It absolutely matters that Ford has lost #2.. it affects morale, it affects image, it affects a lot... it leads to apathy.. and that all affects the employees in a big way.
Ford is making me so mad. Why doesn't the 500/Montego have a bigger engine already? Leaving the large RWD market to Chrysler is idiotic - the Town Car/Crown Vic could have generated money for years, but they neglected them too long. Explorer/Expedition sales have been dropping for a while now - it's like they just freakin realized it. The Focus should be on the Mazda 3 platform already. If Jag had revamped the S even once, and the X was a true G35/IS competitor, the plan would have worked. But as usual Ford comes up with a great idea, and doesn't follow through...or waits for some halo vehicle like the original Explorer to save the company. Well the Edge aint it. It's ugly. Look at the Mazda CX-7/9 - handsome vehicles that can compete on style and technology.. right there in Ford's own stable.. and what do we get? A slab slided box.
INstead of spending billions on an aluminum platform everyone just basically yawns at (XJ), they could have developed a versatile large RWD platform that could have worked in a Jag and a Lincoln or even a Mercury. Nissan/Infiniti and Mercedes/Chrysler have proven you can make a platform work in a premium and a more standard vehicle. But nope, the XJ ( a very fine car) sits on dealer lots with bland style, and the Town car is being killed off... while large luxury cars fly off other brand's lots and Cadillac proves there is room for a large American luxury car.
So now sell Jag? After all that money? When someone else can come in, tweak it and make it work? Stupid. Why not kill Mercury and expand Lincoln?
Just dumb, dumb, dumb!!!
So yeah, falling to #3 makes a BIG difference - because it's just one more example of how Ford is in deep sh*t. And that is sad.
This isnn't sky is falling. The sky has been falling for a long time, and Mark Fields is the latest "we're gonna turn this around" person... yeah, OK, let's hope he does. But Bill was supposed to do that too. Their heads are still not out of the sand.