#Lincoln

On Friday, our intrepid Managing Ed brought us a yaffle of photos from the L.A. Auto Show, wearing out the soles of his shoes in the process. From Ascent to Wrangler, there was plenty of new metal on display in the City of Angels.

What caught your eye at the show?

Browsing on The Facebook recently presented me with an astonishing feat of custom bodywork, one I felt compelled to share in a very special Custom Edition Picture Time Edition of Custom.

It’s a one-off modification of a 2006 Lincoln Town Car, and you need to see it.

Another day, another chance for this author to write about the Lincoln brand. This time, we learn of the company looking outside the WPP ad agency for help marketing its new Lincolns.

The Glass House is not ditching its longtime partner. Instead, it’s turning to the Wasserman Media Group and their Laundry Service ad shop based in New York to handle social media for a new campaign for the redesigned 2018 Lincoln Navigator SUV.

The tens of readers who follow my bleatings here on TTAC (Hi, Dad!) may recall my fondness for the Lincoln brand. Having spent my own hard-earned Canadian dollars on two of them, plus encouraging other family members to do the same, I would be lying if I said I’m not rooting for the brand to once again plant its feet firmly in the minds of its target demographic.

For me, the disarmament campaign started when Lincoln began abandoning real names in favor of an alphanumeric (minus the numeric) naming scheme. Turns out, after reading a revealing Automotive News interview with Lincoln’s marketing chief, I’m not the only one who disliked it.

As we learned yesterday, the midsize Lincoln MKX will soon be no more, replaced by a vehicle that’s very similar in appearance but definitely not in name. Nautilus, the Jules Verne-inspired moniker that graces the crossover’s flanks starting next summer, is a signal that real names are back, baby. Take note, rival automakers.

Besides freeing the former MKX from the abyss of alphanumeric naming hell, the arrival of Nautilus means significant powertrain changes and a design detour — pushing Lincoln’s best-selling model ever so slightly further upscale while adding a dose of fuel savings.

A few days ago, official photos surfaced of the next-generation Lincoln MKC, showing a crossover that had ditched its krill-hungry maw in favor of a new grille in line with treatments found on the Continental and Navigator. Lincoln announced that the refreshed MKC will be shown this week in L.A.

Yesterday, Lincoln dropped a quick teaser video on Twitter, showing several seconds of pavement followed by the lower half of a chrome wheel. Promising a vehicle that will “make a lasting impression,” the video leaves us pondering a question: If Lincoln has officially shown us the 2019 MKC, what else could it possibly have in store?

As part of its effort to align all of its products under the same general styling umbrella, Lincoln’s smallest crossover, the MKC, undergoes a significant facelift for 2019. Well, significant when viewed from a head-on angle.

The mid-cycle refresh, available to customers next summer, sees the baby Lincoln’s split waterfall grille jettisoned in favor of a corporate, Continental-esque opening (though the smaller MKZ sedan’s nose seems a direct match). Improvements in safety equipment round out the updated package.

Despite the addition of a corporate split grill a few years ago, there’s no denying Lincoln’s outgoing Navigator is one old piece of kit. As such, the glitzy premiere of the new-for- 2018 Navigator heralded greater full-size Lincoln SUV sales not just from new buyers, but returning ones.

Having seen what Dearborn was up to, it seems some inhabitants of the Renaissance Center decided to try and spoil Lincoln’s fun. If you’re the owner of a 1999 or newer Lincoln vehicle who’s thinking of maybe getting into a new Navigator, Cadillac would like you to know there’s 5,000 smackeroos waiting for you on the hood of your nearest Escalade.

The heart of a K-Car, the styling of a LeBaron, the build quality of an Italian, and the price of a Corvette. Just one car in the history of the world managed to combine all these virtues together into a gelatinous, custard-like vehicle.

And our Rare Ride today just happens to have a similar color, too. Come have a look at the majestic Chrysler TC, by Maserati (not really).

If the Detroit Three want to keep wind in their sales sails, it sure won’t happen on the strength of traditional passenger cars.

