Why Ford believes its 10.2% July U.S. sales decline was still a ‘good’ month
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DETROIT — Despite reporting a 10.2% decline in its July U.S. vehicle sales Tuesday, Ford Motor is touting the results as a “good sales month.”
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That’s according to Rob Kaffl, Ford’s director of U.S. sales, who said the steep decline from the previous year was “by design,” as the Detroit automaker phased out two vehicles and lowered its daily rental fleet business.
“July was a good sales month for a number of reasons. Our July results reflect a strategy that is working exactly as planned: we’ve intentionally been sunsetting select models and pulled back on low-margin rental fleet volume to make room for an onslaught of new-product introductions by the end of the decade,” Kaffl said in an emailed statement.
Many times, automakers do not cancel products — like Ford has done with its Ford Escape and Lincoln Corsair — until closer to production of newer models. Or they build up inventories to assist sales during the changeover in production for new vehicles.
Kaffl said the company prioritized retail sales of its F-Series pickup trucks as the automaker continues to recover production after two fires last year at a major aluminum supplier. The company said rental sales, which typically are less profitable, were reduced by 96% compared with a year earlier.
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Without such actions, Ford contends its sales would be down less than 1%, slightly better than an estimated 2% fall for the overall industry compared with July 2025.
Planned or not, the decline last month adds to a lackluster sales year for the automaker following the troubled F-Series production as well as a pullback in all-electric vehicle sales. Ford’s sales year to date through July are down 9.7%.
Ford’s U.S. sales through June were already off 9.6% from a year earlier. That compares with an estimated 2.4% sales decline for the overall industry through the first half of the year, which doesn’t include July, according to the most recent data from Cox Automotive’s Kelley Blue Book.
Higher prices and consumer economic concerns are weighing on the overall auto industry, which Cox and other forecasters expect to be off about 3% compared with last year, to 15.8 million new vehicles sold.
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