits in their cars, but the creator of the Mustang himself, Lee Iacocca, never envisioned any of the fire-spitting, brake melting powertrains that have graced Mustang chassis’ throughout the decades.

Mustang was designed to be a stylish, sporty and affordable two-door car. That’s it. The Terminator Cobra was not affordable, nor was the original or current GT350.  

Car and Driver says the new Mustang Mach-E shares familiar styling cues with the current Mustang, but it looks to me like Ford figured out what they finally wanted to call their new baby and grafted the front grille of a new Mustang onto a Tesla-like body and then filled in the holes with painted block-off plates.

Mustang Mach-E is not a pony car at all. Even when Ford royally messed up the Mustang the first time with the Mustang II, they at least got the basic pony car formula right.

The hood is not proportionally long compared to the rear overhang and there are more than two doors. Ford’s decision to make the drivetrain layout optional between rear-wheel drive and all-wheel drive is sensible though, considering electric motors and batteries make it possible to add all-wheel drive stability without changing the overall styling of the car.  

People might say that the sloping roofline gives it some of the sporty appearances of the Mustang. That’s some crap. The Mustang didn’t always have a sloping roofline. Some of the most prominent Mustangs to roll off the assembly line had a clear wedge-shape in the back. Sure, the Mustang from “Bullitt” starring Steve McQueen featured a 1968 Mustang Fastback, but can you imagine a Mustang family tree without a foxbody notch or the very genesis of Mustang, the 1964.5 model-year when fastbacks were not available?

Others might argue that the decision to name Ford’s new electric car Mustang will only make the new offering more popular and attractive to customers because Mustang as a brand holds so much influence over people around the world.  

As Sobieski would agree, buyers of traditional Mustangs won’t stop buying them in large numbers because of this branding exercise and Mustang is one the few car model names to ever become an icon around the world.  Surely the new name will only attract new buyers without pushing away current ones.

However, that’s not really the problem here either. Ford’s marketing decision to copy the homework of their half-century-old predecessors and pass it off to the consumer in hopes that they will get another A+ just tarnishes Ford’s brand image and makes them seem lazy.  

Slapping the Mustang name and badge on a product just to make it more appealing to consumers by taking advantage of prominence seems almost condescending towards Ford buyers. It’s not like everyone in the United States knows exactly what a Mustang looks like and probably sees one just about every day of their lives.

Imagine telling someone at a dinner party that you own a Mustang Mach-E. They’re probably going to immediately start thinking about how many cowboy hats you have in your trunk while they look down at your feet to check if you’re wearing spurs and then think about whether or not it’s hard to drive manual in spurs.

Are there really no other good names left to pluck from the pot of world languages and cultures?

If you absolutely have to pull from the Ford scrapbook and tug on the heartstrings of people who remember the Ford’s of old, Falcon fits the bill for the Mach-E quite well.

No matter how you slice it, the name for the new Ford Mustang Mach-E is controversial, but if that’s Ford’s biggest problem with their first attempt at an electric vehicle for the public, they are on the right track.

“If they were going to do that [use the Mustang name for a different model] with any car, they picked the right one because using the Mustang name shows Ford is 100% behind this,” said Sobieski.