Ford Snatches Away the Focus Active, Leaving Future Low-end Buyers With the EcoSport and What Else?

Steph Willems
by Steph Willems

U.S. Ford Focus production ended in May, but the automaker planned to import the next-generation Focus Active, a slightly lifted, mildly cladded five-door, in order to have something to sell to entry-level buyers. With the subcompact Fiesta ceasing production early next spring and the Fusion following it a couple of years later, that left very little low-end product for new or returning customers.

Well, scratch a crossoverized Focus off your shopping list. The automaker now says the Focus Active will not arrive on these shores in the latter part of 2019, or any date after that.

After learning this, how many of you are now pricing a three-cylinder, FWD EcoSport? Anyone? Hello?

Ford made the admission during a Friday media conference call. At the heart of the matter is something that was already on the radar when the Blue Oval decided to cull all but one of its passenger car models: tariffs, specifically those placed on Chinese-built vehicles.

According to Automotive News, Ford’s North American president, Kumar Galhotra, doesn’t think it’s a big deal.

“The impact to our future sales is expected to be marginal,” Galhotra said. “Our viewpoint is that, given the tariffs, our costs would be substantially higher. Our resources could be better deployed at this stage.”

Galhotra said the company didn’t expect to sell more than 50,000 Focus Actives annually. To put that figure into perspective, Ford unloaded nearly 30,000 Fiestas in the U.S. through the end of July. Focus volume, so far this year, totals over 84,000. Still, the Active would have been an affordable product Ford could have dangled in front of buyers not interested in warmed-over Indian models with questionable styling and quality. Investors and analysts may have been heartened to see it arrive, too

Recall that CEO Jim Hackett said no customer would be left behind after the car cull. What do existing Fiesta or Focus buyers buy next?

Regardless, money talks, and it seems the 25 percent import tariff imposed on Chinese products this year would have erased much of the model’s profitability. Even if tariffs disappear around the globe, Galhotra claims Ford has no plans to pull a U-turn and bring the Active here.

As for Canadians, they weren’t getting the Active anyway, so expect to hear a bit of chuckling from north of the border today.

[Image: Ford Motor Company]

Steph Willems
Steph Willems

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  • Fusion2010 Fusion2010 on Sep 04, 2018

    No customers left behind... right... Well as the owner of my 3rd Fusion and 2 bought brand new, I will not be buying an Ecosport thing, or an escape or any other of their SUV's. I like my sedan especially with AWD and will NOT buy an Ford SUV just to stay in the Ford family. So count me as a left behind customer and a lost sale for them because of the lack of choice of any non SUV products.

  • Akear Akear on Sep 10, 2018

    America can survive without another Ford POS.

  • CanadaCraig You can just imagine how quickly the tires are going to wear out on a 5,800 lbs AWD 2024 Dodge Charger.
  • Luke42 I tried FSD for a month in December 2022 on my Model Y and wasn’t impressed.The building-blocks were amazing but sum of the all of those amazing parts was about as useful as Honda Sensing in terms of reducing the driver’s workload.I have a list of fixes I need to see in Autopilot before I blow another $200 renting FSD. But I will try it for free for a month.I would love it if FSD v12 lived up to the hype and my mind were changed. But I have no reason to believe I might be wrong at this point, based on the reviews I’ve read so far. [shrug]. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about it once I get to test it.
  • FormerFF We bought three new and one used car last year, so we won't be visiting any showrooms this year unless a meteor hits one of them. Sorry to hear that Mini has terminated the manual transmission, a Mini could be a fun car to drive with a stick.It appears that 2025 is going to see a significant decrease in the number of models that can be had with a stick. The used car we bought is a Mk 7 GTI with a six speed manual, and my younger daughter and I are enjoying it quite a lot. We'll be hanging on to it for many years.
  • Oberkanone Where is the value here? Magna is assembling the vehicles. The IP is not novel. Just buy the IP at bankruptcy stage for next to nothing.
  • Jalop1991 what, no Turbo trim?
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