Several brands from Ford Motor Company, General Motors, and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles posted U.S. sales declines in October 2017, all thanks to the slipping popularity of regular cars. In many cases, the continued strength of the crossover/SUV/truck market wasn’t enough to tip the scales back in the automakers’ favor.

Utility vehicles are nothing new at Lincoln, but where there was once a single heritage-diminishing (but lucrative) oddity built to give Cadillac’s Escalade a run for its money, there now sits three models with rear liftgates. A fourth looms.

Now back from a near-death experience, Lincoln isn’t alone in requiring a lineup stocked with high-riding vehicles. Sticking with tradition bodystyles is akin to suicide these days. We can eyeball the resurrected Continental and debate whether Lincoln went far enough, style-wise, in rekindling the famous nameplate, but the reality is the brand sells far more utilities than cars, hands down, and will continue doing so. Buyers overwhelmingly want SUVs, and woe is the automaker that remains mired in the past.

Even the ancient Navigator, poised for a long-overdue revamp for the 2018 model year, sold just 148 fewer units than the Continental in September.

Leading the Lincoln sales pack is the midsize MKX, now sporting an identity comfortably divorced from its Ford Edge underpinnings. Fully redesigned for the 2016 model year, the SUV, which reportedly awaits a Continental-esque front end treatment and a transmission swap sometime in 2018, ended last year with its best sales showing since 2007. In doing so, it knocked the MKZ sedan down to the silver medalist podium.

There’s an abundance of power. There’s butt-coddling opulence. But is there enough refinement and cross-generational appeal to lure buyers back from the Germans and Japanese?

Cadillac enjoys some of the highest average transaction prices among premium auto brands operating in the United States. After years of Lincoln MKS disappointment, the new Lincoln Continental actually looks the part. Globally, Cadillac sales are rising month after month after month. In the U.S., Lincoln is rare among auto brands in a declining auto industry in 2017: sales at Ford’s upmarket brand have risen 3 percent this year.

Indeed, while discussing the apparent appeal of the Tesla brand last week, Jack Baruth said, “You might say that General Motors and Ford are going to build better, more reliable, and more thoroughly developed electric cars than Tesla can, and you’re probably right.”

“But the world doesn’t want an electric Cadillac or Lincoln,” Jack accurately points out, “for the same reasons it doesn’t want gasoline-powered Cadillacs or Lincolns.”

Regardless of how you grade the momentum of Cadillac and Lincoln, they are mere blips in the global luxury automobile market and remain rather inconsequential players in their U.S. home market, as well. Will that change in your lifetime?

If you’ve been reading me for a while, you know that I’m passionate about obtaining products, goods, and services that are Made In The USA. Which is not to say that I never buy anything from low-cost countries where workplace safety and environmental regulations aren’t up to snuff — to my eternal sorrow, both of my laptops are Chinese, and as many of you have reminded me, the new Silverado LTZ in my driveway was Hecho en Mexico — but in general I will pay a considerable cost in both time and money for an American or at least Western product.

It’s possible, of course, that I’m just doing it to be a total snob. Nowadays, Made In America tends to imply prestige and cost, whether we’re talking SK Tools, Alden boots, or any number of high-end, hand-made bicycles. If you’re walking down the street and everything on or about your person is USA-made, chances are you’ve spent some real money. That’s also true for many industrial goods, certain building supplies, and nearly anything with wings. There’s just one complex product where the American flag logo is attached to a mandatory discount in the minds of most consumers.

No prize for figuring out what that is…

It’s getting to the point that if you’re not a premium automaker promising some sort of brand-wide electric propulsion revolution, you’re not a premium automaker. Volvo has announced it’s going all-electrified (not necessarily electric) in short order. Maserati and Aston Martin are headed in a similar direction.

Is Lincoln the next luxury brand to ditch gas-only powertrains?

Not quite, but Ford’s luxury arm is planning on endowing every model in its lineup with an available hybrid powertrain, according to three sources who spoke to Reuters. It’s a plan very similar to the one Jaguar Land Rover announced just yesterday. While the completion date for Lincoln’s lineup electrification is 2022, the brand might not stop at just hybrids and plug-ins.