Jay talks about the new Ford F150 Lightning with President and CEO Jim Farley – and takes him on his first TV ride-along in this exciting EV from Ford that’s a real gamechanger.
Welcome to a special mini edition of jay leno’s garage i’m going to talk with jim farley president and ceo of ford motor company about the new f-150 lightning this is the all-electric truck you can power your home well it’s unbelievable this is going to be fun well congratulations on the success thank you jay the lightning how hard was this to sell to what
They used to call the bean counters i mean people hey look we make a million of these a year with a gasoline engine that’s doing fine yes and then you come in hey why don’t we make it electric don’t i mean how was that a hard yes it was actually uh in fact the first capacity proposal for the f-150 lightning is now at 150 000 units a year was 20. and they’re like i
Was like well why 120 isn’t tested building a factory in austin texas and we’re gonna have 20 000 and they’re like well we won’t make much money on them so we don’t want to sell too many i was like no that that’s not how we need to approach it you guys we have to we’re changing the company so you know we have to build up the scale we have to build an image and we
Need to make it affordable that that was the big tension point is 39 000 right now in defense of them i would say uh i’m playing the other side now well truckers are very conservative they don’t like anything different and they’re correct correct so it was was it tricky to come up with that just go up to the edge and not and not go over it yeah it was you know
I i think ford has such experience with truck owners we’ve been the best-selling truck and vehicle for four decades that we you know we use that experience and it helped us a lot but yes there is an invisible line we were arguing about this truck more than almost any vehicle i’ve seen in my career i can remember when you went from steel to aluminum yes aluminum
I mean that was like i mean lighter just as strong fuel economy is better but that was a hard sell too yeah i think truck customers are very reasoned people like they’re like oh i can get better fuel economy i can tow more i can pay the same thing you know they same with ecoboost everyone’s like well we have to sell v8s we can never sell a twin turbocharged v6
And compete with a v8 that was wrong because got better fuel economy better towing like you said they they want the functionality yeah and like i always say if a new technology succeed it can’t be equal it’s got to be better correct it’s got to be better in every respect when the wankle came out oh it was lighter but it used more fuel and it drank oil so right
Away you’re going to sell a few to engineers and people like yes but to most people why would i want that and you have to time it right too you you can’t be so advanced that most mainstream customers go that’s too far for me right right so what are your three top features if you were selling this to someone in in a minute and a half the three top features would
Be what i think the first thing is what you said which is it does everything an f-150 does and most places does it better that’s number one it’s it’s affordable it’s fast it’s quiet it tows it’s got payload all that stuff that’s the second thing is it could power your house or a job site or you know a tailgate people love the fact that they have energy independence
Like oh i don’t have to worry about that right and the third thing i think is the frunk it’s big it’s easy to use and people really like the idea of you have lock storage in a pickup truck that’s not in the bed or not in the cab and you can use it to have fun you could put a full screen tv in there it’s it’s great yeah and the idea is the house will power your car
When times are good right when times are bad the car will power your house exactly so that’s exactly right it’s a give and take so one hand washes the other pretty cool yeah now jim was kind enough to make me uh the first tv ride along so let’s give it a shot i can’t wait it’ll be a lot of fun it’s amazing how quiet this is isn’t it incredible yeah and because
The acceleration oh man yeah that’s something i think people will be most surprised and attractive that because it be it’s a big vehicle yeah this is like as american as you get in the car business a full-size truck and to electrify this vehicle was not just to make it an electric propulsion but to make it a digital product was it was a big challenge for
The team i give them so much credit because there was a lot of things to solve for our feedback was it’s very smooth because we engineered a independent rear suspension right which was a big investment for us but i think it’s worth it it’s it’s it’s quiet it’s comfortable why don’t we give people more of what they love already like faster acceleration quieter
Inside yeah you know so it’s a hard job trying to predict the market it is because we had to make all these choices four years ago that’s what people don’t understand yeah yeah but the thing that has really captured the imagination is powering your house yes yes i mean that’s such a real world problem yes and it’s a problem that if you’re the homeowner you
Can’t do anything about it right right you can put the stupid propane generator and sit out there and pull on that and this is really a unique moment in time when your car is like a rolling energy yeah power plant well that was a lot of fun jim thank you very much jay yeah i always think of myself as a car guy but now i’m a truck guy because this yeah it’s
Really yeah it really is it’s pretty amazing you know i hope you enjoyed this little uh brief interlude here you can see the full episode this fall on jane ellis garage on cnbc i want to thank jim again for stopping by thank you jay thank you so much keep coming up with new stuff will you this is great yes sir
Transcribed from video
First Ride! Ford F150 Lightning and CEO Interview | Jay Leno's Garage By Jay Leno’s Garage
