Mercury demise should be no big thing

By Bob Bong

Southland Savvy

Back in 1939, Ford decided it needed a brand to bridge the gap between its regular-guy Ford models and its luxury Lincoln models. Voila, Mercury was born.

Trouble was, with some notable exceptions over the years such as the Mercury Cougar XR-7 specialty coupe, most of the time Mercury models were fancified Fords rather than Lincoln wannabes.

Mercury sales have been declining steadily for almost 20 years. So it should come as no surprise that Ford announced this week that it is pulling the plug on Mercury and will stop production of Mercury models in the fourth quarter. Aside from the Grand Marquis (pictured) I couldn't name one of the four Mercury models being sold this year. I had to look them up on Google. The others are Mariner, Milan and Mountaineer.

Sad to say, but I doubt anyone will miss Mercury and certainly not for long. Ford has fiddled with Mercury enough over the years that the brand long ago lost whatever identity it might have had. Most Mercury models for the past 30 years or so were built on Ford platforms and except for minor changes and Mercury nameplates looked much like their Ford counterparts.

The Cougar started out looking like the Mustang and later looked exactly like a Thunderbird. The Bobcat was the same as a Pinto. The Comet first looked like the Fairlane and ended up looking just like a Maverick. The Sable was a Taurus. You get the idea.

The joke used to be that the car came down one assembly line and became a Ford or Mercury depending on what door it emerged from.

The good news is that the demise of Mercury should not lead to dealership closings. I don't know of any Mercury stores that don't also carry Lincolns or Fords and possibly other brands. They should be able to survive.

But it's sad anyway to think of another fabled American auto brand biting the dust.