Ford Super Duty trucks did it again.
The Dearborn automaker shattered a sales record for the month of November after reaching a record-setting pace of 52,518 new orders for the 2023 Super Duty pickup in the last five days of October, when it averaged more than 10,000 trucks a day, according to monthly sales data.
But the November sales report nearly triples that figure.
Ford now has orders for 151,870 Super Duty trucks since the order bank opened Oct. 27, the company revealed Friday.
“The demand is just insane,” said Todd Dunn, president of UAW Local 862, whose members build the vehicle at the Kentucky Truck Plant in Louisville. “A lot of people love those vehicles for farms, hauling. It’s a beast.”
After taking 52,581 orders in October, Ford saw an additional 99,229 orders in November.
“This would be a record,” said Erich Merkle, U.S. sales analyst at Ford. “It’s crazy.”
These are not reservations; these are orders placed through Ford car dealerships on behalf of actual customers who have decided to purchase the vehicle. Technically, it isn’t counted as a sale by Ford until the vehicle is delivered, but the factory is tooled up to fulfill all these orders.
Buyers had to place their orders through dealers rather than online, unlike the Mustang Mach-E or F-150 Lightning.
“We’ve never had this kind of activity,” Merkle told the Free Press. “It’s like taking your food truck to a site and thinking you’ll be there all day, but you’re done after 15 minutes.”
Ford is no stranger to trucks. Thanks to the F-150, it is known as an industry leader in truck manufacturing.
But the Super Duty is a whole different animal.
The Super Duty pickup has a base price of $43,970 (plus $1,795 in destination fees) that often climbs past $90,000, depending on amenities selected by the buyer. Options include type of engine, wheels, tires, cloth or leather interior, display screen size and massaging seats.
While all F-Series trucks are the backbone of Ford, the Super Duty brings in super dollars.
From January through November this year, Super Duty production averaged approximately 26,000 to 27,000 vehicles per month, according to a news release posted Friday on Ford’s investor affairs website.
Merkle noted that the orders taken in just over one month represent five to six months of production.
And the company is working to adjust builds on all production lines to get the customers these Super Duty trucks as quickly as possible, Dunn told the Free Press.
Factory workers “come to work, get ‘er done, go home to sleep and start all over again,” he said.
The Super Duty is used in various commercial industries, including utility companies, emergency response, mining and quarry, forestry and construction. These rugged Super Duty trucks are built for really heavy towing, hauling, plowing, and off-road driving for work.
During America’s Thanksgiving Parade in Detroit, Ford engineers drove the Super Duty truck and noticed comments from onlookers about new design features. Generating the most buzz, engineer Peter Bejin said that day, was the step that allows people to access the truck bed without lowering the tailgate.
Marick Masters, a business professor at Wayne State University, said Ford has a high-stakes interest in maintaining the appeal of the Super Duty that goes beyond just happy customers who want a pickup with a traditional internal combustion engine that pulls enormous loads of weight.
These are the products that fund the future at Ford in electrification and technology research, he said.
“This bodes well for the company’s future,” Masters said. “The sheer volume of orders is particularly surprising. It’s very important for the company to have high levels of sales in these profitable areas.”
Also Friday, Ford released November sales data that showed the company is the best-selling brand and manufacturer of electric vehicles after Tesla:
- F-150 Lightning sold 2,062 trucks in November — and 13,258 to date.
- E-Transit vans sold 654 for the month and 5,811 year-to-date, dominating the electric van segment.
- Mach-E sold 3,539 SUVs, with global production topping 150,000.
The 2023 Ford F-Series Super Duty trucks, which go on sale early next year, are built by UAW members at Kentucky Truck as well as the Ohio Assembly Plant in Avon Lake.
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Contact Phoebe Wall Howard: 313-618-1034 or phoward@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @phoebesaid.